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Baseball season is back, and it didn’t take long for the New York Yankees to start crushing records and dominating conversation. And at the center of it all? “Torpedo” bats.
The Bronx Bombers tied an MLB record as they hit 15 home runs in their opening three-game series – including a franchise-record nine in their 20-9 rout over the Milwaukee Brewers on Saturday.
Here’s all you need to know about the “torpedo” bats that have everyone talking.
What is the ‘torpedo’ bat?
The “torpedo” bat – so named due to its shape resembling a torpedo – is a customized bat that tailors the barrel for each hitter. Gone is the standard swell of the bat as it’s replaced with more wood in the barrel shifted closer to the hands.
It’s all about locating a hitter’s so-called “sweet spot” and moving more wood to that area – and because every hitter’s sweet spot is different, so too is their “torpedo” bat.
The Yankees analytics department looked at every player’s hitting data so that the widest part of the bat – or the barrel – could be placed where they most often hit the ball.
For shortstop Anthony Volpe that meant moving the barrel closer to the label on his bat, according to YES Network commentator Michael Kay. Volpe’s teammates Jazz Chisholm Jr., Cody Bellinger, Paul Goldschmidt and Austin Wells were also swinging torpedo bats this weekend.
“It doesn’t feel like a different bat. It just helps you in a little way,” Chisholm Jr. said after his multi-homer game on Sunday.
“I don’t know the science of it … I think I still hit the ball the same, like, exit velocity as I always did. I just feel like it gives you a feeling of – just feeling like you have more to work with.
“You probably don’t have more to work with, but it feels like it,” he added.
New Yankees outfielder Bellinger practiced with a different “torpedo” bat last season while with the Cubs, but the games this past weekend were the first time he’d used one in a regular season game.
“Personally, the weight is closer to my hands, so I feel as if it’s lighter in a way. For me, that was the biggest benefit. Obviously, the bigger the sweet spot, the bigger the margin for error,” the 2019 NL MVP told MLB.
Who invented it?
The torpedo bat was developed by MIT physicist Aaron “Lenny” Leanhardt when he was an analyst in the Yankees organization.
Leanhardt said the idea was driven by the players as he noticed a common concern voiced from batters who wanted to make more, and better, contact with pitches.
“It’s just about making the bat as heavy and as fat as possible in the area where you’re trying to do damage on the baseball,” Leanhardt told the Athletic.
“It’s just through those conversations where you think to yourself, ‘Why don’t we exchange how much wood we’re putting on the tip versus how much we’re putting in the sweet spot?’
“That’s the original concept right there. Just try to take all that excess weight and try to put it where you’re trying to hit the ball and then, in exchange, try to take the thinner diameter that used to be at the sweet spot and put that on the tip.”
Leanhardt has since moved to the Marlins organization, taking up a role as a field coordinator.
Why doesn’t every team use it?
Although the Yankees’ performances are driving the “torpedo” bat narrative, they are not the only team dabbling in its use.
Twins’ catcher Ryan Jeffers and the Rays’ Junior Caminero and Yandy Díaz were also spotted using “torpedo” bats in Spring Training and over opening weekend. Players from around the league also started testing them out last season.
Baltimore Orioles hitting coach Cody Asche revealed some of his players are also trying them out, according to MLB.com.
“I think a lot of teams are doing that around the league. (The Yankees) may have some more players that have adopted it at a higher rate. But I think if you were around the clubhouse, all 30 teams, you would see a guy or two that’s kind of adopting a bat that’s kind of fashioned more specifically to their swing,” Asche told MLB.
ESPN’s Buster Olney reported on the network’s “Sunday Night Baseball” game between the Atlanta Braves and San Diego Padres that the Braves put in an order for the torpedo bats after seeing what the Yankees did on Saturday.
And not everyone on the Yankees is using one. In fact, Aaron Judge’s monster four-homer weekend was brought to fans using a traditional bat and he doesn’t have plans to switch anytime soon. “The past couple of seasons kind of speak for itself. Why try to change something?” he said a day after his three-homer performance.
Why are they allowed?
MLB’s bat regulations are fairly lax. The “torpedo” bats remain legal so long as they follow MLB Rule 3.02 which states: “The bat shall be a smooth, round stick not more than 2.61 inches in diameter at the thickest part and not more than 42 inches in length. The bat shall be one piece of solid wood.”
The rule further specifies that experimental bats cannot be used “until the manufacturer has secured approval from Major League Baseball of his design and methods of manufacture.”
So unless anything is changed in the MLB rulebook, the bats look like they’re here to stay.
What are the players saying?
Not everyone in the game is as enthusiastic as some of the aforementioned Yankees players. Brewers’ pitcher Trevor Megill, who faced the Yankees in his first relief outing of the season on Sunday, told the New York Post: “I think it’s terrible. We’ll see what the data says. I’ve never seen anything like it before. I feel like it’s something used in slow-pitch softball.
“It’s genius: Put the mass all in one spot. It might be bush (league). It might not be. But it’s the Yankees, so they’ll let it slide.”
Whereas San Diego Padres third-baseman Manny Machado was a little more open-minded.
“I have no idea what they are. They should send a few over here if they’re gonna be hitting homers like that. Whoever is making them can send a few over to Petco (Park) with this big ballpark,” Machado joked while mic’d up in-game on Sunday.
Baltimore Orioles outfielder Cedric Mullins was similarly intrigued.
“Trying to give hitters any kind of edge because pitching is only getting better and it’s getting harder to hit. It’s an interesting concept. When it was first introduced to us, I didn’t know how widespread this thought process was, but it’s getting around pretty quick,” Mullins told the The Baltimore Banner.
Based on the Yankees performances over the weekend, baseball fans might be seeing more torpedo bats around the league soon. And the 2019 Minnesota Twins’ “Bomba Squad” and 2023 Braves’ MLB joint record of 307 home runs in a single season might just look a little vulnerable to this season’s Bronx Bombers.