We originally posted this when we won the World Series and wanted to share in honor of Nats Opening Day and the beginning of short, but hopefully, sweet season. Our scrappy, D. Much like guitars , bats can be made from a variety of lumber and different trees have different qualities. Hollow metal such as aluminum and composite bats are now standard in most amateur baseball and some professional leagues outside of North America. The non-wooden bats can hit the ball much harder and further than wooden bats, and many leagues are now placing restrictions on their performance.
Hilariously enough, the Major League has pretty low key rules about bats — one stipulation is the bat shall be one piece of solid wood.
So just what kind of trees make bats? Maple is a dense wood that gives a baseball bat a heavier feel. Density is directly related to hardness and durability. The denser the wood used to make a bat, the more durable a bat will be and the more pop it will have — perfect for those game-changing homers.
This softness also tends to make birch more forgiving than maple when striking the baseball off the end of the bat or near the trademark. Like Maple, Birch is also a curly grain wood which lends it to be more durable when making repetitive contact with the baseball in the same area of the bat. In this sense, birch holds together similarly to maple. Birch bats will not flake apart like ash bats.
Cons: Birch is softer than many other wood species, causing it to dent slightly when first used. The surface hardness of a new birch bat is not near as hard as a new maple bat which may slightly decrease exit speeds. Conclusion: Over the course of the last 20 years Maple bats have emerged as the most popular species of wood used by players at the major league level.
This is due to the hardness, durability, and overall performance of the wood. While there are some benefits to ash and birch, most players choose the performance of a maple bat over any other species. The Pro and Cons of Each Maple Pros: Maple is a very dense wood, which tends to make it one of the best species to use for wood bats.
Ash Pros: Before maple bats became popular, most traditional wood bats were made of ash. Birch Pros: Birch is a softer wood which causes it to be more flexible. As noted above, maple is a diffuse-porous wood, meaning that the grains do not run in a straight line. As such, maple is more brittle than ash and can break spectacularly under certain circumstances. Cons : May acquire moisture and weight over the lifespan of the bat. Maple is such a dense wood, and so heavy, that hitters may not be able to use the maximum 2.
A softer wood with more flexibility that may help generate more whip-like speed through the hitting zone. Birch, like maple, is a curly-grained species that will compress over time and resist flaking.
Exit velocity may suffer until this is achieved. The first baseball bats were made out of hickory, which is the heaviest and hardest of all bat-wood species. Pros : Very hard wood results in high exit velocity. Most modern big league bats weigh between 30 and 34 ounces. Bamboo is technically a grass, and many strips of it must be pressed together into long rectangular billets that are then turned into the round shape of a bat.
Over the years, bat production has settled into producing several standard models that can be found in the hands of pro hitters. The is a lightweight, but slightly end-loaded, model. The has a slightly thicker handle and a long taper to a 2. The bat is less end-loaded than many models particularly in its popular cupped version.
The is known for its large and long barrel size, which makes it a favorite of power hitters. This bat has a thin handle with a sharp taper out to the 2. The result is an end-loaded bat that can do great damage, but which can also be difficult to control. This model is similar to the barrel construction, but it also features a thicker handle and a more gradual taper.
The model is most like combining the barrel of a with the handle of the M The result is a well-balanced bat with a long and gradual taper that still retains some flexibility at contact.
Get a bat that matches your body type and hitting style. Fat hands? Use a thick handle. Long arms? Find a bat with a good taper that will allow you to whip the bat and generate bat speed and leverage. You should also read through our guide to picking the right baseball bat. A composite bat is designed to be nearly unbreakable while imitating the performance of wood. Otherwise, Hickory is the hardest bat to break, but also one of the worst-performing.
Stiffer woods like maple are more prone to break since they will not flex if contact is made away from the sweet spot on the barrel. Time and force.
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