2024 Depth Charts: Left-Handed Starters

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss

Photo Credit: K.A. Fulmore | Richmond Flying Squirrels

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So far in this year’s Depth Charts series, we’ve covered:

• 2b

• RHP - Starters

• Corner Outfielders

• Catchers

• Center Fielders

Now would seem to be a great time to downshift into my Christmas break by focusing on the lightest — though in some ways, the most important — Depth Chart of the series. It’s sort of a weird thing, handedness, when you think about it. Most of us go willy nilly through our lives, grabbing at plates or pens or doorhandles with our dominant hands with nary a thought as to what being right- or left-handed might say or mean about us. Being a lefty has no influence on one’s skills as a teacher or plumber, a dentist or economist (though it does seem to have some sort of bizarre correlation with being elected President of the United States).

Even in the world of sports, it’s not always an issue of any importance — it’s not particularly notable, for instance, that James Harden shoots with his left hand, nor Chris Mullin or Manu Ginóbili before him. But in baseball, lordy, what a difference it makes whether infants grab for the ball rolled before them with their left hand rather than their right.

In baseball — where seeing pitches coming from in front of you rather than from behind you — a chain of impact is created from players’ handedness. Because there are far more right-handers in society than left-, there are far more right-handed pitchers. Because left-handed hitters are markedly better than their right-handed counterparts at hitting off right-handers, the best and most threatening hitters in the game frequently hit from the left-side. Because so many threatening hitters are left-handed, teams need to counteract their effect with same-side pitchers, which, unlike left-handed hitters, are almost universally natural dominant lefties, and thus coming from a selection pool of only about 10% of the population.

There’s an old joke in baseball that sums this quandary up nicely:

Q: Why do you never see any left-handed catchers
A: Because they’re on the mound

Or perhaps you like this one better: “if you’re left-handed and breathing, there’s a job for you in this game.”

It’s a skillset in this game in which demand always outstrips the supply. But lefties have an advantage that helps them overcome their limited numbers. Left-handers tend to succeed better with lesser stuff. They can produce better results even while throwing less hard. They also tend to have greater platoon advantage against their poor, same-sided hitters than do right-handers. There has been some research done suggesting this is the result of hitters of both hands seeing so few lefties in their youth, when the brain is at its most plastic, and busy mapping out internal models and programs that professional hitters will later put to great use.

But whatever the exact cause, we know one thing for sure: a baseball executive with a prized left-hander has one of the most valuable commodities in this game. And while they might not exactly say “you’ll have to pry my lefty from my cold, dead hands” when talking trades, the sentiment is frequently implied — if only to gain more leverage in the discussions.

So what joy must Farhan and Pete feel when surveying their own internal LHP Depth Charts, where they can find not just one prized lefty, but many. Let’s end our year with one of the real strengths of the Giants’ farm system, the port-siders.