(NEXSTAR) — Even if you don’t follow baseball, you may have heard talk of the torpedo bats that seemingly helped propel the New York Yankees to put up 36 runs and hit 15 homers during their opening series against the Milwaukee Brewers.
As significant as this start is for the Yankees, it’s the bowling pin-like bats that are catching the most attention.
So what are these weirdly shaped bats, how do they work, and are they even legal?
Here’s what to know about these new-styled bats you may see more of during the MLB season.
Credit has been directed toward Aaron Leanhardt, a former Yankees front-office staffer who now works for the Miami Marlins.
Before Leanhardt joined the baseball sphere, he was a physicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. While his name has become just as popular as the torpedo bats have, he told The Athletic that the unique lumber was a group effort.
As new as the torpedoes may be to fans, they became available to players in the Yankees’ minor league system in 2022 and were pitched as being able to improve contact. Some Yankees players even used them during the postseason last year, commentators noted during Sunday’s game against Milwaukee.
Those who have put bat to ball — or at least tried to — know how challenging it can be to connect with a pitch. It can be even more difficult to strike the ball in such a way that it becomes a hit and not a ground ball, pop-out or a graze that finds its way to the catcher’s mitt.
That’s where the torpedo bat comes in. With its bowling-pin-like barrel, there is more mass at the bat’s sweet spot.
Here’s a side-by-side comparison of Jazz Chisholm Jr. On the left is Chisholm batting last season, and on the right, Chisholm batting over the weekend with the torpedo.
NEW YORK, NY – OCTOBER 30: Jazz Chisholm Jr. #13 of the New York Yankees bats during Game 5 of the 2024 World Series presented by Capital One between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the New York Yankees at Yankee Stadium on Wednesday, October 30, 2024 in New York, New York. (Photo by Daniel Shirey/MLB Photos via Getty Images)
And here is a side-by-side comparison of Yankees outfielder Cody Bellinger.
On the left is Bellinger’s bat from last season, when he was with the Chicago Cubs, and on the right is the bat he used over the weekend.
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS – SEPTEMBER 03: Cody Bellinger #24 of the Chicago Cubs bats in a game against the Pittsburgh Pirates at Wrigley Field on September 3, 2024 in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by Matt Dirksen/Chicago Cubs/Getty Images)
The bat on the left likely looks more like the bat you’re familiar with, with a narrow barrel. The bat on the right has a slightly thicker barrel.
Can’t really tell the difference? You may not, because, as former Yankees infielder Kevin Smith wrote online, “It’s fractions of an inch on the barrel.”
“You’re going up with a weapon that can be better,” he wrote while discussing the bats. “Your just misses could be clips, your clips could be flares, and your flares could (be) barrels.”
As Leanhardt explained to The Athletic, the original concept swapped how much wood was at the tip of the bat to the sweet spot, a few inches down from the tip.
The shifting of the weight has been attractive to players so far. Bellinger, who was presented with the torpedo-shape concept in a batting practice session last season but did not use it in a game, got a more advanced version during spring training this year.
“I started swinging this one in spring or before spring, kind of early on, and I was like, ‘Oh, it feels good,’” Bellinger said. “It was an ounce lighter than the one I was swinging, but I think the way the weight was distributed felt really good.”
Simply, yes, these bats are completely legal.
MLB has relatively uncomplicated bat rules, stating under 3.02: “The bat shall be a smooth, round stick not more than 2.61 inches in diameter at the thickest part and not more than 42 inches in length. The bat shall be one piece of solid wood.” It goes on to state there may be a cupped indentation up to 1 1/4 inches in depth, 2 inches wide and with at least a 1-inch diameter, and experimental models must be approved by MLB.
Among the Yankees, Bellinger, Paul Goldschmidt, Austin Wells, Anthony Volpe, and Jazz Chisholm Jr. opted for the torpedo bats over the weekend. They all hit homers during New York’s 20-9 rout of the Brewers on Saturday.
“The concept makes so much sense. I know I’m bought in,” Volpe said. “The bigger you can have the barrel where you hit the ball, it makes sense to me.”
Volpe, with two homers, is one of four Yankees to have already hit multiple home runs this season: Chisholm sits at three, while Wells also has two. The fourth is Aaron Judge, who has hit four homers — without the help of the new bat style.
“The past couple of seasons kind of speak for itself,” Judge said a day after his third career three-homer game. “Why try to change something?”
New York Yankees’ Aaron Judge hits an RBI double during the seventh inning of a baseball game against the Milwaukee Brewers at Yankee Stadium, Thursday, March 27, 2025, in New York. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)
Minnesota Twins shortstop Carlos Correa had a similar response, telling The Minnesota Star Tribune that while he tried the pin-like bats in spring training, he “was really comfortable” with his conventional bats. “I feel like we need a full year of data to see how they play,” he added.
He told the outlet that pitches away from the batter become “a little tough” with the torpedo, as those are typically hit further down the bat. That area becomes more narrow with the torpedo design.
While Judge and Correa are satisfied with their conventional bat, other players around the MLB are turning their eyes toward the torpedo bats.
Los Angeles Angels infielder Nicky Lopez told The Athletic that the Cubs, who he spent spring training with, utilized the bats. The Boston Red Sox also tried them in spring while some members of the Baltimore Orioles have reportedly been testing them. Ryan Jeffers of the Twins, Davis Schneider of the Toronto Blue Jays, and Junior Caminero of the Tampa Bay Rays have tried the torpedoes.
Brewers first baseman Rhys Hoskins said he put in an order for the bats after seeing them Saturday, noting “there’s no harm” in trying them.
San Diego Padre Manny Machado told ESPN’s “Sunday Night Baseball” he wasn’t familiar with the bats until seeing the Yankees use them but joked, “Whoever’s making ‘em, they can send a few over to Petco [Park].”
It’s too soon to say whether everyone will begin using the torpedo bat.
“My old a– will tell you this, for sure, it ain’t the wand; it’s the magician,” Brewers manager Pat Murphy said in New York over the weekend. “If the bats help, I’m sure every guy in the league will be using them within a week.”
For what it’s worth, the Yankees only beat the Brewers 12-3 on Sunday. Among the torpedo-welding Yankees, Goldschmidt went 3-for-5 with two runs and an RBI; Chisholm was 3-for-4 with two home runs and five RBIs; Bellinger went 0-for-3 with an RBI; Wells went 0-for-4 with an RBI; and Volpe went 0-for-4.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
