Brewers' demolition at the hands of Yankees was aided by truly weird bat design

The Milwaukee Brewers were on the wrong side of a lopsided 20-9 ballgame Saturday afternoon against the New York Yankees. Nestor Cortes, who was facing his former teammates, surrendered five home runs in total. Three long balls came on the first three pitches of the game, four occurred in the first inning, and he ended up only recording six outs.

Rule-5 pick Connor Thomas replaced Cortes in the third inning, but gave up three home runs of his own that included a grand slam to Aaron Judge. Lastly, rookie Chad Patrick, who was making his MLB debut, gave up the teams ninth home run of the game.

All this marked the first time in Yankees history that they hit three straight home runs to begin a game and the first time they ever hit four in the first inning of a game. Additionally, New York's nine home runs are a franchise record while also being the second most ever in a single game, with 10 being the record that was set in 1987.

Crazy as all of this is, throughout the YES Network broadcast it was revealed that Yankees players are utilizing custom made bats. These were designed by a former New York front office member, are called torpedoes, and have been utilized since Spring Training. Specifically in this game, Anthony Volpe and Jazz Chisholm were using torpedoes and Cody Bellinger a modified version.

All three of Volpe, Chisholm, and Bellinger homered in Saturday's contest. Paul Goldschmidt, Austin Wells, and Oswald Peraza all contributed a long ball a piece, and Aaron Judge hit three of his own.

Brewers pitchers were helpless against the New York Yankees custom torpedo bats, but they are legal

On air, YES Network broadcaster Michael explained that these bats that were made based on a study they did on Anthony Volpe. Their analytics department ultimately came to the realization to move a lot of the wood into the label, so that the harder part of the bat is more consistently striking the ball.

This change has altered the look of Yankees players bats, hence the name torpedo. The goal of these bats is to decrease misses and increase barreled balls. It was clear on Saturday that these fracture of an inch changes altered the outcomes of several at-bats as several home runs balls didn't have the sound nor look of balls that would typically leave the park.

However, these bats still fall within legal length, weight, and diameter requirements of MLB bats. According to a league spokesperson, the Yankees did not break any rules, as per MLB Rule 3.02, which states: 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 also notes that teams cannot use “experimental” bats unless the league gives clubs the green light.

All of this is to say that despite the number of record set, and nearly broken, on Saturday afternoon, the Yankees appear to have done everything by the book. With no rules being broken, there is nothing that can be done, aside from other organizations, like the Brewers, learn from this and adapt.

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