I see where an 18 year old pitcher was killed in Montana at a Legion game when he was struck in the head by a batted ball. I am not sure if legion switched to the BESR rating, or if the batter was already using one but hopefully this convinces them that they need to make it mandatory if the batter wasn't. It may not have made a difference but yet it may have, we'll never know. Hopefully it makes us more responsible in checking for the ratings before a game

Pat O'Reilly response
This bat-safety issue must be solved. I've seen enough pitchers get pasted, and many near-misses It is established fact that the ball accelerates when coming off an aluminum bat.The fear of injury has unmeasured negative influence on the psyche of pitchers. They are scared and this likely compromises their skills. A new bat design is on the market, called MetalWood. See http://www.metalwood.com It has an aluminum handle and a wood head. Acceptance by baseball leagues and administrators should be expedited. Besides improved safety, this bat reduces by about 3 years the time it takes an aluminum bat player (high school, college, Legion) to adapt to the feel of ML wood bats. MetalWood also gets us back to real baseball instead of bling-ball long ball and long outs. NOTE; the aluminum bat safety issue applies to fasat pitch softball too. This new generation of girls generate tremendous bat contact. The high school mound-plate distance needs to be increased to the college specs. Pat O'Reilly, umpire, sports researcher

metalwood bats are terrible. i've used them and the only thing they are useful for is batting practice so you can save your good bats for the game. i think all baseball above little league should go real wood...not metalwood. that metal wood bat is seriously garbage. i know it would be safer than the current metal bats but just make it a blunt transition so they know the seriousness and go straight to wood.

kids swinging a 33"/30 oz. aluminum would have no problem with a 32" wood bat for a little bit then they can step back to a 33" after a dozen times of BP. they will notice that they arent hitting 5,000 MPH shots back at the pitcher, and they will notice that it makes for a better game.

HS is already at 60'6" mound distance and 90' bases, so unless they want to go farther than the MLB does i dont see any changes on the way. college is also 60/90 and they arent going anywhere. the only solution is the bats, and make em go straight to wood.

[Edited by brian43 on Jul 28th, 2003 at 10:43 AM]

<b>The high school mound-plate distance needs to be increased to the college specs. Pat O'Reilly, umpire, sports researcher</b>


Pat:

Where do you live that has a different distance from the rubber to the plate in high school?

Maybe he's thinking of softball.

Bob

Are you sure this is the correct URL for MetalWood. It took me to the website of a jazz band.

It should have been http://www.metalwoodbats.com, however the site is under construction.

New voice
 

Pat, I see that you are relatively new to this forum with only a few posts....

I checked out your profile...

What is
Occupation:Sports Researcher, Sports Officiaal, Sports Inventor???

I understand the Official part but what is the "Researcher" part and what sports inventions are you involved in?

I guess the metalwood bats...

Re: New voice
 

Researcher means "researching various aspects of sports, or an individual sport". Example: “Research Methodology for Rating the Entertainment Value of a Competitive Sporting Event Using Measurements of LIVE BALL Possessions and Dead Ball Events”. It's more academic in nature than commercial. Yes, you would be amazed at the negative impact officials have on the game! Sometimes the research leads to invention projects. Currently work is underway on the games Futuristic Basketball and Futuristic Soccer.
i hope this helps. Respectfully yours, Pat O'Reilly.

Several pewople raised the same question, so it must have been the poorly stated presentation. Sorry.I was referring to softball, not baseball, re the distaance from mound to home plate. Thanks for helping clear this up. Pat O'Reilly

It's time for all these governing bodies (NCAA, NAIA, NFHS, Legion, etc.) to just say WOOD. It is how the games should be played and eliminates all this nonsense about BESR, weight to length ratios and composite materials. When safety finally outweighs $$$$$$$ they will go to it.

Ball accelerates?
 

<b>"It is established fact that the ball accelerates when coming off an aluminum bat."</b>

I know that the ball rockets off some metal bats much faster than off wood ones, and something has to be done. Even in softball people are being killed and seriously injured by shots off red-hot bats.

Softballs are coming off bats at 105 miles an hour, so baseballs must be far above that. One physicist estimated that a ball Mickey Mantle hit off the Yankee Stadium façade was traveling 155 mph (don't know whether he meant at the time it hit the façade or the time it left the bat). That was of course with a wood bat, so who knows how fast they are leaving a metal one these days.

But a technical question: Is it physically possible for a ball to <i>accelerate</i> in flight?

[Edited by greymule on Aug 4th, 2003 at 02:51 PM]

I would like to give you an emphatic NO!
 

But that is not quite technically correct.

A curve ball technically accelerates because it changes direction ==> it gets going faster in that particular direction to which it is curving. This is an acceleration but does the overall speed of the ball increase from the time it leaves the pitcher's hand? If it does it would be pretty minimal and would require some fairly high powered analysis of the ball's flight to prove the overall speed was increasing. Perhaps this would be a good use for the wonderful QuesTech system!

Overall does the speed increase during flight... possibly, in a very minimal amount due to the spin of the ball but realistically, NO. A ball does not leave a bat at 100 MPH and increase it's speed so that by the time it is caught it is traveling 125 MPH. Quite the contrary is what happens; the ball decreases speed in the direction it is traveling due to the friction and drag of the air.

You can see this in the projected flight of a ball as it leaves the bat and climbs at a nice gradual angle but as it reaches the extent of its upward movement the descending angle in which the ball falls is much steeper than the ascending angle. This is because the ball has slowed down (due to air friction) and at this point in the flight, gravity has a much greater affect/portion of the ball speed than the original impetus provided by the bat.

Can the speed increase due to gravity be greater than the original speed? Not on a level playing field. Yes, if you hit the ball over a cliff where the distance the ball falls is much greater than the distance the ball rose into the air.

So in the sense that you asked the question the answer is no.

I think some of this talk about acceleration has to do with the materials of the bat (given that the COR, Coefficient of Restitution/Resiliency, of the ball is constant). A soft bat, such as a wooden one, dents in more and the dent rebounds back to its original shape more slowly - less energy is transferred to the ball and consequently the ball leaves the bat at a slower speed (for a given speed of the bat). A harder metal bat does not dent as much as the wooden bat and the dent's rebound is quicker - more energy is imparted to the ball and the ball leaves the bat at a higher speed ==> therefore quicker and farther flight and the need for quicker responses by the defense. It is for this reason that highly resilient bat materials become a safety issue for the infielders because they cannot respond fast enough to the increased ball speed.

Hope that helps and that I haven't confused anyone. Tony :)

[Edited by DownTownTonyBrown on Aug 4th, 2003 at 03:44 PM]

<b>"But a technical question: Is it physically possible for a ball to accelerate in flight?"</b>


On it's downward path gravity will overtake friction and the ball will accelerate slightly. Since it is doubtful that it was high enough to obtain termninal velocity as it falls, it should accelerate righ to the point it hits the ground or glove.

But the instant it leaves the bat friction and gravity will work to slow it's velocity.

Garth is right
 

The ball will speed up as it falls - the farther it falls the faster it goes (as in hitting it over a cliff) - up to a terminal velocity as he mentions.

The ball speed will not increase above the speed with which it left the bat because of air friction and the level playing field - the ball falls down the same distance as it went up.

Gravity works AGAINST the flight of the ball on its way up and gravity works WITH the flight of the ball on its way down - the net effect is close to zero.

If there were no air, there would be no drag or air friction and the ball would fall at the SAME speed with which it left the bat. Hence in Denver, balls fly farther because at this higher elevation there is less air (it is less dense) and therefore less air friction.

But any place they play baseball they have air. Different from gravity that always pulls down (decreasing the ball's speed on the way up and increasing it on the way down), air friction always works against the flight of the ball and is always decreasing the speed of the ball.

Thanks, Tony and Garth.

That's what I thought. On, say, a line drive back at the pitcher (discounting the insignificant effects of tailwind, gravity, cosmic rays, solar wind), the ball is traveling fastest the instant it leaves the bat and constantly slows thereafter. A line drive horizontal to the ground cannot "pick up speed" in the air, no matter how much potential energy it carries as a result of being deformed by the bat.

I have seen softballs make drastic, seemingly impossible changes in direction after they have been hit by some of the weapons of mass destruction that Miken and Worth have produced. I've seen line drives toward the pitcher rise and go sailing off toward right center. I once saw a line drive hit so hard that it shot past F5's head and dropped to the ground 6 feet behind him. F5 was just getting the glove up as the ball hit the ground. I felt at the time that he might have just escaped death.

Can't say I've ever seen such weird things with baseballs. I guess they don't deform to the degree that softballs do.

Tony, I see your point about the curve ball. The correct question would then have to be, "Does the ball accelerate on its <i>path,</i>" and of course the answer would be no.

I realize this is an older post, and my two cents worth is probably not necessary, but I think that it is worth mentioning that Baseball Ontario has changed their rules to make all age groups use wood bats as soon as they are old enough to make the jump to a regulation sized diamond (60'6" / 90'). While Baseball Canada still allows the Junior division to use aluminum only in the National Tournament. Since this ruling has come into affect, I have noticed several changes in the way baseball is played up here. Weaker teams are no longer getting blown away by stronger teams (what would once be a 15-2 game is now 5-0), far fewer injuries, games are MUCH quicker (I've had only 3 games over 2 hours this past season out of 75). Plus, it just sounds right...I hate the sound of an aluminum bat 'DING' ... it's just not baseball without the crack of the bat!

Take care

I've seen similar dramatic results when our MSBL went to wooden bats two seasons ago. It has turned weak pitchers into decent pitchers. It has resulted in FAR fewer home runs (I've seen one in two seasons, where before I'd see more than a dozen each season.) The scores of games have been dramatically reduced, from double digits to single. The length of games have also been dramatically reduced. 9 inning games now last 2 to 2-1/2 hours, where before it was almost always a 3-hour affair. The gap between the best teams and the worst teams has also been significantly reduced, leading to better competition.

The only drawback is the cost. But our adult players are willing to pay for the obvious improvement in the league. No one wants to go back to aluminum.

MSBL....
 

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I love the look on these guys faces when they take one on the handle, hands are in shock, ball squibs to F1 for easy out...batter is staring at hands....gotta love those outs!!!! Our MABL league has some summer JUCO teams, they can pop the crap outa the ball with the woodies, I was really impressed, one field has the alleys at almost 400(cf is 425), now that is some real estate to cover!!!!!!!

Our local adult league usually has 2-3 home runs per game and the fields here are usually pretty good sized.

First couple of years the offensive stats will be crap, but eventually the good players will be hitting quite well with the wood.

Rich

In our MSBL they switched this year to the Worth baseball. Now, all the players are complaining it's a mush ball. I have to agree. The ball isn't coming off the wood like it did last year. They're stuck with them for the season, but next year they'll be going back to the Rawlings.

I love working in that league. They have a 48 and over division, and those guys are hilarious! Non-stop one-liners. There's a team in that division called the Silver Foxes. Look for them in Arizona if anyone works those games this year. They are all 58 and over, and many are older than 70. There are a number of former Major Leaguers in that division. Those guys can still hit and pitch amazingly well, but they don't run all that great.

[Edited by Jim Porter on Aug 18th, 2003 at 09:59 PM]

Worth...less
 

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Those are mush....Rawlings R100's or RPBL's...the FED ball...they do get OOR, but as long as you have a clean dozen!!! Had a submariner tossing a month or so ago, boy did he have some nasty crap...found out why...ball was a literal egg...me gotta work on that......