You guys sure you want to talk about Barry Bonds?
“Blah blah blah, look how big his head is, blah blah, perjury, blah blah blah disgrace to the game. Blah.” Okay, we’re done.
Why don’t we talk about bats! Do you know all the things that are happening with baseball bats right now? Well apparently, metal bats originally tested in a lab were deemed usable by the NCAA, but as time went on, they somehow became even more powerful. That’s right. We’re dealing with a highly evolved, continuously metamorphic breed of bat these days. They’re… evolving. And they’re bats.
So to combat the issue, the NCAA has set up a lab where I guess there’s a bunch of ferocious, snarling baseball bats in cages being tested around the clock. They came up with the Bat-Ball Coefficient of Restitution, which is a phrase that I only now for the first time was able to read all the way through without instinctively falling asleep by the end of “coefficient.”
Colleges assume they are now safe from the increasing appetite of their own equipment. High schools, however, weren’t satisfied, and decided to ban the freakishly hungry bats altogether. And it’s not as simple as “metal” and “wood,” there are countless numbers of garish hybrids out there, swapping elements, breeding uncontrollably, and spreading whatever mutant powers exist all over the gene pool. Of baseball bats.
Do you know what that means? It means there’s an exhausted scientist in a batting cage somewhere, being handed a revolving series of bats, swinging at every pitch, and wishing he was dead.
Everybody’s got their own take on what’s acceptable and what isn’t, but there are too many different types of bats to list, so it’s impossible to form a cohesive gallery of banned material. And that’s before we even get to the youth leagues, where children could be holding baseball-murder weapons in their hands at any moment. Hundreds of parents will show up for a Saturday morning cook-out/little league game behind the church, only to watch their children break the law at bat after at bat, because god knows what’s in these bats they’re using.
GOD ONLY KNOWS.
…
Okay I’m being told I need to talk about the Barry Bonds trial. Here are your witnesses.
- Greg Anderson: Guy who supplied the steroids; will refuse to talk and be immediately arrested.
- Jeff Novitsky: Federal agent who has made a career out of middle fingering a host of professional athletes/suspected drug users, like Lance Armstrong, Marion Jones, and Floyd Landis. And Barry Bonds. Hates Barry Bonds.
- Steve Hoskins: I don’t know, somebody else.
- Some Fourth Witness: Apparently there’s another one.
…
All right my editor’s gone.
By 2012, they’re talking about removing aluminum bats altogether. Which is like the part of the movie where the corrupt Military general, whose plans to contain the monster have failed at every turn despite the urgings of the quirky scientist, is just like “Fuck it; let’s nuke Manhattan.”
Fortunately, there is a clear reason for doing this.
"“This whole issue is not an injury issue. I want to be emphatic about that.”–Abe Key, president of PONY, inc.“What is the real concern here? It’s the pitcher dying. No one wants to say it, but the concern is the pitcher gets hit in the head and dies.”–CAL Baseball Coach David Esquer"
So I can’t decide whether these two are agreeing that “injury” and “death” are two different things, or if they actually have different stances on the issue of ultra-bats so potent they are attacking the players.
Last year many schools began forbidding metal bats because of pitchers’ skulls getting fractured and concussed across the country. This correctly led to the discussion of whether wooden bats should once again become the standard through all levels of play. Are we standing on the verge of baseball’s old timiest revolution, since I tried to make my junior high team wear those tiny hats from the past?
It certainly seems that way, because every bat now needs to be approved by the BBCOR, or in compliance with it, or whatever, I can’t remember if it’s a group of people or a ruling. The point is, scientists are claiming they’ve reduced the “liveliness” of approved bats by five percent.
My personal experience with bats has been somewhat demoralizing; best case scenario, some kind-hearted coach would end a cage session with “Don’t give up if I seem to be paying more attention to every other person on the team this season.” But I do recall one practice where I was for some reason on a wooden bat kick. Naturally, I was the only one who tried to use wood that season, and had I managed to put the bat on the ball, we would have all seen just how much more organic hitting is when the bat is wooden. My teammates [would have] stared in shame at their aluminum bats, hating themselves and making me team captain over Shep Brandywine, that muscular jerk with the name that sounded made up. And why pay hundreds of dollars for a piece of metal that’s going to be outlawed in a year when you can spend a Saturday carving your bat out of a tree?
The sun seems to be setting on the time of aluminum bats. Very soon, the *pings* of summer will have evaporated, and along with them the cringes of parents enduring another evening of shrill noises for the sake of their child’s interests, as well as the horrific injuries and blood that accompany a dangerous line drive right back at the pitcher.
Meanwhile, the Barry Bonds trial will get tons of coverage on ESPN. We’ll get to hear about every minute detail as soon as the two to four week process spits it out, and eventually, Barry will probably be found not guilty because he keeps all that money in his giant head.
But now you know all this stuff about bats.