Edward Thoma: Thoma column | Trying to replicate the uniqueness of Shohei Ohtani

Jul. 24—When Dave Winfield came out of college a half-century ago, he and the San Diego Padres had a decision to make. Was he to be an outfielder or a pitcher?

The Padres picked outfield and brought the Gopher star straight to the big leagues in 1973. It's hard to say it was the wrong choice: Winfield collected 3,110 hits and 465 homers and has a plaque in the Hall of Fame.

But he's always wondered what he might have done as a pitcher also.

A couple weeks ago, the San Francisco Giants used the 16th overall pick on a high school player from Virginia named Bryce Eldridge. Like many such draftees, Eldridge both pitched and played a position in high school. Usually, a drafting team will announce such a pick as one or the other. The Giants identified him as a two-way player.

Welcome to the Shohei Ohtani effect. Ohtani is doing what has never really been done, what had long been assumed could not be done: both hitting and pitching on a regular basis at a high level in the major leagues.

And now that he's doing it, a number of teams are looking for opportunities to replicate it. This is the second year in a row, in fact, that the Giants announced their first-round pick as a two-way player.

That's putting some significant eggs in a risky basket. First-round picks are taken with the intent of finding a future star, and that's difficult enough in one role, be that pitching or at a position. Trying to develop somebody for both roles — and have those different skills honed to at least major league competency at the same time — is far more daunting.

The 2022 draftee, Reggie Crawford, has barely played so far this minor league season as he makes his way back from Tommy John surgery.

And yeah, it's far too early to say that Crawford is a bust; in fact, the Giants bumped him up a level this month. But consider Brendan McKay, taken by the Tampa Bay Rays in the first round in 2017 as a left-handed pitcher and first baseman out of the University of Louisville.

That's the same draft in which the Twins took Royce Lewis with the first overall pick. McKay and his two-way prowess was believed to be a candidate for that slot; the Rays got him with the fourth pick.

McKay to date has 10 major league at-bats and 49 major league innings. He's no longer on the Rays 40-man roster and is out for the rest of this season after having Tommy John surgery. Worse, he's also had thoracic outlet surgery.

The Rays aren't pulling the plug on him, but I don't like his chances.

There have been a few recent players who tried to do both in a reserve role. Brooks Kieschnick milked a couple extra seasons as a relief pitcher and pinch hitter. Michael Lorenzen, who made the AL All-Star team this year as a pitcher with the Detroit Tigers, racked up a bit less than 100 innings in the outfield over four seasons with Cincinnati.

The most prominent two-way player in major league history was, of course, Babe Ruth, who did it for two years with the Boston Red Sox in 1918 and 1919. Unlike Ohtani, Ruth didn't have the advantage of the designated hitter rule; if he wasn't pitching, he had to play somewhere in the field to be in the lineup.

Then there was Martin Dihigo, the "El Inmortal" of Cuban baseball. Dihigo was reputed to be not only the best pitcher on the island but the best shortstop, the best outfielder, the best everything. Johnny Mize, the Hall of Fame first baseman, said of a winter he spent in Cuba: "I thought I was having a good season, then I realized they were walking Dihigo to get to me."

Dihigo is also in the Hall of Fame — four of them, in fact, Cuba, U.S., Mexico and Venezuela. His long career was so split up — across countries, across positions, but always on the "inferior" side of the color barrier — that it is difficult to comprehend.

But if there is a historical precedent for Ohtani, I'd go with Dihigo.

Edward Thoma is at ethoma@mankatofreepress.com. Twitter: @bboutsider.