Left Handed Katcher, Became a Switch PItcher

Left Handed Katcher

The Ogden Standard-Examiner (Ogden, Utah) 8 Jul 1948

Have you ever heard of a Katcher who also was a pitcher who did his hurling with either his left or his right arm - depending upon the circumstances? Well there is such a gent and he doesn't strangely enough, play for the Brooklyn Dodgers.

His name is Ralph Katcher and he is a pitcher for the Lubbock Texas club of the class C West Texas-New Mexico league. It seems that Katcher was a fine southpaw pitcher in his high school days back in Stillwell, Oklahoma. Shortly after graduating from high school in 1942, Katcher entered the service. During the war he injured his left shoulder in a wrestling match in France and when he got back to the states he found he could no longer throw left handed.

So the pitching Katcher decided to try pitching with his right arm and he did so well in amateur games around Stillwell, OK that he was signed by Texarkansas, Texas of the Class B Big State league. Texarkana, probably from utter confusion more than anything else, decided to assign Katcher to Lubbock.

Katcher, a chunky 25-year-old Indian, began experimenting with his sore left flipper and soon discovered that he had all the stuff he formerly had as a southpaw. Consequently, Katcher now takes the mound armed with two gloves for he has become a "switch-pitcher."

What might happen if Katcher, the "switch-pitcher" had to pitch to a switch-hitter is something to have nightmares about.

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Found on Newspapers.com .

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