A power surge: Was it the batters, or was it the bat?

Austin Wells homered in the first inning off Néstor Cortes on Saturday. (Instagram via Ground News)

By Sam Blum / The Athletic

During a splendid 2023 season, Atlanta Braves first baseman Matt Olson, a two-time All-Star, led MLB with 54 homers and 139 runs batted in. He has had a successful baseball career by using a typical bat, with the barrel near the end.

But even a hitter of his stature, one with little reason to experiment, took notice last weekend when the New York Yankees went viral for walloping the Milwaukee Brewers with a torrent of home runs. Some of them were hit by players wielding an innovation from a former team employee and onetime Massachusetts Institute of Technology physicist who reimagined bats to be shaped more like torpedoes.

“Guys are going to be trying it out now,” said Olson, who noted that personal preference would be among the factors to consider. “I might try it to just feel what it’s like.”

The torpedo bats have been the talk of baseball since Saturday, when the Yankees hit nine home runs in a single game, a franchise record. On the YES Network, broadcaster Michael Kay clued in viewers during the second inning: The team’s front office had analyzed shortstop Anthony Volpe’s at-bats, he said, and found he was making more contact on the label, slightly below the barrel.

“So they had bats made up where they moved a lot of the wood into the label,” Kay said. “So the harder part of the bat is actually going to strike the ball.”

The Yankees went on to win, 20-9. For an encore Sunday, New York tacked on four more homers in a 12-3 triumph to complete a three-game sweep. Whether the power surge was the result of new equipment or hot hitters, the weekend served as a live infomercial. Their 15 home runs in their first three games tied a Major League Baseball record.

And after the Yankees’ 32 runs in their past two games, consciousness of the new model is rising, and more players are open to seeing if it works. Some agents have noticed an uptick in calls from their clients, inquiring about how to get their hands on the new bats.

“It seems like it’s making its way around MLB,” said Los Angeles Angels infielder Nicky Lopez, who spent spring training with the Chicago Cubs, where he said they used the bats as well. “It’s definitely not just the Yankees. I think we’re going to see more people — it’s legal. It’s under MLB rules and everything. Just basically moving the sweet spot down. Those balls that you’re getting jammed on are finding some barrels.”

While the Yankees might use them the most, they and the Cubs are not the only teams with access to the torpedoes. Several members of the Minnesota Twins, including Ryan Jeffers, use the bats. Davis Schneider of the Toronto Blue Jays and Junior Caminero of the Tampa Bay Rays also use them.

Before this season, use of the bats and knowledge of their existence seemed to vary from team to team. Will Venable, the manager of the Chicago White Sox, said he had not heard of them until Saturday but added that “everyone across the league probably now is going to be looking into using these.”

The Boston Red Sox knew about the bats and even used them at times in spring training. But manager Alex Cora said none of his players are batting with them as the games start to count.

The Cubs have been researching the bats since last season. One player said the front office relayed that using the bats would increase exit velocity.

“It will get plenty of attention now,” A.J. Hinch, the manager of the Detroit Tigers, said Saturday. “The internet has a beautiful way of bringing things to be a big deal. I hadn’t paid a ton of attention to it really until today.”

But the torpedo bats, it seems, have been lingering in the background for a few years.

The first iterations of the bats seem to stem from Aaron Leanhardt, the MIT physicist who now works for the Miami Marlins but had been with the Yankees in player development. San Diego Padres outfielder Brandon Lockbridge had been in the Yankees organization with Leanhardt and recalled him developing the bats around 2022. They were made available to players in the minors, and Lockbridge remembers seeing them at the team’s minor league complex.

“They weren’t a hot commodity,” Lockbridge said.

Leonhardt kept evangelizing, anyway. He offered presentations to interested players, advocating the reasons for change. Lockbridge recalled that the focus was less on improving exit velocities — which have become a basic measure of success for hitters — and more on increasing contact.

“His big thing was, like, guys that just swing and miss by a fraction of an inch, you’re now fouling off, staying alive,” Lockbridge said. “Because there’s more barrel there, your mis-hits can be closer to a barrel or maximize that.”

Some who did try the new bat said it felt weird. Lockbridge used the bats in spring training dating to 2022, though he has stuck with his typical equipment during games. But others have taken a chance. The bats were initially used in real games last season. Yankees outfielder Cody Bellinger said up to five of his teammates were using the new lumber.

“I guess this is like a turning point,” Lockbridge said. “It’s kind of been going public the last couple days. So we’ll kind of see how it goes. I’ve heard a couple guys chirping around saying, ‘I need you to order me a couple of those torpedo bats.’”

A veteran hitter for the Philadelphia Phillies said B45, a bat manufacturing company chaired by a former Los Angeles Dodgers closer, Eric Gagne, brought a model with similar weight distribution to their camp in spring training. He wrote it off as a fad at the time, but called his bat guy after the Yankees’ outburst Saturday.

“I think it’s really smart,” said Angels outfielder Taylor Ward, who also just heard of the bats over the weekend. “It makes sense, where guys constantly hit the ball on the bat. I think it’s an amazing discovery.”

If a study revealed that this new bat worked best for his contact tendencies, Ward said, he “would absolutely listen and consider adjusting what I swing, for sure.”

Ultimately, the bat will not be for everyone. The veteran Phillies hitter said he believed prototypical sluggers might be less inclined to use one. Aaron Judge uses a normal bat, for example, and hit three home runs for the Yankees on Saturday and another Sunday. He has signaled that he has no intention of changing. There is also a concern, Olson said, of pitchers adapting and inducing more end-of-bat contact.

The bats are legal. MLB rules only require that the bat is smooth, with a round stick not more than 2.61 inches in diameter at the thickest part and not more than 42 inches in length. A league representative confirmed the new bats did not stray from the rules.

There was some speculation about whether their use would become widespread. Padres infielder Jake Cronenworth, a member of the executive subcommittee of the players’ union, acknowledged that though he had not used them, “there’s no reason not to try it.”

It was not until the final weeks of spring training that the Yankees’ Jazz Chisholm Jr. picked up the bat. He used Volpe’s in a game and hit a double. He used it again the next game and hit a home run. At that point, it was decided: This was his new bat.

He is not sure of the science behind it, or if the advantage is legitimate or mental. But if MLB players believe it works, then its use may increase.

Chisholm hit two home runs Sunday swinging the torpedo.

“I feel like it gives you the feeling like you have more to work with,” he said. “You probably don’t have more to work with, but it feels like it. It gives you that extra confidence in your head to go out there and hit anything.”