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Nickname:
Lou_B
Posts: 13828
Member Since: 4/30/02
Posted: 11/4/2009 12:09pm
Views: 250
Replies: 1
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ESPN OTL on Aluminum Bats
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Tonight's ESPN Outside the Line Show is on the recent Jury Award in the 2003 death of the pitcher (Brandon Patch) killed by a ball hit by an aluminum bat.
The team started using only wood bats and briught extra wood bats and asked opponents to use only wood.
The show also talks about efforts in the state to pass a law dis-allowing non-wood bats.
[ Modified 11/4/2009 5:27pm by Lou_B ]
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Nickname:
Mike_CVUA
Posts: 7180
Member Since: 6/18/00
Posted: 11/5/2009 3:13pm
Views: 172
Replies: 1
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Re: ESPN OTL on Aluminum Bats
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Note that since 2003, Little League has mandated a BPF number which is a lab test standard by which a legal LL baseball will hit and come back from said bat with no more than a given speed.
This year was the first year that the enforcement was mandatory.
Note that these bats are "non-wood", not necessarily aluminum.
Mike CVUA
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Nickname:
piks6
Posts: 259
Member Since: 8/16/03
Posted: 11/6/2009 7:25am
Views: 160
Replies: 2
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Re: ESPN OTL on Aluminum Bats
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"Note that since 2003, Little League has mandated a BPF number which is a lab test standard by which a legal LL baseball will hit and come back from said bat with no more than a given speed."
Mike,
LL hasn't been honest about their BPF lab test.
BPF is an antique, flaw-ridden, easily fooled test.
New York Times, Oct. 2008: "A study of youth bats released in June from the University of Massachusetts at Lowell also questioned that test, concluding it was “misleading” and had “no correlation” to ball speed.
The Little League test, called Bat Performance Factor, was created in the mid-1990s by Richard A. Brandt, a New York University physics professor who has since retired.
The test measures the speed of a ball fired at a bat and the speed of the bat recoiling in a pivot assembly. From those numbers it calculates the springiness of a bat. The test does not account for swing speed and does not measure the outgoing ball speed..."
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/18/sports/baseball/18bats.html?pagewanted=2
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Nickname:
Rich_Ives
Posts: 10593
Member Since: 7/27/00
Posted: 11/6/2009 7:45am
Views: 155
Replies: 0
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Re: ESPN OTL on Aluminum Bats
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It's not "Little League's Test" - it's an ASTM standard. It's been around for a long time. It was also used to test softball bats.
Are there now better tests? Yes - we think.
Did BESR work? Maybe. Maybe not. It seems bats that made the grade at the time of manufacture would degrade/improve (depending on you point of view) upon use. Problems were found by the NCAA in both softball and baseball. SO - the test was abandoned in favor of a new one.
Will BBCOR work? Maybe. Until someone figures out how to beat that one.
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Nickname:
mackman
Posts: 3006
Member Since: 8/08/00
Posted: 11/6/2009 10:42am
Views: 143
Replies: 0
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Re: ESPN OTL on Aluminum Bats
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BPF isn't the greatest test, but none of the tests used for big barrel bats work for 2 1/4 bats. The small barrel bats don't produce enough pop to make the tests valid.
LL's been looking to implement the softball tests, but the jury is still out if the tests work on LL dimension bats. That plus the fact that composites have now been conclusively shown to exceed the tests once they've been worn in, either naturally or the result of a modification.
It ought to be noted that at least LL has some type of performance regulation vs. many other leagues. The Jury award above was from Legion baseball which allowed ANY form of bat, no regs whatsoever! Not true anymore in Legion, I'm sure that the lawsuit had something to do with them adopting NCAA regulations.
How long before Pony finally starts adopting some type of bat reg? You've got Pony kids swinging full size 2 3/4 bats with huge drop differences (on a smaller field, no less).
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