Should aluminum baseball bats be banned from little league and high school baseball for safety reasons?
Good question and that’s a continuing debate. Both sides of the issue think they have valid points. Some point to injury data, but I’ve seen pitchers injured with shot offs a wood bat, so I’m not sure the anecdotal evidence that non-wood bats are inherently dangerous is conclusive. The fact that non-wood bats are “deadened” to meet the BESR requirement would indicate that they are livelier and the ball does come off the bat faster. “Metal” bats first appeared as a cost savings tool for youth and school play. The cost savings component is now a non-issue since many non-wood bats sell for $300+. While I haven’t seen a non-wood bat with a price tag of $400, I expect to see a bat break the $400 level within a year or so. My personal opinion is that I’d love to see non-wood bats go away. I have umpired double headers where the teams use non-wood bats in the first game and wood bats in the second. You’ll see scores like 12 – 10 in the non-wood bat game and 2 – 1 in the wood bat game. No chea
