Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, April 30, 1994 TAG: 9404300023
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-2 EDITION: STATE
SOURCE: GLEN JOHNSON ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: CAMBRIDGE, MASS. LENGTH: Medium
Leave it to a frustrated Red Sox fan to try to liven up baseball by modifying the bat.
But Jeff Di Tullio, a 31-year-old aerodynamics instructor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, insists he's not out to help just the Old Towne Team.
The Sox, after all, are battling for first place and hitting the cover off the ball this spring.
Di Tullio has found that by adding small dimples to baseball bats, he can improve bat speed by up to 5 percent. He estimates that could add another 15 feet to major-league hits, which could liven up the game as much as a juiced baseball.
"As pitchers have become specialists, batting averages have fallen. This could give batters more of an advantage," he said.
Di Tullio is an avid baseball fan, although he no longer plays. "I gave it up in junior high. I couldn't hit," he said.
He made his discovery about dimpled bats last year, after he discussed the aerodynamic principles of a cylinder with his students. While cylinders such as baseball bats appear aerodynamic because of their smoothness, Di Tullio says that's not so.
"In fact, it's very, very far from being streamlined. The drag on a bat is abominable," he said.
As a bat passes through air, its bluntness slows air passing just over its surface. That, in turn, slows air just above the surface, creating drag and inhibiting air from slipping around the bat.
By adding dimples similar to those found in golf balls, Di Tullio found it increased bat speed.
"What it does is mix the low-energy air on the surface with the high-energy air above. The mixing allows the air to stay on the bat longer, which reduces drag," he said.
MIT has patented Di Tullio's design, but it has yet to turn into a moneymaker.
Major League Baseball rules say, in part, "The bat shall be a smooth, round stick. . . . No laminated or experimental bats shall be used in the professional game."
Di Tullio argues that his bat conforms to that rule, since the dimples, while sensitive to the hand, are barely visible to the eye. He said they leave no marks on the ball, either.
He said that bats currently used in the league are far from a "smooth, round stick."
"If you look at the bats up close, they have the players' names, the teams' names and manufactures' names burned into them," Di Tullio said. "Those intrusions into the bat are far more significant than the dimples, I think."
Still, while Di Tullio proposes allowing his bats to be used at the major league level, he remains a baseball purist. He opposes making aluminum and composite bats legal, because they have larger sweet spots than standard wooden bats.
"Those bats would give a greater advantage to a marginal player than these would. That's important when people say this would ruin the game or inflate the stats," he said.
Di Tullio says that his bat would retain the same hitting characteristics as standard bats, but strong hitters could swing them faster and solid hits would go further.
"Guys still have to put the bat on the ball. If you don't make contact, this isn't going to matter at all," he said.
by CNB