Posted by: SBK () on Tue Aug 10 11:26:00 2004

My son, age 9, played in a wooden bat tourney last week. He faced better pitching, better fielding, etc. The bat was a 27" 22.5oz. model. He used a 29" 16.5oz aluminum bat during LL play.
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> He hit the ball much further, harder, and more consistently with the heavier wood bat. How can that be? Smaller sweet spot, etc.
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> Now, my son wants to use a wooden bat all the time for LL play. Is that a good idea? It seems that it would not make him dependable on technology for success.
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> Any thoughts?
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> Thanks,

Wooden bats are excellent for practice in particularly because the limited sweetspot rewards better swing mechanics, etc..

At age 9 I wouldn't get too hung up with using wood even for practice until high school. (Players need to be strong enough to swing a wood bat using proper mechanics first)

Your question is about physics although hitting is mental so it is possible to "feel" better about a bat and hit better even though science can prove it shouldn't be so.

Having said that disclaimer, the performance for modern metal bats are superior to wood bats. That's been proven by various scientific studies, or for that matter, most hitters who have used both.

I am sure your analysis of your son hitting the ball harder with the wooden bat is accurate.

The reason is that the bat is 40% heavier. If he used a similar size metal bat he should see even better improvement.

There are many factors that can make a difference in addition to weight. Longer bats can produce more batspeed due to physics. It also matters how the weight is distributed.

In addition to other property advantages, metal is a material that allows the weight to be distributed more favorably than wood.

To make a long story short. If you are looking for the best results, use the longest and heaviest most modern bat that allows you to create the highest batspeed at contact and make the most favorable, consistent contact. (And of course that is within the legal weight and length guidelines for the league)

It's pretty much the same case for swing technique. You generally want to do what creates the highest batspeed at contact and enables the most favorable, consistent contact. For me, it's rotational mechanics.

Best of luck to you and your son