Major League Baseball to investigate broken bat issue and deliberate until somebody actually gets killed

by Dex on Jun 25, 2008 9:01 AM PDT

Two years ago, a broken bat came close to killing an umpire and it was then that I predicted somebody was going to actually die before baseball would do something to fix what is an obvious bloody mess waiting to happen. Well, I was partly wrong. They're going to do something, but I can't quite tell what. From ESPN:

Baseball will start testing bats following Tuesday's meeting of a player-management safety committee, but the sport made no decision on the contentious issue of banning maple models.

Oh good. Let's undergo a series of tests.

"I don't know if there's an immediate short-term solution to this because even the data that we do have, it's tough to quantify it," [Met's reliever, Aaron] Heilman said.

Only hours after the meeting, plate umpire Brian O'Nora was hit in the head by a shattered piece of Miguel Olivo's broken maple bat, sending blood streaming down his face and forcing him out of Tuesday night's game between Colorado and Kansas City.

I hate how baseball has to "quantify" this kind of stuff. Here's a question for the "quants": Is it ever appropriate for an umpire to leave a pool of blood at home plate?

If the answer is "No", then the quantitative statistic I point at is that the number of umpires leaving bloody pools at home plate is greater than, or equal to, 1 this season.

SOLUTION

If any part of the bat enters the field of play, the batter is called out on interference and base runners must return to the base that they were on at the beginning of the at-bat.

Simple. Effective.

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Comments

How about this rule

If a pitcher breaks your bat, you’re out.

by jbox on Jun 25, 2008 9:05 AM PDT reply actions

Then instead of corking...

we’ll get players inserting carbon fiber rods down their bats.

by pjbno4 on Jun 25, 2008 9:58 AM PDT up reply actions

That's what she said

by jbox on Jun 25, 2008 10:00 AM PDT up reply actions 1 recs

Gawd I hope not.

can you cure us of this fate
mock the litany in its face

by Axion on Jun 25, 2008 10:08 AM PDT up reply actions

Or this rule change

Leave the bats alone and get rid of that crazy rule about wearing batting helmets.

by Jonny Dub on Jun 25, 2008 9:14 AM PDT reply actions

Higher frames per second cameras

Super-HD

I want to see shrapnel through grey matter in glorious 1080i endlessly replayed in slow motion at 500 frames per second.

Then, and only then, can we begin to think of such drastic changes. I’m partial to a “Two bats per at-bat” rule. You break two, you’re swinging shards, buddy.

can you cure us of this fate
mock the litany in its face

by Axion on Jun 25, 2008 9:40 AM PDT reply actions

1080i sucks

rule change. All brains and blood must be broadcast in 1080p

FIRE BUD BLACK! RETIRE HOFFMAN! TRADE HEADLEY!

by Sam (sdsuaztec4) on Jun 25, 2008 2:33 PM PDT up reply actions

it is not that hard to do a stress test

and figure out what type of wood is stronger

so i don’t know why they just don’t do that and make mlb use the stronger bat

really not that big of a decision for them

Trust me, death is the best argument for moisturizer.

by C8LIN B on Jun 25, 2008 11:22 AM PDT reply actions

What if the baserunner

is impaled by said bat chard? Drops to the ground, bleeding from the thorax. If someone on the team touches him, is HE out?

"It is only by an unimaginable chance that our world circles just close enough to and just far enough from a single, constant star."

by ABY on Jun 25, 2008 11:30 AM PDT reply actions

yes

FIRE BUD BLACK! RETIRE HOFFMAN! TRADE HEADLEY!

by Sam (sdsuaztec4) on Jun 25, 2008 2:33 PM PDT up reply actions

I was under the impression that bat tests

were going on nightly, and the results show that they are widow-makers.

The problem is that trees take too long to grow and we’ve already signed up with the bat companies for maples for the next couple years. The bat companies need MLB to survive, and MLB needs them, so MLB can’t just abandon their wares. A complicated symbiosis.

Curtis Granderson blogs about maple bats yesterday.

can you cure us of this fate
mock the litany in its face

by Axion on Jun 25, 2008 12:01 PM PDT reply actions

Aluminum bats

And every team has to make their park dimensions match Petco. No more shattered bats, a lot more of the home runs that many entertainment-starved fans are willing to watch steroid-pumped freaks produce, and maybe, just maybe, the first female major leaguer. No composite bats, though. Those things kill. Also, the pitchers might have to wear Kevlar and a goalie mask.

"If you aspire to the highest place, it is no disgrace to stop at the second, or even the third, place." - Cicero

by Boilermaker19 on Jun 25, 2008 12:45 PM PDT reply actions

Aluminum bats

would leave us with a dead CY.

can you cure us of this fate
mock the litany in its face

by Axion on Jun 25, 2008 1:00 PM PDT up reply actions

Actually, the raw brute strength of Albert Pujols

would probably bend a standard aluminum bat on impact, so he would have to use a heavier bat with thicker walls, greatly reducing the speed of the ball leaving the bat. Also, see my original post about the goalie mask. Also, MLB will never change to aluminum bats, which begs the question “Why don’t they use wooden bats in college?”

"If you aspire to the highest place, it is no disgrace to stop at the second, or even the third, place." - Cicero

by Boilermaker19 on Jun 25, 2008 1:10 PM PDT up reply actions