Bats

Ash is a much denser and harder wood than maple, and I can certainly see that bats would be stronger. Probably the reason it's not used more is a matter of supply. Maple is more readily available than ash is.

According to this link http://www.thewoodbox.com/data/wood/ashinfo.htm ash wood is not stronger but it has the best strength to weight ratio. Maple wood is stronger, but it might not work as well as it would not have the correct balance, but I presume that the reason is because maple is cheaper or since a lot of furniture is made out of maple, why throw the limbs away, make them into bats. This is my take on this, economy.

I'm not sure but that is a very good question. I think there should be a rule for it also.

I've heard people say that maple is harder wood and gives some players more power, but that ash gives a little and other players like that for the control, but I think any wood could break, and that it depends more on the quality of the particular wood than whether it is maple or ash, but that if it is good quality wood either kind is less likely to break. I wonder, though, why they don't use bamboo, which is stronger than either.

Well if people would pat attention to what`s going on on the field we would have lower rates of injuries. In reference to the bats. People dig the long ball. Bats breaking have a lot to do with poor mechanics and not taking care of their bats. Second, if they used only ASH the tree huggers would be protesting that. the biggest problem is smaller barrels so people can swing the bat faster. Just saying that ash would be safer does not make it so. Barry bonds used maple and didn`t have a broken bat problem. It`s ipkeep and the maker that determine that.

I don't know much about baseball, and I won't really know the material of a baseball bat. Yeah, they should really make a rule to prohibit the flying bat injures an audience.

Wow! That's terrible to happen! You know, I always thought it was a rule that the bat HAD to be ash because of it's strength & that it didn't snap easily like softer woods. Here's a good example of the difference....when we used to keep bulls at the farm here, their pen rails were made of ash because it's so much stronger. A bull wouldn't have to make much effort to snap something out of maple. I've never ever heard of a bat being made out of anything but ash, or those newer aluminum type ones (which are not for pro ball.) I tried looking to see if there is such a rule, but couldn't find anything on it. Maybe this will make them go back to bats made out of ash, doesn't make sense to make it out of a softer wood like that. Even so, I would think a softer maplewood would get dents in them just from the hardness of the baseballs after repeated use. Interesting, will have to watch the news on that.