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Powerful Tape
Just what is WITH all these homeruns?
Everyone in this league is enjoying a happy little time as a hitter
while at the same time facing certain death on the mound. Some of
the more inexplicable things this league has ever seen have occurred
this season, and we're not even a third the way through. For example:
--Jeff
Morrison has 6 HRs in only 51 ABs.
--Both Scott
Carmichael and Mike
Walsh broke the record for homers in a game, and it was
the SAME game!
--Nate
Stuempfig hit the Creighton's roof on a shot off Seth
Yoder. This had only been done once before, and it was
in a HR Derby.
--Speaking of Seth, he has 11 HRs in only 74 ABs.
--Mike Walsh has 24 in only 91 ABs.
--Terry
Creighton has 8 HRs in 64 ABs.
--Casey
Sylvester has 12 in only 49 ABs.
--The league's AB/K ratio is only 6.51, the lowest ever by a large
margin. Last year it was 10.29.
--Six times a team has scored 10 or more runs in a game.
--Eric
Christensen still hasn't returned!
And so on...
What
is going on? The early gamedays in this league are usually spent
seeing pitchers dueling it out in low-scoring affairs while hitters
try to see who will be the first to find his stroke. Now the tables
have been turned. Batters are walking mudholes all over the pitchers
and pitchers are scrambling to figure out what can be done before
they see their ERA reach double digits. Only four pitchers in this
league have an ERA below 3.00. Last season, that number was eleven.
The weather has been nice, but not this nice. The game seems to
be changing, and while many reasons abound for this offensive revolution,
one reason sticks out in my mind like a sore thumb: Carmichael Technologies
and their (his) new way of taping bats.
A myriad of people have a myriad of
theories as to why we are seeing offense at this pace, and I'm not
going to discount any of them. Yes, many teams are only playing
with two guys, which helps the team's offense while it hurts their
pitching. Yes, the hitters are getting a little bigger and stronger,
and are getting tougher to fool with curves or inside gas. None
of these ideas are wrong, but none of them are the main reason pitchers
are now the ones shitting their pants. The weaponry is, and I will
tell you why.
In today's world of wiffleball, you
can buy aluminum wifflebats for $30-$100 a pop. Somewhere in some
east coast city exists some guy who is coming up with the "next
big thing". Aluminum bats that don't harm the ball, bats with
air pumps that allow you to increase or decrease the power of you
bat. All dumb ideas, and none worth your money or attention. Years
ago, most people were content with just the naked, yellow wifflebat.
People started to realize though, that if you put tape on a bat,
you could hit the ball further. Scott Carmichael was one of these
fellows, back in 3rd and 4th grade.
"Well, it's a simple idea,"
says Scott. "Of course I'm not the first guy to figure this
out, but I did figure it out on my own. You then move on progressively.
By 1996 I figured out that duct tape works much better than electrical
tape. Coming into 2001, I was getting bored. There had to be better
tape," says Scott, who was also getting bored with nearly everyone
in the league now using duct tape. He found what he was searching
for with bandage wrap. "It was like BOOM!,"
exclaims Scott, describing the idea that hit him. "I tinkered
with it at first. Putting tape on a bat is like art. Put too much
tape on, and your bat becomes too top-heavy. Put too little on and
you take away the purpose of the tape. The great thing about this
bat is that it doubles as a first-aid kit. Mike Walsh rolls his
ankle rounding second, and we've got no problem."
While there may or may not be an art
to applying tape to a bat, there might just be an art is selecting
the tape for a bat. Bandage wrap is much softer than duct tape and
electrical tape. What this means is that when a ball is hit off
the bat with bandage wrap, the cushioning of the tape does not allow
the ball to dent. This happened often in our league with the Cosom
Fun Ball. The ball would be hit so hard that the ball was misshapen
upon impact and then died in the air. This has become a nonoccurrence
with the new bats. Balls jump off the bat like never before. Wimpy
little "choke and poke" Texas leaguers are carrying themselves
over the wall. Countless HRs that would get taken away last year
because they were hit TOO hard are now leaving the yard. However,
the CEO of Carmichael Technologies isn't sold on this theory.
"The reduction of denting in the
ball is a possibility, but I'm not entirely sure how much difference
that has made. Personally, I've made a lot of changes in my swing.
Last year I was most embarrassed by my .348 average. I'm no .348
hitter. I'm a .400 hitter. This year I don't go "HR-or-nothing"
anymore on my swings like used to, which I think is what cause the
ball to dent...at least for me."
If
you look at players other than Scott though, you aren't sold on
HIS theories. Carmichael Technologies has "signed" Derek
Byrd to a "contract" that allowed Derek to
get a custom-made bat by Scott himself. Derek currently has 7 HRs
in 52 ABs, by far the best HR ratio of his career. Derek is "HR-or-nothing"
on every swing--something he will not deny--and when using CarTech's
bat, his ball has not been denting. This happened routinely with
Derek earlier in the season when he used an all-electrical tape
bat. Derek could not be reached for comment, but it's believed that
his power numbers, especially those with a CarTech bat, speak for
themselves.
The last and possibly most important
thing this bat seems to be doing is giving hitters confidence. Whether
or not the bat is making a statistical difference, many hitters
believe that it is, and step to the plate worrying less. Hitters
now believe that they can still hit one out if they get jammed,
or hit it off the end of the bat. This in turn is leading pitchers
to suffering from confidence problems. These same people who trust
the bat when they are hitting fear the bat when they are pitching,
and instead of pitching like men, are pitching like afraid men.
Is the fear justified? Yes it is, but that's when it gets good.
You see, when pitchers have their backs against the wall...they
always seem to come up with SOMETHING to even out the card. Develop
a new pitch, master the art of playing the field, scout the hitters
like never before...whatever. In the MLB, pitches like the slider
came about because of hitters dominating the game. It was a little
curve, a little fastball, and it evened out the playing field. The
splitter...same story. The pitchers in this league (who are also
the hitters) are going to have their backs against the wall all
year it appears. The MLB pitchers have had the juiced ball, the
tiny fields, the lower mound, the cheerio-sized strike zone, and
the hitters who are becoming beasts on drugs to compete with the
past decade. Still, guys like Pedro Martinez remain as unhittable
today as (rightfully deserved) legends like Sandy Koafax were in
the 60's. Our strike zone ain't getting any bigger. The truly talented
ones are going to find out how to be able to hold their own, or
maybe even dominate.
Everyone else will just be waiting
their turn to hit.
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