Wood bats VS. Aluminum

[thomecollector]

Metal Bats Are an Issue of Life and Death

• Published: July 16, 2006

On a July night three years ago, a line drive rocketed off a metal bat and smashed into the left temple of Brandon Patch, an 18-year-old American Legion pitcher in Montana. Within hours, he was dead.

James Woodcock/Billings Gazette, via Associated Press
The Miles City Mavericks were joined by the Helena Senators in July 2003 for the funeral of Brandon Patch, who was killed by a drive off a metal bat.

Related

Hit in Chest by Line Drive, a 12-Year-Old Player Remains in a Coma (July 16, 2006)






Alison Dinstel for The New York Times
A ball is estimated to travel about 20 miles an hour faster off a metal bat than off a wood bat.



In April 2005, a line drive off a metal bat slammed into the temple of Bill Kalant, a 16-year-old high school pitcher in suburban Chicago. The ball traveled “with laserlike speed,” said Skip Sullivan, Kalant’s coach at Oak Lawn High School. Kalant was rushed to a hospital adjoining the field, where an emergency-room doctor told his parents, “He is on the cliff of death.” He made it through after being in a coma for two weeks and having brain surgery. He has had to learn how to brush his teeth again, how to tie his shoes again, how to walk again.
At a Police Athletic League game last month in Wayne, N.J., a line drive off a metal bat struck the chest of Steven Domalewski, 12, knocking him down and stopping his heart for a few minutes. He was revived on the field and taken to a hospital, where he was put in a medically induced coma, placed on a feeding tube and hooked to electrodes to stimulate his brain. He is still in a coma.
Brandon Patch lived with his parents, Duane and Deb, in Miles City, Mont., a small cowboy town where he played for a team called the Mavericks. The Patches run a Web site dedicated to Brandon, forever11.com, and are part of a national crusade to eliminate aluminum bats in amateur baseball in favor of wood bats, which they and many others consider to be less dangerous. They have, however, met with stiff resistance from bat manufacturers and officials of amateur leagues.
At home in Oak Lawn, Ill., Tony Kalant, Bill’s father, said he believed that his son would not have sustained his life-threatening injury if a wood bat had been used. “He would have reacted quicker,” Kalant said. “Like this, the ball was hit so hard and came so fast, he didn’t have a chance.”
In Trenton, Assemblyman Patrick J. Diegnan Jr., a Democrat from Middlesex County, introduced a bill last month to prohibit the use of metal bats in youth and high school baseball leagues. “It’s time to do away with the hollow ping and the increased risk of injury aluminum bats brought to New Jersey ballfields,” Diegnan said in a statement. He added that a ball traveled about 20 miles an hour faster off a metal bat than off a wood bat because of what is generally referred to as the “trampoline effect.”
The conflict over the use of metal versus wood began almost from the inception of the use of aluminum bats in the early 1970’s to cut the cost of replacing broken wood bats. The controversy took an odd turn last month: The Mavericks forfeited four games as part of a home-and-away series with the Bozeman Bucks of their Eastern Montana Class AA American Legion conference because Bozeman refused to play with wood.
“Ever since Brandon’s death, we only play games with wood bats, because it’s safer — I feel there’s no question about that — and out of respect for Brandon and his parents,” said Matt Phillips, the Mavericks’ coach.
He was speaking in the clubhouse at Denton Field, the Mavericks’ home ballpark. The clubhouse, named Patch’s Corner, was built with donations from the community and from supporters around the country. A memorial stone and a photo of the left-handed Patch following through on a pitch are at the entrance.
The other five teams in the conference, as well as all other American Legion teams in the state, play with aluminum bats when Miles City is not involved. They have respected the Miles City position in games against the Mavericks. In the past two years, in the eight games Bozeman and Miles City played, Bozeman used wood bats. Bozeman is again at the top end of the league standings, Miles City at the lower rung.
“At the conference meeting in December, all the teams, including Bozeman, agreed again to play us only with wood bats,” Phillips said. “Then on Friday, three days before we were supposed to play them, Mitch Messer, their coach, calls and says they have decided to play with aluminum bats. I said we aren’t going to play with aluminum bats and that we’d have to forfeit the games. He said: ‘We’re a metal-bat team, and we don’t want to do anything to jeopardize our season. I mean no disrespect to your team or to Brandon Patch’s family, but that’s our decision.’ ”
Deb Patch said: “It really is a slap in our face. It totally is.”

'Nuff Said !!

[Fnazxc0114]

are you kidding me. wood bats are bad for the enviroment. now i have read it all. is the processing of aluminum good for the enviroment. is the fart i just let good for the enviroment? everything we do affects the enviroment. granted i also dont by into the beliefs of global warming and all the crap that goes along with it.

[GarkoCollector]

I ain't never seen someone die from an aluminum bat.

Have you ever seen 10 billion dollars in cash?
Just because YOU haven't seen it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

[spartakid]

It appears that there's only one advocate for the aluminum bat theory. That should probably say something. I would also assume that the professional players are much stronger than most college players and I do recall a story about a college coach at 3rd that was killed by a foul ball. The use of wood from bat production is so low on the overall scale that it's not even a problem. People are jumping on the "green" bandwagon and are taking it overboard.....

[shoremen44]

New York Time article...

"Metal Bats Are an Issue of Life and Death"

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/16/sp...pagewanted=all

[Masimen]

There really is no debate here. The numbers don't lie. It takes a human a minimum of just under 4 tenths of a second to react at 60 feet 6 inches to a batted ball. At that distance any ball traveling above 97 MPH will get there before the pitcher has time to react. Balls have been measured coming off aluminum bats at upwards of 110MPH. You just aren't going to get hat velocity from a wood bat. Not to mention the sweet spot on an aluminum bat is much bigger. It is a bad combination. This is big business, far bigger than the wood bat business. The bat companies are going to do everything they can to keep it going.

[bigtruck260]

It appears that there's only one advocate for the aluminum bat theory. That should probably say something. I would also assume that the professional players are much stronger than most college players and I do recall a story about a college coach at 3rd that was killed by a foul ball. The use of wood from bat production is so low on the overall scale that it's not even a problem. People are jumping on the "green" bandwagon and are taking it overboard.....

This is coming from someone who played baseball at almost every amateur level out there including American Legion, SLABA, High School and college...

Just a few reasons for wood:

1. Tradition is very important. The powers that be seem to be removing little traditions from American culture daily. Wood bats have been constant in MLB - this will never change.

2. Amateur vs. Pro - HUGE difference. 99% of Division 1 college players never play in the MLB. Even the best college players do not have the ability to drive the ball the way major leaguers do.

3. The problem with shattering bats is being addressed. Hopefully, there will be a decline this year. As a fan who sits very close the the field, I'll take my chances on a bat flying into the stands (happened once in 20 MLB games attended last year at BUSCH) as opposed to a line drive foul from Chris Duncan or Albert Pujols...I see 10-20 of these EVERY GAME.

If you really need more than this - you are just grabbing at straws.
My guess is that you've never played real baseball Frik (and that's not being sexist) - because if you did, you'd realize how silly of an 'argument' this whole thing is. Wood bats can be recycled and are biodegradable BTW.

[frikativ54]

1. Tradition is very important. The powers that be seem to be removing little traditions from American culture daily. Wood bats have been constant in MLB - this will never change.

I think this hits the nail on the head. Above all else, I think that people value tradition, and since it's been this way, people want it to stay this way. Don't know what traditions are being taken away - I don't see it, probably because I (at 24) am too young to notice. Before raising the issue in the other thread, I never knew there was such opposition to aluminum.

3. The problem with shattering bats is being addressed. Hopefully, there will be a decline this year. As a fan who sits very close the the field, I'll take my chances on a bat flying into the stands (happened once in 20 MLB games attended last year at BUSCH) as opposed to a line drive foul from Chris Duncan or Albert Pujols...I see 10-20 of these EVERY GAME.

Once is too much. I don't have the time to pull out a bunch of articles, but I remember hearing a bunch of incidents in the past with people getting hurt by flying splinters of wood. I know there are efforts to address this, but I would really like to know how this is going to be eliminated.

If you really need more than this - you are just grabbing at straws.
My guess is that you've never played real baseball Frik (and that's not being sexist) - because if you did, you'd realize how silly of an 'argument' this whole thing is. Wood bats can be recycled and are biodegradable BTW.

What is considered "real baseball"? I did play baseball in the 7th grade, and I have played softball in other years, and we never had the problems so described. I have been struck by line drives while pitching in non-competitive softball, and I do know that it hurts. But perhaps I am not in a position to comment having not played college baseball or softball (career cut short - a story for another day).

[frikativ54]

are you kidding me. wood bats are bad for the enviroment. now i have read it all. is the processing of aluminum good for the enviroment. is the fart i just let good for the enviroment?

I didn't think discussions of flatulence were relevant to this conversation.

everything we do affects the enviroment. granted i also dont by into the beliefs of global warming and all the crap that goes along with it.

[xpress34]

Actually (if I can find the article) while I was working for Rawlings there was a story circulating about a player (I don't remember what level) that was killed by a broken aluminum bat.

Just like with a wood bat, the aluminum is more vunerable where the rise of the barrel thins down into the handle. The batter swung at an inside pitch and literally had his bat saw off and the flying barrel with the sheared off end impaled someone.

Much rarer than a line drive, but it has happened, just the same.

If you want another reason why Aluminum would be so much more deadly for the speed and distance it puts on a ball:

Last year before a game at Coors Field they had an exhibition from a touring professional HR hitting Softball group. these guys were hitting SOFTBALLS into the Upper Deck at Coors Field! It's hard enough to hit a HR on a regular Softball field - not to mention at a MAJOR LEAGUE Park. I still have one of the softballs that I caught int he LF Pavillion during their exhibition.

Wood should always be the bat of choice for MLB - and to address an earlier comment about NCAA players who don't make it in the pros - many of them have never swung a wood bat until they hit the pros... and that's a HUGE adjustment from Aluminum.

- Chris