I've been watching baseball for a long time, but I've never understood...

Question

...why pitchers can't hit. Pitchers are often the best athletes on the diamond, and so in high school they are among the best hitters. Somewhere in college/minors, though, pitchers seem to lose their hitting ability. It seems illogical that becoming a better pitcher makes you a worse hitter, as if you can't have both.

Decent hitting pitchers like Micah Owings, Carlos Zambrano, and CC Sabathia are huge advantages for their teams. Why don't more organizations focus on developing athletic pitchers who can hit at least league average? Pitchers need strong legs to push off the rubber, so why aren't more pitchers fast baserunners?

Answer 1

Yes they are right, the pitchers really dont focus on anything but there pitching, and also I believe that they dont want to loose the pitcher to get injured while up to bat and have them sit out for the game. They need to spend that time warming upp while the team bats.  

Answer 2

its just cuz they dont spend as much time in the cages as they do practicing pitching

Answer 3

Managers and GM's do not want pitchers to hit in the cage too often because of the posibility of getting blisters or injured and as we have noticed all year, both can keep a pitcher out for a long time.  The pitchers who are good at hitting get their own work in on their own time.  

Answer 4

They don't spend as much time in the batting cage i guess.

I think they worry more on their pitching than how "clutch" they can be as a hitter.

Answer 5

It's called specialization.  The MLB pitchers can still hit better than most of us, it's just that you're comparing their hitting against the best hitters in the world.  The same could be said about some of the hitters.  They were probably awesome pitchers in high school but nobody's asking "why hitters can't pitch?".  Of course there are exceptions.  Owings, Zambrano, and Sabathia that you mentioned are good hitting pitchers while John Olerud, Mark McGwire and Rick Ankiel are good pitching fielders.

Answer 6

In high school, pitchers knew how to hit but since the minor leagues and college have DH, pitchers work on their pitching more than their hitting.  When they go to the major league level, most pitchers struggle at hitting because their batting eye is way off and major league pitching is already tough to hit but most pitchers have the hitting of that to a high school student, they don't size up to major league pitching.  

Answer 7

They don't hit in the minors, which uses the DH, so they go years from high school (or college) to the majors without hitting regularly. And, hitting well at the big league level is a day-to-day commitment: doing drillwork, taking BP, studying scouting reports on other pitchers, etc. With the work they have to do to get ready for their next start, they just don't have the time to put in to hit well. Most of the better hitting pitchers in the league are just exceptional all-around athletes, they are good at pretty much everything they try.

Answer 8

Pitchers usually can't hit because they do not work on hitting. The majority of their practice goes into pitching.  

Answer 9

Good hitters practice hours a day and hit against major league pitchers every game. Not just once every five days.

Answer 10

They don't work on it.  They only have so much time as does the team.  They might have been decent hitters in high school, but hitting in the majors is pretty hard.

Answer 11

idk either but i do no that the Rays have some amazing bats

Edwin Jackson can hit a ball 500 feet! I saw him in batting practice. He hit the upper deck at the trop and thats saying something.  

Answer 12

this is just a guess, but i think it might be the reason.

most pitchers are amazing athletes, you're right. my highschool had a decent baseball team (my college doesn't) and the pitchers all played positions on their off days just to get their bats in the lineup. i would guess this is the case a lot of times. however, pitchers don't get to practice hitting nearly as much as position players, becuase they have to practice pitching. this doesn't seem to matter in lower level baseball, but this could be the reason for good hitting pitchers in the majors to be a rarity. once they get to the collegiate/minors level, their natural ability to hit is superceded by their inability to practice and they just aren't as successful.

if this is true, imagine if micah owings just learned to play left field and practiced hitting all day.