National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)’s Post

NIST has a heavy hitting history with baseball. Throughout the 1987 baseball season, allegations of bat tampering were on the rise.  Yet, not since 1974—when the bat of the New York Yankees' Graig Nettles broke and several compressed rubber balls spilled out—had a hitter been ejected for using a doctored bat. In response to the latest flurry of bat-related rhubarbs, Major League Baseball (MLB) Commissioner Peter Ueberroth granted managers permission to confiscate one bat from an opponent if they suspected tampering. In August 1987, a representative from Ueberroth's office asked NIST experts on nondestructive evaluation to do a quick study of ways to detect illegal cork or rubber cores bored into the heads of bats. A handful of scientists and engineers from NIST's Gaithersburg, Md., headquarters, and Boulder, Colo., facility contributed to the effort. With four bats (two normal bats and two with cork cores about two pencil widths in diameter) supplied by Major League Baseball, the NIST team assessed a variety of approaches—ultrasound and several types of x-ray devices, including a CAT scanner. Two of the bats—one "loaded" and the other not—were even taken to Boulder Memorial Hospital for diagnostic x-rays, which were viewed from several carefully determined perspectives. The cost of the service was $30. Ultimately, medical x-rays were deemed the best imaging tools for non-destructive tests of baseball bats. They were found to be the quickest and most practical option, since most ball parks were equipped with x-ray machines for diagnosing player injuries. In contrast, measurements made with ultrasound were less definitive, and the data took longer to collect and interpret. #Baseball #Technology #Innovation