News & Articles

Nobody who watched this year’s World Series came away anything but totally entertained. A little exhausted, too, perhaps, but thoroughly entertained.
We will have to assume that the best two teams in the Major Leagues are the Los Angeles Dodgers and Houston Astros, although they had to work to get to the Series. Oncs there, they put on a show with great pitching, good pitching, and shaky pitching, plus mostly exceptional defense and potent hitting. Sometimes the hitting proved vulnerable, but only because of the aforementioned great pitching.

We did, however, come away with a great debate, as well. I listened with interest and some amusement to the charges that the baseballs are juiced up this year, and that’s why record numbers of home runs became big news all season, and in the playoffs, and particularly in the World Series. I mean, eight home runs in one game? Home runs as commonplace as singles in extra innings? Seriously?

It’s mostly amusing when guys who have never played the game, nor been closer than a television set, or maybe a press box, try to explain why they are certain the balls are juiced. Some say the inner wrapping of the balls are wound tighter, making the ball harder and thus eager to fly much greater distances, turning fly balls into home runs.

We’ve heard those arguments before, although I took notice when Justin Verlander, the best pitcher in the game, said he honestly thought the balls felt different in the World Series, and that a more slippery ball was harder to grip and control, particularly for curve balls and sliders, and when the balls don’t break as much, they get hit more often, and farther.

Now let me tell you a story about the Over-35 amateur baseball league I played in, and coached, for 20 years. We used to use aluminum bats, and we all were impressed at how consistent the bats were, and delivered a pretty normal-feeling velocity and impact. Then the companies that make aluminum bats went crazy, designing and building bats of higher and higher potency, for more and more dollars.

Pitched balls were suddenly being strafed down the third base line with such velocity that very good players on my team began asking if I would play them somewhere other than third base, simply because they didn’t think they could react quickly enough against the higher-velocity missiles coming their way. I agreed, and wound up moving myself from shortstop to third because the last asset that seemed to stay with me was a quick-reacting ability to field such rockets.

 In our league meetings, though, the topic came up for considerable discussion. We formed a committee to study the development of bats, and I was on it. We determined exactly which level of alloy bats were the break-even point between providing a “normal” velocity and those that were what I call “unobtainium,” because they were exotic metal that gave a much more distinct “ping” and simply got to the fielders faster and flew farther.

My recommendation was that we outlaw such bats, and any that went beyond the simple norm of those designated bats that hit at normal velocity and gave all the pleasure of normal baseball, but simply didn’t break.
My proposal got voted down, led by an aggressive group of players who went to Floriday every winter for some annual age-group baseball tournaments. I played in two such tournaments that were amazingly fun, and I was surprised that anything goes in their bat rules. Some guys from our league bought $250 bats for those games, then naturally wanted to use their big investment in our league. One pushy character -- who had bought a $250 bat and didn’t want to leave it unused until the next winter’s tournament in Florida - convinced our board that he was knowledgeable, and that he could guarantee that there was no difference in the velocity of a normal aluminum or wood bat and his unobtainium special.

I got ridiculed for asking if we had to wait until somebody got seriously hurt before we put in a little caution to our bat rules, and some accused me of being “afraid” to play third, and I told these cynics that I was playing third. The next season, with the rules relaxed, this cynic’s own team had a first baseman injured when he couldn’t get his glove up quickly enough to prevent a line drive from shattering his orbital bone, ending his playing days and costing him the sight in one eye. That manager changed from cynic to wood bat advocate in one quick lesson.

The next year, our league president saw an impasse and acted on a provision he had put in the rules, that if agreement wasn’t readily obtainable, we would go to all-wood bats. And that’s what the league did. It all worked out very well, for a couple of years. Then players would pay extra to get bats with composite handles, which wouldn’t break as readily.

The smartest ones ventured away from the standard ash bats and bought bats made of maple. They were about the same weight, but were much stronger and stiffer, with less flexing. They didn’t break often, but when they did, they shattered off into long, dangerous-looking shards. And without question, pitched balls came off those maple bats with more force than off the friendly old normal ash bats.

I’ve tried bats made from birch, and bamboo, as well as maple, and I gravitated back to ash because they just had a more personable feel -- like an extension of your arm. It is not unlike the way a good-old Christian Brothers wood hockey stick felt like it was an extension of your arm, and not like the current, $250 fabricated sticks that flex and don’t flex in a completely different manner.

Now we go back to the Major Leagues. I enjoyed watching the Twins throughout this past season, and I marvelled at how Joe Mauer rose up from a poor first month or two and wound up hitting over .300 - where he belongs. One time he was batting and hit a foul ball, which broke his bat. One ofthe analysts said that Joe Mauer was one of the few Major Leaguers who still prefers bats made of ash to those made of maple that most players use.

A month later, watching the world series, and balls are flying into the seats in record quantities, while everybody overanalyzes and blames the baseballs for being juiced up, even though Major League officials say My explanation is simple: Almost all the players are using bats made of maple, which strike the ball with much less or no flexing, and send it flying with greater velocity. A ball that used to be a long fly to the warning track is now sailing into Row 6 of the stands, and those that used to be long blasts are now measuring at 550-600 feet.

Amazing to me that nobody has thought of the obvious change in bat material. I find myself looking carefully at every bat carried to the batter’s box and I can almost always tell whether they are maple or not. Ash is lighter, flexes more, and while it might break more readily, it is more forgiving. Maple is stronger, stiffer, flexes less -- and sends baseballs far, far away. Often I notice that the handle of the bat is a different color, and I think they might be allowing composite handles, screwed into the wood barrels of modern bats. That produces even less flexing and more power-making.

There also is one other factor. Umpires now call a tight enough strike zone so that pitches that are just nicking the outside or inside corners, and those two inches above the belt and right at the knees, are almost always called balls. The pitchers glare and grumble, but the huge factor here is that if you’re pitching to a good hitter, and your corner-nicking pitches are being called balls, you know you have to throw it more over the plate -- maybe completely over the outside edge instead of nicking it.

But you don’t want to walk the guy. So the hitters mostly all take a strike or two, testing the umpire. They often take a fastball down the middle for strike three, and think they can rationalize it by saying they were “fooled,” because they were looking for a slider. Look for a slider on strike one or two, but don’t ever - EVER - be fooled by a fastball down the middle.

Under current conditions, hitters can wait out a pitcher, knowing that if the ump doesn’t call a marginal strike, the pitcher is going to have to throw him a better pitch, which he can hit farther with his maple bat. 
In this World Series, we had a 1-0 game, and 13-12 slugfests. And everything in between.
I loved every minute of it. But if I had a preference, I would pass a rule that says all bats must be made of ash or an equivalent wood, measured for flex and rigidity. And no weird man-made handles that add to rigidity - it’s either wood or not wood, period. Then I would order the umpires to start calling a strike zone that goes from the chest (letters) to the knees, and to both outer edges of the plate.

 Now let me sit back with a Perrier and a bowl of popcorn and watch Justin Verlander strike out the side.