http://www.psychedonline.com/2003/06/06/feature-eye-hand-dominance-baseball-performance/

I found this very interesting because I am left eye dominant and right handed. I only realized how important this fact was once I decided to try my hand at clay shooting a couple of years ago. With a pistol, it also comes into play, but I have always just closed my left eye to aim (same with scoped rifles). In the past, the only shotgun shooting I had done was at cans on the ground.

Anyways, shutting your left eye doesn't work when shooting clays unless they are coming from your right side.

Well, what this study shows (link above) is that being left eye dominant and right handed is actually a plus in baseball for hitters (and a negative for pitchers). Personally, I was pretty good at both so I am not sure what to think exactly.

Anyone here ever paid attention to this when it comes to helping your kids out or in any other way?

Goose, man, I can't tell you how much I appreciate this link. I have a 8 year old grandson that has this. I have been concerned about it, because he struggles to bat, and I haven't had any information on the left eye dominance. When we go out to target shoot, he does what you do. I am going to pass this on to his coach/dad for him to see. Once again, thanks for the information.

Gig'em, Ole Army Class of '70

I tried switch hitting my first year of college. I could see the ball well from the left side, simply couldn't hit anything but popups. Everything looked like a beach ball from the left side. I later figured it was a dominance thing.

Luckily I had a good coach when I took up clay target shooting and he taught us this the very first day we went out to shoot clays. He would switch a left eye dominant, right handed shooter to a left handed shooter immediately because there is no way you can compete if you mess this up early. It makes such a huge difference.

Never thought about how this affects baseball, that is an interesting finding though

I am left eye dominant but play sports right handed, except shooting sports where I shoot left. I am left handed, btw.

Interesting denied. I wonder how this affects shooting in basketball? I have yet to Google it, but I was actually a very good free throw shooter (I was 75-80% my 2.5 years on varsity in basketball and also shot ~38-42% from 3pt).

By the way, I found 4 or 5 websites which talked about this in baseball. One actually said the opposite of the above website I am not 100% sure that the above is true. There was one that said the opposite was true, several that confirmed this website, and another that claimed it didn't matter.

I am right handed, but my left eye is stronger (although both are fairly blind). I learned this when I took riflery at A&M, and re-trained myself to shoot left-handed. Once I got over the strangeness of it, I became a better shot. I would still fire a pistol right-handed, of course, since there's really no point to aiming it.

Unless of course you are shooting at coke cans 20 yards away

Get this:

I'm left handed but right eye dominant (always batted right handed naturally)

My 7 year old son is right handed but insists on batting left handed.

I guess tennis would come naturally?

His backhand would probably come naturally. But the forehand would only be natural if he used a two-hand forehand, which is a very unusual grip and you would probably not be able to find him an instructor/coach who could develop it.

Blake Stouffer advised my son to bat left handed since he is right eye dominant, thus getting the dominant eye with no disrupted view or distraction facing the pitcher.




Love and serve God by loving and serving others.

I don't think you can ever go wrong letting a kid learn to bat left handed. More often than not it will be an advantage simply because the majority of pitchers they face will be right handed. If there is truth to the above article, then that is another benefit for a right handed kid to learn to bat left handed.

eye docs have long known this (batters with "cross-dominance" are at an advantage at the plate). i tell someone this fact weekly.

i kind of figured it out on my own because i am right eye dominant and i always had trouble pulling the ball from the right side. once i taught myself to hit from the left side i finally knew what it felt like to really see the ball "out in front". i wish i would have figured that out as a little kid.

Great article. I grew up right-handed throwing and right-handed hitting. Took tennis lessons at some point around 9 years old.

And then around 10 starting hitting left-handed. It was an easy transition because batting left-handed is a lot like hitting a tennis backhand (for a natural right-handed person).

Batting left-handed just seems to me like a smoother hitting stroke. Easier to get the arms extended.

same with me W