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Reply to "The DH"

Just my opinion ...

At least in HS, many of your best atheletes are good offensive position players and also your best pitchers, so often don't need a DH hitting for them. Of the top-10 starting pitchers in our league, half hit for themselves and were also among the top hitters in the league. If your starting pitcher is hitting .400, but your 3B is hitting .150, DH'ing for the 3B allows another kid to get some hacks in who otherwise may not have the defensive skills to play.

Given that most HS teams aren't 9-men deep in quality hitting, the DH roll can sometimes rotate around as a coach searches for that elusive 9th man that can get it done at the plate ... who may not be the best position player. The other benefit of the HS rule of being able to DH for any position: if you have an excellent defensive player that is in a deep hitting slump, it allows another guy to get involved in the game as a DH off the bench without severely crippling your defense. It gives a coach more flexibility in how he distributes playing time.

I know it's not a 'pure' form of the game, but it does allow two kids to get involved in the game instead of one, and allows the coach more flexibility in giving kids some playing time. It's HS after all. For at least half of the players on any HS team, playing HS ball will probably be the end of their organized team experience, so a little impurity is OK in my book if it helps get a few more kids involved in the game.
Last edited by pbonesteele
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