Splendid Splinters

 

Among the thousands of prose poems about baseball, very few are devoted to the charmless instrument known as the metal bat. The co-star of Bernard Malamud’s benchmark baseball novel The Natural is “Wonderboy,” the handmade bat used by the protagonist Roy Hobbs, who created it from a tree that had been struck by lightning. Metal bats and lightning, it should be noted, are a lethal combination. And thanks to a feisty city council member from Staten Island, metal bats are no longer used in official New York City high school baseball games.

It’s been a year and a half since Republican councilman James Oddo got local law 0341 passed, and in recent months several other major cities have considered similar legislation. New York Family Sports caught up with Oddo for an update as the 2009 baseball season arrived.

It will be two years this fall since the city banned metal bats from high school baseball games. What is your current assessment of the situation?

In New York City last season we conducted a great experiment with all the high school baseball games being played with wood and I am happy to see that despite the dire warnings from the metal bat industry it was a great success. Baseball returned to the high schools of New York City. Pitching became important again, defense became important, little ball became important, taking the extra base. Instead of relying on an artificial bat, it was back to being baseball. And these aren’t just my words because you might say I have a vested interest in it. Go back and look at the quotes from the players and the coaches— including some of the loudest critics. It was a resounding success, and at the same time we made the game a little bit safer. All of the dire predictions about the bats breaking at such a high rate that it was going to cost the schools their baseball program—that didn’t happen. The fear-mongering that the metal bat cartel put out saying New York City ballplayers were going to lose their scholarship opportunities because the statistics in the offensive category wouldn’t be as inflated—it was laughable when it was said to educated baseball people and it has already been proven false.

Were you surprised at how much organized outcry their was about this law?

Maybe initially when I was naïve enough to bring some players, coaches and league officials around a table one summer night 10 years ago on Staten Island and we said “C’mon guys, we know metal plays differently than wood, let’s just do it on our own” that is when I got my education about just what type of Goliath we were fighting. As this process went on, nothing shocked me anymore because I realized that this was about money.

And when money is on the line and you are fighting corporate America with all of its reach, this is what they do. When I was contacted by the Alderman in Chicago last September when we were notified he was going to try to pursue the same type of legislation we did, I tried to caution him that the ride would get bumpy, that the press was going to mock him and some people in the public would question his priorities. And the metal bat cartel, as I deemed them, were going to roll out a very well-financed PR machine which included coaches and so-called experts on their payroll who would obfuscate and try to confuse and out and out lie. And that is what we ran up against. I have enough New York Post editorials calling me an idiot to wallpaper my bathroom.

What specific evidence do you rely on to prove the difference between wood and metal bats?

There was what they call an International Power Showcase, which is a home run derby in St. Petersburg, at Tropicana Field where the Rays play, in January, and they had the best high school hitters in the country hit in a home run derby situation.

They hit with metal and hit with wood. There was a Baseball America article, and if you look at it you’d see the top five distances with wood were 408 feet or so. The top distances with metal [Las Vegas High School prospect] Bryce Harper hit a home run 502 feet. A scientific experiment? No, not at all. But, it just goes to show in a small way—an unscientific way—but in an accurate way, the difference between metal and wood. What the uninitiated don’t get is we’re talking about fractions of a second allowing a pitcher and sometimes and infielder just a little bit more time to get his glove up and protect himself.

I’ve said many times now, and it sounds kind of corny, but it’s accurate—the game of baseball was built around a piece of wood.

Are you surprised this issue has spread to other cities like Chicago and Pittsburgh?

I always believed that we were the first domino and that if New York City went to wood it would encourage other grassroots efforts, whether they were legislative efforts or efforts from parents to follow suit. I said to my staff at the time when we passed the bill that we may not see legislatures rush out and do this, but we planted the seed in the minds of folks and when there is the next near-incident in a particular jurisdiction, they will recall that New York City did this and they will be more likely to act. My only concern is that I hope it is not after a tragedy. Whether it is this small issue or it is as big as homeland security, government on all levels tends to act after a tragedy or some sort of incident. I just hope it doesn’t cost another kid’s life before my colleagues across the country have the courage to endure what they will endure to pass this type of prohibition.