The Southpaw: Difference between revisions

In baseball, left-handed players have a [http://www.newsweek.com/id/146842 big advantage] over their right-handed competitors. Especially when batting against a right handed pitcher. Left-handed pitchers are able to counter this advantage, so a good baseball team usually wants to have several left-handed pitchers. The slang term for such a pitcher is a ''southpaw'', derived from the fact that a traditionally oriented baseball field would have the pitcher facing west, and thus would have the south to his left<ref>This prevents a setting sun from getting in the batter's, catcher's, or umpire's eyes, which would make their jobs much harder and be potentially dangerous. Pitchers will never have this problem because the grandstand where fans sit behind home plate are high enough to block the sun before it becomes a problem</ref>. That term has spread to be used in general for left-handed people, particularly in sports. Generally there is considered to be an advantage for southpaws, because they are different from the more common right-handed opponents.