Baseball may have found its greatest box office attraction, the switch pitcher.

That’s right the ambidextrous pitcher that can throw equally well with both arms, which becomes quite confusing to the ambidextrous ballplayer that can hit from either side of the plate.

Furthermore it has become quite confounding to umpires, for their doesn’t seem to be a rule in the baseball manual that deals with a pitcher switching throwing arms on the basis of which side of the plate a batter selects.

You see coaches in later innings of baseball games strategically change pitchers and batters on the basis of which side of the plate a pinch hitter hits from and which side the pitcher throws from.  You see, it is well known that a batter sees the ball sooner when it is thrown by a pitcher using the opposite hand.

There hasn’t been many switch pitchers, but there have been many switch hitters, perhaps the most famous being Mickey Mantle, who’s Dad taught him to be ambidextrous.

This past week during a minor league game between the Class-A Staten Island Yankees and the Brooklyn Cyclones a pitcher by the name of Pat Venditte made his professional debut.

He pitched the ninth inning and after retiring two batters and allowing a single, a switch hitter stepped up to the plate for Brooklyn.  Now under usual circumstances this would not be unusual.  But you see Venditte is a switch pitcher.

Venditte was home schooled and his father Pat Venditte Sr., raised his son as ambidextrous from the age of 3.  He had him kick footballs with both feet, then punting with both, and finally throwing with both hands.

By the time he was 7, he was better throwing a baseball with both hands than most kids were with either.

The pinch hitter for Brooklyn was Ralph Henriquez, who had taken his on-deck circle swings as a lefty, but entered the batter’s box from the right side.

Venditte then put his specially made glove — it has six fingers, two webs and fits on both hands — on his left hand, and got ready to pitch right-handed.

Henriquez than changed sides of the plate.

So Venditte shifted his glove to the other side.

Then it happened again.

And again.

And again.

The umpires didn’t know how to end this cat-and-mouse game until Venditte walked toward the plate and said something. Umpires and both managers than huddled and the umps decided the batter and pitcher can both change sides one time per at-bat, and that the batter must declare first.  The ruling thereby favoring the pitcher, since he gets to declare last.

Henriquez struck out on four pitches as a righty against a right-handed Venditte.  Staten Island won, 7-2.

It’s unclear what the MLB rule book says on the matter.

Venditte was only signed by the Yankees two weeks ago, but they may have a big time box office attraction to replace Mariano Rivera.

Some scouts have noticed that Venditte throws harder from the right side, nearly 90 mph as opposed to 80 from the left side.

His father said not so fast.

“The reason he’s not as fast from the left is he drops his arm from the left side to get more movement — a sweeping slider.,” his father said.

Think about it, with an ambidextrous kid you could double the playing days of a major league player.  You could have Tommy John surgery on one arm and still throw with the other while it was healing. Fielding the ball from the mound would be much more expedient, for either hand could be used on a bunt to throw to any base.  Likewise infielders and outfielders that were ambidextrous could do likewise.

The ultimate ballplayer of tomorrow, might be one that throws well with either arm and bats from either side of the plate.

With more Venditte’s it could change the likes of the game.