Kretschmann, a research engineer with the federal government's Forest Products Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, and a member of MLB's bat study committee.Ī report in the Chronicle of Higher Education explains why maple bats shatter more frequently and in different ways, compared to ash bats: Maple bats 'account for 7.5 times as many multipiece breakages than did ash bats in the 2008 season and five times as many in 20,' according to David E. The problem is that maple bats break far more often and in more dangerous ways than ash bats. Today, more than half of all major leaguers use maple bats. A performance-enhancing bat, if you will. That year, Barry Bonds hit 73 home runs using maple bats, breaking the single-season home-run record. Even so, most players stayed with ash until after the 2001 season. Maple is stronger than ash, and thus better for hitting the ball long distances. So, after fifty years of success with ash bats, why did players switch to maple? Ash had replaced hickory as the wood of choice for bats when players opted for a lighter wood, in order to increase their bat speed. The problem, in large measure, came from the increased use of bats made from maple, supplanting ash bats, which had been the standard in Major League Baseball for 50 years. MLB responded by setting up a committee comprised of wood and engineering experts to study the issue. In the final three months of the 2008 season, 2,232 bats broke, with 756 of them separating into multiple pieces.

(And no one has yet figured out why Kevin Youkilis was the Cubs trainer that day.)Ĭolvin's injury came two years after MLB began looking into the issue of shattered bats. The shattered bat, in fact, punctured his chest wall, putting Colvin in the hospital for several days. Remember this horrifying play at the end of the 2010 season, when Cubs rookie Tyler Colvin was impaled by a piece of shattered bat as he ran from third base to home?Īt the time, the broadcasters didn't realize how serious Colvin's injury was.

Sometimes, these whirling, spinning shards of wood strike and injure people. Sometimes the bat shatters, sending pieces of bat hurling through the air at great speed. Sometimes, when a wood bat strikes a baseball thrown at speeds greater than 80 miles per hour, the wood bat breaks.

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