Wood was the primary material used to make bats for baseball and softball since the games were introduced in the 1800s. By the 1970s, metal emerged as a bat material, while the 1980s brought carbon composite bats. Studies have shown that composite bats perform better than aluminum; however, the carbon-based bat has its own drawbacks.
Aluminum Bat Development
Worth Sports was a leading manufacturer of baseballs and softballs through the first half of the 20th century. Its watershed moment in the history of softball came in 1970, when it released the first aluminum bat for sale. DeMarini introduced the first multi-wall aluminum bat, featuring smaller aluminum tubes encased within the larger aluminum barrel, in 1993.
Composite Bat History
Composite is term that encompasses any bat made from a combination of materials. The first composites, like those made in the mid-1980s by Worth, mixed plastic with graphite. It wasn't until the 1990s and 2000s that bat companies combined graphite with aluminum or other metals.
Aluminum Bat Performance
The Don't Take My Bat Away Coalition, a group of amateur softball and baseball associations opposed to a government ban on nonwood bats, states that aluminum bats far outsell their wooden contemporaries. The original justifications for their use were safety and durability. Aluminum bats did not splinter or break, reducing the need to replace them and the occurrence of injuries from fans or fielders being struck by a bat part. DeMarini points out that the larger sweet spot on aluminum bats created a greater trampoline effect -- the ricochet created when the ball hits the bat -- than wood.
Composite Bat Performance
The composite fastpitch bat offers distinct advantages over wood and metal in the realm of performance. Composite bats are lighter than aluminum, creating faster swing speeds and balls that hit farther and harder. The bat can also be fashioned to meet the needs of the hitter, with flexibility varying based on the hitter's strength. Composite bats also have larger sweet spots than aluminum, creating an even greater trampoline effect.
Drawbacks
While aluminum bats do not shatter like wood, they will dent over time. It is also possible to break one of the inner tubes of a multiwall bat. Aluminum bats can also develop microcracks, described by University of Massachusetts-Lowell Professors James Sherwood and Patrick Drane as damage to the outer barrel that changes batted ball speeds. Composite bats lack durability. The study, conducted at the college's Baseball Research Center, showed that composite bats can break after less than 100 hits. The bats also become unpredictable the more they are used. Batted ball speeds during Sherwood and Drane's tests varied greatly as the bat deteriorated and the sweet spot became damaged.
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