Four years ago, a line drive struck Wellesley High sophomore pitcher Billy Hughto on his head, nearly taking his life and re-igniting a debate over the safety of metal bats.
The incident and research indicating that balls come off metal bats faster than wood bats spurred Wellesley and Natick Little League and some high school teams to return to wood.
Debate continues today over the safety of metal and wood bats, but proponents of metal appear to have carried the day as most youth and high school baseball teams have not switched to wood.
Metal bats can be designed to lessen the speed of a batted ball, and the key decision-makers say there is no good evidence to support using wood bats for safety reasons.
That's what the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association determined in 2003. The group held a state high school championship tournament that year with wood bats, but switched back to metal shortly after.
"Essentially, they felt there had not been a compelling case made that wooden bats would be safer," said Paul Wetzel, an MIAA spokesman. "There's really a lack of statistical evidence."
There was another proposal to move to wooden bats this year, but it generated little interest and was dismissed, Wetzel said.
Little League Baseball also has determined there's not enough evidence to ban metal bats or set a minimum weight to reduce bat speed, letting individual leagues decide what type to use. Little League officials also note that injuries to pitchers from batted balls have declined significantly, from 145 in 1992 to 28 in 1999, but could not say why that has happened.
Many teams may prefer metal bats because they tend to increase offense and are less costly since they don't break. But Richard Hughto, Billy's father, didn't expect the wooden bat debate to turn out the way it did.
"I really thought when someone got seriously hurt they would change," said Hughto, who has lobbied in favor of wooden bats.
Hughto believes if wooden bats were in use on May 4, 2001, the ball struck by a Walpole player never would have hit his son's head.
"I think he would have caught the ball" if it was hit by a wooden bat, Hughto said. "He actually threw his hand up. I thought when I heard the sound it hit his glove. He tried to react."
Richard Hughto says he counted a dozen significant injuries in the Boston area within a year of his son's, and all of them involved metal bats.
Hughto's skull was cracked, cutting an artery which poured blood into his brain, his father said. He was rushed to a Boston hospital for brain surgery and was home in less than a week.
Hughto returned to pitch and became a league all-star his junior and senior years, after the Bay State League switched to wooden bats. Because of his injury, he stopped playing football.
Hughto pitched at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, but recurring problems from his injury caused him to quit last October. His father said he was affected by a combination of physical and mental problems, and was bothered by the sound of the metal bat used by college players.
"In the fall he was doing quite well, and all of a sudden he had his issues recur from the brain surgery and decided to give it up," Hughto said.
Hughto's experience helped convince Wellesley and Natick Little Leagues to begin using wooden bats, even though it is costly to outfit a team with wood because the bats frequently break.
Natick has used wood for a few years but nearly switched back to metal this year because it costs more than $4,000 a year to buy enough bats, said state Rep. David Linsky, whose sons play in the league.
But MetroWest Medical Center, believing that wood bats are safer for children, donated money for the league to buy more wooden bats this summer, Linsky said.
Pitchers seem to be most at risk of getting hit by a line drive, since they are closest to the plate and have little time to react after going through a pitching motion.
Boston Red Sox pitcher Matt Clement was recently hit by a ball, causing some scary moments as he lay motionless on the ground before being taken from the field. Major leaguers, of course, use wooden bats, but hit the ball very hard due to the strength of batters and speed of professional pitching.
Children hit by line drives can suffer concussions, eye injuries or injuries to the chest muscle and bone, said Dr. Jerry Wortzman, MetroWest Medical's chief of pediatrics. Even a player's heart could be damaged if hit by a ball, he said.
It may also be more difficult for a child to react to a line drive than it is for an older athlete.
"One thing that comes to mind is they're still developing fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination skills," Wortzman said. "I expect what they would call reaction time might be considerably slower in the younger kids."
But is it any safer for a pitcher when a batter uses wood? A study by Brown University bioengineers in 2002 determined that balls hit off metal bats travel faster. But Little League officials and manufacturers say they can make metal bats that perform about the same as wood.
Bat makers have agreed to make bats that meet a certain "bat performance factor" that determines the speed of a batted ball, said Chris Downs, spokesman for Little League Baseball.
"The intent is to limit the recoil factor off of a bat," Downs said.
Downs said there's no "credible data" to support the idea that metal bats produce faster ball speeds, and said Little League is not considering new mandates on the types of bats teams may use.
Jim Darby, vice president of promotions for bat-maker Easton Sports, said the company has redesigned its bats in response to calls from high school and college organizations.
"We were mandated by the NCAA and the high school federation on down that organizations wanted the non-wood bats to perform more in line with wood bats. And that's exactly what we've done," he said.
But beyond the health of players, there is another reason for moving to wood bats, some say: they're better for teaching kids how to play.
Since Wellesley Little League switched to wood four years ago, offensive numbers have gone down about 20 percent, said league president Eric Winer. But coaches can now teach kids aspects of the game that are harder to learn with metal bats, he said.
Wooden bats force kids to learn how to hit, since they have smaller sweet spots and less room for error. Pitchers learn how to pitch inside, since kids are less likely to hit a home run on an inside pitch with a wooden bat, Winer said. There is also more opportunity for defensive plays, instead of just chasing down line drives hit into the gaps, he said.
The main issue for Wellesley, though, is the safety of the players. And based on his years of watching Little League baseball, Winer is convinced metal bats produce a faster and more dangerous batted ball.
"The metal bat companies will continue to tell you there is no difference," he said. "I just don't believe it's true. I believe the velocity is much stronger."
