quote:
Originally posted by Ninthmanout:
Truman,
I guess it all depends on what you want out of a bat. When I say more like a BESR I mean it has a better balance than most BBCOR bats and instead of a small sweet spot like most BBCOR bats it has a larger one, more like a BESR. If you want something to be more like wood... use a wood bat. They now have laminated wood bats with a one year warranty.
The reason for the BBCOR standard was to reduce the trampoline effect to that of wood not to make the bat behave like wood. I guess it's the same thing as the large head tennis rackets with a large sweet spot or perimeter weighted golf clubs that have large sweet spots so the balls that don't hit right on the sweet spot still go someplace.
IMHO the only reason the pros still use wood bats is tradition. Wood is not the best material to use for a bat (that's why they break so much) or any other club or racket. If it was the best they would still make and use golf clubs and tennis rackets made out of wood... or skis (water and snow) or auto bodies or wheels or any other thing that was made of wood until they found a better material to make it out of. Do people say that pro golfers are not as good today as say Bobby Jones because they are not using badly balanced clubs with wooden shafts anymore? Maybe but you will not see a wooden wood on the tour because it's no longer the best material to use. They do limit how fast the ball can come off a golf club. They could do the same in pro baseball. Baseball is just slow to change.
I know that this sounds sacrilegious but it is true.
From what I've read from official's statements, staying with wood is more about maintaining relative consistency in baseball than just tradition's sake. And the same goes for the ball itself. Having BESR bats and/or juiced balls would change the game much as it has for golf, even more so.
Yes, BBCOR standard was to reduce the trampoline effect AND and effort to get the game of Collegiate Baseball back to what it used to be rather than Gorilla Ball. The BBCOR bats has changed how Collegiate Baseball has been played in recent years and I from what I heard in the pro ranks, they would not like to see baseball changed to what baseball was at the college level. IMHO, keeping baseball "traditional" is a good thing and I'm glad college baseball has made attempts to get the game back to that.
While I feel golfers are as good or even better today than was Bobby Jones, it's impossible to compare except for what you see around the greens. The technology that has gone into metal clubs allows player to not only hit the ball much further, but also allows them to be more accurate. To reach a 600 yard hole with a driver and an iron is almost all thanks to technology put into the clubs. (I gave up my persimmon wood driver a few years ago because I just couldn't compete with my friends using their high tech clubs). I would not like to see that kind of thing in pro baseball and I'm glad it's out of collegiate baseball. And personally, I don't like seeing it in Little League either and would like to see LL go to wood.
If pro-ball were to go with high tech metal bats, they'd have t enlarge the infield and the whole baseball park and pitchers would have to pitch differently just as the college pitchers did. So, call it "traditional" if you want, but I like the idea of keeping the game "pure." No juiced bats, no juiced balls and no juiced players.
PS: It was interesting seeing what was going on when my son played at the Cape this year and the concern they had about why there were so many more home runs hit this year over last year. Apparently it had something to do with the ball having a harder core than last year's balls. So, it'll be interesting to see if that is something they're going to try and regulate to keep the game. . . "traditional".
