Tyler Fitzgerald has tried everything possible to break out of his early-season slump and might have found some answers in the Giants’ impressive 8-6 comeback win over the Reds at Oracle Park on Wednesday.
Fitzgerald collected two hits, including a key sixth-inning single, to improve his batting average from an anemic .179 to .219 and gain some confidence as the Giants prepare for their longest trip of the season beginning with a weekend visit to Yankee Stadium.
Like other hitters, Fitzgerald always seeks an edge at the plate, and that includes the type of bat he swings. He knows all about the torpedo bat craze that’s sweeping the Major League Baseball landscape and is interested in experiencing it himself.
“I put in an order just to try them,” Fitzgerald said. “I’m not sure that’s going to save me or anything. We’ll see. I’m going to try them out.”
Many hitters have experienced success with the thicker-barreled torpedo bats that somewhat resemble bowling pins and provide exaggerated sweet spots closer to the label — in some cases, they generate huge results.
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The bats are perfectly legal based on MLB rules on specifications for size and shape, confirmed Commissioner Rob Manfred, who has supported rule changes in recent years that promote accelerated offensive numbers. The weight with torpedo bats is redistributed from the end of the bat to a portion of the barrel where a hitter best strikes the ball, increasing the diameter at the sweet spot as well as exit velocities.
While the Yankees have been swinging torpedo bats since the season-opening series and Cincinnati’s Elly De La Cruz has used them as well, including the past three days at Oracle Park, nobody on the Giants has used one in a game.
It’s not that they don’t want to. It’s that they don’t have any in their hands yet. Because torpedo bats are special orders, each designed for an individual hitter, it takes time for manufacturers to size them, make them, and ship them. Production is determined by specific technological data, including the hitter’s precise specs and where pitches tend to strike his bat.
“They are coming,” assured Brad Grems, the Giants’ clubhouse and equipment manager. “I just don’t know when.”
When the Giants were getting shut out Monday and Tuesday, managing just eight hits in the process, it would have been natural to wonder if a torpedo bat or two could have made a difference. Wednesday, torpedo bats were the furthest things from the Giants’ minds as they rediscovered their groove with 12 hits and overcame a 6-1 deficit, tying the game in the eighth on Wilmer Flores’ homer and winning it in the 11th on Mike Yastrzemski’s two-run shot into McCovey Cove.
Fitzgerald has two torpedo bats on order from Louisville Slugger, which has its plant near his home in Kentucky. He doesn’t expect them to arrive during the upcoming trip through New York, Philadelphia, and Anaheim and hopes they’ll be available next homestand.
“They’re getting swamped by so many people right now that they can’t send 10 of them,” Fitzgerald said. “So they’re sending me a couple of demos. It’s probably going to be a while, but I’m excited to try one.”
De La Cruz, the Reds’ dynamic shortstop who had two hits Wednesday, including a hard chopper off the top of first baseman LaMonte Wade’s mitt that went for a two-run double – would it have been a routine groundout with a regular bat? – also uses Louisville Sluggers.
So why did De La Cruz get a shipment and not Fitzgerald?
“I asked that same question,” Fitzgerald said. “‘How did he get them so fast?’ ”
A Louisville Slugger spokesperson suggested in a phone interview with The Standard that the Reds’ proximity to Louisville makes it easier for Cincinnati players to acquire the bats. According to a report by the Cincinnati Enquirer’s Gordon Wittenmyer, the process was hurried along after De La Cruz’s representatives from the Boras Corporation reached out to Louisville Slugger.
Fitzgerald isn’t the only Giant waiting on torpedo bats. Catcher Patrick Bailey, whose RBI triple highlighted the Giants’ four-run sixth inning Wednesday, put in an order with Victus Sports out of Pennsylvania. He already uses bats with a puck knob, which is an extension to the knob that allows hitters to choke up on the bat without actually choking up and moves the point of balance closer to the hitting area.
“We’ve got some coming,” Bailey said of torpedoes. “I’ll try anything. I think it’s something that makes sense. It won’t hurt to try. It seems to work for a couple of Yankee guys and guys around the league. If there’s any type of advantage we could get as a hitter, I think we’ve got to take it. Pitchers are always a few steps ahead.”
The Standard interviewed all the top position players on the Giants, and several are lukewarm over torpedo bats. Some said they’d give them a try in the batting cage while others want nothing to do with them.
Third baseman Matt Chapman, who swings Old Hickory (Tennessee) bats, said, “I did put in an order. Why wouldn’t you check it out? I don’t know if I’d use it in a game, but I might take batting practice with it. I don’t think it’ll be some huge, significant difference, but I’m willing to see.”
Yastrzemski, who hit his fifth career walk-off homer and seventh career splash hit Wednesday, also put in an order and anticipates a torpedo from one of two bat companies, Victus or Chandler.
“I don’t know if I’m going to use it,” he said. “I’ll at least try it in the cage and see how it goes and go from there. I think you always want to try new things. You could always get better, have the willingness to try it and see if it works. If not, no worries.”
Hitters are particular about their bats, just like their gloves, and don’t easily make wholesale changes. Certain bats got them to the majors, and it’s not easy to give them up. As a result, not everyone is gung-ho about joining the torpedo craze.
That includes Flores, whose game-tying homer was his fifth in 12 games. Last year, he had just four homers in 71 games.
“I’m not interested,” said Flores, adding he has used the same model for 15 years, a Marucci 34-inch, 31 ½-ounce. “It’s hard for me to use new bats. My bat, it’s just a good feeling. I mean, I might try them in the cage, but for me to take them into the game, it has to come with that good feeling. I don’t think I’ll use them.”
Willy Adames, the Giants’ prized offseason acquisition who collected 32 homers and 112 RBIs last season, could use an offensive boost this year — Wednesday’s 0-for-4 dropped his average to .184 — but he’s not about to start swinging torpedoes.
“I really don’t care about it right now,” he said. “I’m not saying I wouldn’t give it a try. Maybe in the future, if we get some and I try it and like it. It appears to help a lot of guys.”
The Yankees got a head start with torpedoes. Giancarlo Stanton used something similar last season and raked in the postseason. Cody Bellinger tried it with the Cubs last season — teammate Nico Hoerner had been using it — and after Bellinger signed with the Yankees in the offseason, torpedoes suddenly became popular in the Bronx.
In the Yankees’ season-opening three-game series, they hit a whopping 15 homers, nine of which came courtesy of torpedo bats, hit by Jazz Chisholm Jr., Austin Wells, Anthony Volpe, Paul Goldschmidt, and Bellinger. For the record, Aaron Judge wants no part of torpedoes. Nevertheless, it didn’t take long for players around the game to put in their own orders.
De La Cruz faced Giants pitching in the Reds’ first series and went 3-for-11. The next day, in the opener of a series against Texas, he was swinging a torpedo and suddenly went 4-for-5 with two homers and seven RBIs.
Transformational day for De La Cruz? Or simply a case of pitchers missing their spots? It should be noted that since that day, De La Cruz is hitting .166 (6-for-36) with no homers.
“It sounds like the Yankees have been working on this for a while and had it before anyone else. Typical Yankees,” Giants hitting coach Pat Burrell said. “I would say it’s like the technology with drivers in golf. Every year, there’s something new. It doesn’t necessarily make it better. But if you’re going to consistently hit the center of the club face with the ball, you’re going to have more success. I guess we’ll have to see.”