There is perhaps no sport in which offense and defense are as specialized as baseball. Hitters spend countless hours working on their mechanics and learning to adapt to different types of pitches. Pitchers constantly tinker with their pitches and use advanced analytics to figure out how to get those same hitters out. The acts of throwing and hitting a baseball are so different that, nearly without exception, baseball players choose to do one or the other by the time they reach the collegiate level.
Princeton baseball players Nick Shenefelt and Kaden Kram, however, do both. Though the two players took very different paths, they are each adept at both pitching and hitting. Such a skillset is exceedingly rare at the collegiate level, and nearly impossible to find in the pros. In Major League Baseball, only one player — Japanese superstar Shohei Ohtani of the Los Angeles Dodgers — does both frequently, and he is considered by some to be the most talented baseball player of all time.
Shenefelt has always been a two-way player. He pitched and hit through high school, and there was never even a question as to whether he’d do both with the Tigers.
“In high school, I was always one of our starting pitchers, and so that’s always been something I wanted to pursue in college,” Shenefelt told The Daily Princetonian. “And when I started getting recruited here, I talked with [Pitching] Coach [Joe] Haumacher, and he told me he wanted me to pitch as well. So I’ve just been doing both here.”
As both a hitter and a pitcher for the Tigers, Shenefelt spends more time honing his craft in practice than most other players. He practices every day with the hitters, but also finds extra time to work with the coaching staff on his pitches.
“I always go out early on Tuesday,” Shenefelt explained. “Thursdays are the main days that I would go out and work with Coach [Haumacher], and we get an extra hour of work and do all my throwing stuff.”
In weekend series, Shenefelt typically pitches during one of the three games and hits during all three. He has worked his way into a starting role at first base, which is a position uniquely suited to his pitching schedule and allows him to pitch without taking days off in the field.
“When I’m most likely to go in to pitch in a game, [the coaches] will have me DH [designated hitter],” Shenefelt described. “I can take the time while we’re in the field to go get my arm ready and warm up if I need to go into the game. Then, I go back out to first base. There’s not much throwing, so it works out really well.”
Unlike Shenefelt, Kram was exclusively a hitter throughout his first three years with the Tigers. Despite never quite sticking in a starting role behind junior Jake Bold — arguably Princeton’s best hitter — Kram was a solid catcher, starting 22 games at the position and carrying a .669 OPS.
When pitching coach Joe Haumacher saw Kram fooling around on the mound during his junior year, though, he saw the potential for him to be more than just a catcher. Kram first pitched towards the end of the 2024 season, when the team was running out of pitchers, and he made a quick impression on the coaching staff.
“Over the summer, I got a call from our pitching coach,” Kram recounts. “He was like, ‘hey, are you willing to commit to this? If you really want to pitch, and you try at it, you’ll have a good opportunity for a good amount of innings this year.’ And I was like, yeah, absolutely. Any way I can get on the field and help the team. I’ll do it.”
Kram’s submarine throwing angle, in which the pitcher’s arm is below his waist when he releases the ball, is uncommon at the collegiate level and gives him the ability to fool hitters who have not seen it extensively. Armed with such a unique tool, Kram could make the transition to pitching, even with little experience.
“You don’t really see that many submarine or sidearm guys, so there’s definitely a different look for hitters,” Kram told the ‘Prince.’ “That can throw them off a little bit.”
Once Kram spent enough time on the mound, he got together with the coaching staff and made the decision to convert from catcher to full-time pitcher. The switch required him to relearn what it means to practice, switching from the daily grind of catching and taking hundreds of swings to the limited, focused repetitions needed to refine his pitches. Along the way, one of his greatest mentors has been fellow sidearmer Jacob Faulkner.
“[Faulkner] was my catch partner all fall. I was a mirror of him, trying to copy as much as I could,” Kram describes. “Now, in the spring, I do some unique things that he doesn’t. I’ve learned what kind of pitcher I actually am, and not just a Faulkner 2.0.”
For both Shenefelt and Kram, the ability to hit at a high level gives them an added mental advantage over opposing hitters. After spending the better part of two decades learning how to successfully hit off of elite pitching, they understand how the hitters they face want to attack them and adapt their strategy accordingly.
“A lot of the pitchers don’t really know how a batter is actually thinking in the box,” Kram told the ‘Prince.’ “It’s a huge benefit to me to know that.”
“I know how I would want to pitch to myself if I was pitching against myself as a hitter,” Shenefelt added. “If I get beat on a pitch while I’m hitting, I think about what I would do if I was pitching in that situation and then that sets me up for the next pitch.”
For Kram and Shenefelt, the transition to college pitching has not been easy, proving just how remarkably difficult being a two-way player is. Both have fallen victim to the big inning for a Tiger pitching staff that struggled throughout the season, but there were key bright spots for each.
Kram pitched two hitless innings in a key mid-season matchup against Ivy League powerhouse Penn, and Shenefelt pitched a total of five scoreless innings against power conference opponents Miami, Maryland, and Rutgers. The two pitchers have proven to be useful pieces for a Princeton squad in desperate need of innings, and both grew as pitchers throughout the season.
For both players, the art of pitching is something that they look forward to. Despite the mental and physical stress it brings, pitching is an incredibly rewarding job.
“The most control you have on the field is when you’re pitching,” Shenefelt said. “It’s nice to feel like the game is kind of in your hands.”
“There’s been a couple games I’ve gotten to end on the mound and shake my catcher’s hand,” Kram described. “That’s always the best part.”
Joe Uglialoro is an assistant Sports editor for the ‘Prince.’
Please send any corrections to corrections@dailyprincetonian.com.
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