Are there more broken bats

In the last three months of the season, over 2, bats broke in Major League Baseball games — an average of about one bat per game. Unlike alloy bats that are ready to use straight out of the wrapper, composite bats need a little warming up. A bat is strongest when the grain lines up with the length of the bat. If the vibrations are large enough, the bending can cause the bat to break, usually at the narrowest part of the bat, the handle.

MLB Player Bats. But in , maple bats kept breaking apart. Bat shards struck players and coaches all season. The Forest Service research team has been watching video and recording details of every bat breakage since The team will continue monitoring daily video and studying broken bats collected during two two-week periods of the season, working to further reduce the use of low-density maple bats and the overall number of multiple-piece failures.

The mission of the U. The agency manages million acres of public land, provides assistance to state and private landowners, and maintains the largest forestry research organization in the world.

The agency has either a direct or indirect role in stewardship of about 80 percent of the million forested acres within the U. Even though maple bats are now more popular than ever among players, the rate of shattered maple bats is less than half it was five years ago.

Percentage of bats sold to Major League Baseball players, by type of wood, Kretschmann on this important issue. FPL research engineer Kretschmann and a team of wood experts looked at every broken Major League bat from July to September during the season. Also, low-density maple bats were found to not only crack but shatter into multiple pieces more often than ash bats or higher-density maple bats.

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