Seriously now fellas, I m gonna tell you a story. "Back in the day" I was a pretty good baseball player. Too make a long story short, I was scouted by the Rangers, Pirates, Cubs and Twins. Was Invited to an Invitational Major League Clinic that was put on by the Twins at the Humpty Dome back in 1990. We took infield, ran the 60, and took some swings with wood bats. At the end of the clinic, we had a home run hitting contest and whoever won was awarded box seats to a Twins game of their choice, needless to say I finished second. I was probably as close to playing in the Minors back in 94, but I had other conflicts that I had at the time. Man if we could only turn back the clock.
Journeyman<SCRIPT type=text/javascript> vbmenu_register("postmenu_2852562", true); </SCRIPT> .........AT AGE 14, I WAS VOTED CO-MVP OF MY PONY LEAGUE! REWARD....3 DAYS AS A BALL BOY FOR THE PITTSBURGH PIRATES. GOT TO TAKE BP ALL 3 DAYS!!! NEVER HIT ONE OUT! BUT GOT TO HANG OUT WITH BONDS, BONNILA, VAN SLYKE, AND MY FAVORITE JOSE LIND FOR 3 DAYS.....SO IT WAS ALL GOOD!
in the early to mid 90s i belonged to an organization that got to play a BASEBALL game every year ON THE FIELD @ DODGER STADIUM
the cost to join this group was $20 and it was the BEST money i ever spent
we used aluminum bats for the game and BP
i was in my mid-late 20s and using an aluminum bat the closest i came to a HR (in BP) was i jerked one almost dead down the line (Fisk in 1976 WS) and the ball landed about 20-30 feet short...of the WARNING TRACK. dead down the LF line was about 330 so figure the ball went about 280ish and NEVER came CLOSE to going out
keep in mind at Fenway it is a short fence - but you have to elevate it 37 feet to get it over and for most of us - that all adds up to NOT possible
the cost to join this group was $20 and it was the BEST money i ever spent
we used aluminum bats for the game and BP
i was in my mid-late 20s and using an aluminum bat the closest i came to a HR (in BP) was i jerked one almost dead down the line (Fisk in 1976 WS) and the ball landed about 20-30 feet short...of the WARNING TRACK. dead down the LF line was about 330 so figure the ball went about 280ish and NEVER came CLOSE to going out
keep in mind at Fenway it is a short fence - but you have to elevate it 37 feet to get it over and for most of us - that all adds up to NOT possible
I was good at baseball I'm sure I could knock quite a few over the monster back when I was 21 or so.
played one year of college ball at a small school, home field for our team was about 290 to left with a large 25 foot or so screen up. there was a very big and very old tree out there that nobody wanted to cut down, so thats why the dimensions were like that. I was a pull hitter, one day in BP alone before a game I hit 7 home runs over that screen.
played one year of college ball at a small school, home field for our team was about 290 to left with a large 25 foot or so screen up. there was a very big and very old tree out there that nobody wanted to cut down, so thats why the dimensions were like that. I was a pull hitter, one day in BP alone before a game I hit 7 home runs over that screen.
I couldnt walk out there and hit one, but given say a month of working hard, taking batting practice and I would need an aluminum bat as I am not used to wood ands its much tougher to hit with, I believe I could hit balls over the monster.
In batting practice that is, not against major league pitching certainly.
In batting practice that is, not against major league pitching certainly.
SkinsRaj28 said:
Damn, can't believe you came out of the closet like that Skins????? :missingte
Anyway, I feel like contributing to this discussion. Supposively, if you hit both on the sweet spot there is no difference. I never hit and I never did any homosexual studies of measuring of any sort (no offense Skins), just word of mouth. It's just the fact that the ball jumps off the aluminum bat in every other part of it as well. Hitters can get jammed and crush basehits.
I remember Frank Thomas took BP with metal, and he would crush every ball for a homerun. And everyone was saying that the bat had more pop. Well, yes and no. It's just that even if he missed a ball a bit, it still left the yard. But comparing sweet spots, the ball jumps off both about the same apparently.
But the #1 reason by far that college baseball uses aluminum bats over wood bats is $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$. A good wood bat costs about $120. And they break all of the time, especially with an inexperienced college hitter hitting judy jam jobs 4 times a game. Metal bats are roughly $150 and they rarely break. Small schools can't afford bats with their budget. Shit, some large schools can't afford to pay for wood bats year in and year out. It's estimated that each player would need about 10 wood bats throughout the course of a season (I think more though), where to contrast they would only need 1, maybe 2 metal bats. So pretty much each school would have to multiply their "bat budget" times 10 per year.
15 hitters x $150 = $2,250
15 hitters x $120 x 10 bats = $18,000
Shit ton of money to spend just on bats, especially for North South Dakota Community College Eastern Campus.
The funny thing is that baseballs are actually the greatest expense of any program.
SHAWN GOTTI said:Journeyman<SCRIPT type=text/javascript> vbmenu_register("postmenu_2852562", true); </SCRIPT> .........AT AGE 14, I WAS VOTED CO-MVP OF MY PONY LEAGUE! REWARD....3 DAYS AS A BALL BOY FOR THE PITTSBURGH PIRATES. GOT TO TAKE BP ALL 3 DAYS!!! NEVER HIT ONE OUT! BUT GOT TO HANG OUT WITH BONDS, BONNILA, VAN SLYKE, AND MY FAVORITE JOSE LIND FOR 3 DAYS.....SO IT WAS ALL GOOD!
No shit? When I was an All-Star in Little League I got like 3 dollars in quarters for Flippers Arcade. What a scam.
Metal bats have a hell of a lot more pop than wood its not just that wood breaks. Try pitching to metal. On a line drive you can move out of the way. With wood you can. My first 3 years in college (d3) i hit a grand total of 0 home runs. My senior year they switched to metal and I hit 7 (30 game season)
tkf18ny said:
Supposively it's acceleration of the ball off aluminum. It doesn't make sense to me, just what I hear. But like I said, the sweet spots are about the same. The homeruns you hit your senior year might have not been on the sweet spot ...and those would not be homeruns if you used wood. But I can say with confidence, if you hit those homeruns on the sweet spot, they would of went just as far with wood. This is a one case scenario though and can't be used to prove or disprove anything.
But to say you can move out of the way of a line drive off wood is obviously wrong. A pitcher gets drilled every day somewhere. Not sure if that is what you meant or not?
i took bp in old comiskey park when i played back in high school...the whole team did. we got to use aluminum bats and had the guy throwing center-cut fastballs in the mid 70's - low 80's. the best hitter on the team hit 2 off the wall. no one else came close.
if i couldnt do it when i was 18...i know for sure i couldn't do it now. i was not really a power hitter though. i only hit one over the fence in my whole life and that was in practice...not even a real game.
if i couldnt do it when i was 18...i know for sure i couldn't do it now. i was not really a power hitter though. i only hit one over the fence in my whole life and that was in practice...not even a real game.
