The pros and cons of using a 'Torpedo' bat

Roy Hobbs, the fabled swinger of his beloved “Wonderboy,” might disagree. But there really is no such thing as a “magic bat.”

When MLB hitters select their sticks, they must make certain compromises. The longer a bat, for instance, the more difficult it is to control through the zone. The shorter it is, the more difficult it is to reach pitches off the plate. Maple bats are the strongest and most dense and therefore the most powerful. Ash bats are lighter and therefore less powerful but are more flexible, allowing for more forgiveness on mishits off the end of the bat.

• Meet the man behind the revolutionary 'Torpedo' bats

To this land of lumber selection comes the so-called “Torpedo” -- a bat style that has already been the talk of MLB in the young 2025 season.

In their opening weekend series against the Brewers, the Yankees' offense went ballistic. The Bronx Bombers, led by reigning AL MVP Aaron Judge, hit nine homers in a single game, one shy of an MLB record, while in the course of hammering 15 homers in their first three games, tying an AL/NL record.

It was an impressive power performance that had folks rushing not only to the record books but also the rule book.

As first noted in the YES Network broadcast of the nine-homer game, a few of the Yankees players were using the Torpedo. The bat is skinnier at the top end, with noticeably more wood in the area around the label, closer to the hitter’s hands than the traditional barrel. (Though the bat actually resembles a bowling pin more than a Torpedo, the Torpedo name sure seems to have stuck.)

Baseball hitting history has taught us the value of "barreling" up the ball, propelling it with that correct combo of exit velocity and launch angle to shoot it into the gap or force it over the fence. But the bats swung by the likes of Jazz Chisholm Jr., Paul Goldschmidt, Austin Wells, Cody Bellinger and Anthony Volpe (Judge says he’s sticking with the traditional style of bat he used to hit an AL record-breaking 62 dingers in 2022, thank you very much) introduces the concept of "labeling" the ball. It’s an interesting option for players more prone to making contact in that area than on the traditional barrel.

People were quick to criticize these bats, suggesting the Yankees had Torpedoed their way to an illegal competitive edge.

But as it turns out, these bats are not as new as many think, are not limited to just the Yankees, and do indeed abide by MLB’s stick stipulations.

• From 'banana' bat to 'Torpedo' bat: Tracing baseball's lumber evolution

And in an era in which the absurd stuff wielded by pitchers has created absurd strikeout totals, fans ought to embrace any innovation that could legally induce more offense.

Though the Yankees’ power performance was the Torpedo’s big breakthrough in the public consciousness, they aren’t the only team to have brandished these bats. The roster for Team Torpedo also includes Mets superstar Francisco Lindor, All-Star Orioles catcher Adley Rutschman and young Rays sensation Junior Caminero, among others. That list is going to grow by the day, because, already, bat manufacturers are hearing from tons of players who want to give the Torpedo a try.

As we’ve seen throughout baseball history -- and especially in the analytics era -- unorthodox ideas can quickly gather steam. Heck, extreme defensive shifts that completely altered the traditional arrangement of infielders became so commonplace that MLB instituted a rule change in 2023 to drastically limit them.

Given the leaguewide desire to improve contact percentages, there’s no reason to torpedo the Torpedo. And in a Statcast-inspired sport in which the finer points of a player’s statistical identity can be easily researched, tailoring the bat to a hitter’s specific swing makes a lot of sense.

Just don’t look at the Torpedo as a cure-all for K’s and a salvation for all swing types. As noted by Scott Drake, president of Wisconsin-based wood products laboratory PFS-TECO and MLB’s independent bat consultant, the Torpedo comes with a trade-off.

“Like the sledgehammer analogy,” Drake said. “If you put the weight at the end of the sledgehammer, it takes a lot of energy to get it to swing, and you bring that weight down. If you bring that weight down the handle, it gets easier and easier to swing, but the sledgehammer becomes less and less effective because the weight is too close to your hands, and that leverage changes.

“So it’s a balance between mass and swing speed.”

The new bats, therefore, aren’t for everybody, and you can bet that pitchers will try to adjust to those who use them. But the Torpedo is perfectly legit -- and a reminder that barreling the ball doesn’t necessarily mean hitting it on the traditional barrel itself.

Sorry, Wonderboy.