In its brief moment of fame, the torpedo bat has made quite the impression in MLB. Over the weekend, the New York Yankees used the bat, designed by an MIT-educated professor, as an instrument of destruction against the hapless Milwaukee Brewers. Since then, I’ve heard about the bats so often that they’ve been showing up in my dreams. And that makes sense, because prior to this weekend, even in a bandbox like Yankee Stadium, even for a franchise that’s featured the likes of Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Mickey Mantle, such home run power could only have been cooked up in the sweetest slumbers of their fanbase. Such a display of muscle was less video game and more cartoon, as in the famed 1946 Bugs Bunny clip that saw the Gas-House Gorillas rack up 46 straight runs against the genteel Tea Totallers.
The reason he began using maple, and PEDs, is the same reason the torpedo bat is in the news today – players and teams are continuously looking for an edge. And right now the Yankees are getting it.
Now that we’re here, I have several questions. Will New York’s torrid stretch continue? Will this tech be adopted by other teams and players? If that happens, will more games become farcical? And should the bats be banned? If torpedo bats are banned – and there’s no indication that one is forthcoming – then why didn’t the Yankees wait until the playoffs to unveil their secret weapon? Now that would have surely wrestled back their “evil empire” label from the Dodgers.
There’s a caveat here. Aaron Judge smoked the Brewers – one of his four homers in the series went 468ft – without the torpedo bat. And then, on Monday, the Royals crushed the Brewers 11-1. As far as we know, the Royals don’t have torpedo bats, leading us to the conclusion that rather than being victims of technology, the Brewers are just … bad. But if the Yankees’ power-surge continues for another two weeks or so, MLB will probably have no choice but to ban the bats, legal or not, under the little used “best interests in baseball” clause. This would be another embarrassing mess for baseball, as Leanhardt told the Athletic that “it was a group effort, the results coming from conversations with coaches, players, MLB and bat makers.” So unless we’re all overreacting, MLB may have botched the rollout of this new tech by not unilaterally taking over the usage from the clubs.
The good news is that dialed down torpedo bats could actually serve as the long-term answer for suffering hitters. This could be vital for a sport which needs more dynamic offense and less of the increasingly predictable and boring three outcomes: a walk, strikeout or a home run. For now, much to the chagrin of Yankees fans, I’d put the toy back in the box, do the research and development in the minor leagues, and reintroduce a more refined product in a few seasons.
