#ICYMI - Juiced Balls, Broken Bats & Record Breakers, with Shawn Green

In case you missed this episode on the Playing with Science channel… Chuck Nice and Gary O’Reilly explore the science of baseball with physicist Alan Nathan, James Sherwood, Director at the Baseball Research Center, and baseball great Shawn Green.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:09Gary O'Reilly?

  I'm Gary O'Reilly.

• 0:10Chuck Nice?

  And I'm Chuck Nice.

• 0:11Gary O'Reilly?

  And this is Playing With Science. It's that time of the year when the legends of the fall rise and stake acclaim to Major League Baseball's coveted World Series pennant. We don't know yet who will battle it out this time around, but we do know if there's homers galore, the juicing rumours will return.

• 0:29Chuck Nice?

  Absolutely. And we have the perfect guest for just that topic. The man who wrote last year's baseball juicing paper, physics professor Alan Nathan. So we'll get to the bottom of whether or not that is the case. Plus, we'll be talking to James Sherwood from the UMass Lowell Baseball Research Center. They're the guys that run the tests on both bats and balls, which will certainly be interesting.

• 0:52Gary O'Reilly?

  Yes, it will indeed. And because we've got the science and tech bases covered, we needed a seriously big hitter. So we have a man who, amongst other records, owns the most home runs in a single game, and it's four, by the way. And that man is Shawn Green.

• 1:06Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 1:07Gary O'Reilly?

  Oh, you're looking forward to talking to him, really am.

• 1:09Chuck Nice?

  This is a great mix in this show, man.

• 1:12Gary O'Reilly?

  Yep.

• 1:13Chuck Nice?

  We've got record breakers, we've got the people who keep records and the people who make records.

• 1:17Gary O'Reilly?

  And juiced balls, don't forget that.

• 1:19Chuck Nice?

  No, I love juiced balls.

• 1:21Gary O'Reilly?

  I know you would. Right, let's get our first guest. Professor Alan Nathan, a professor of physics emeritus at the University of Illinois and chairperson of this particular baseball study. Professor, welcome to the show.

• 1:39Speaker 02

  Thank you, good to be here.

• 1:41Gary O'Reilly?

  Thank you.

• 1:42Chuck Nice?

  So how did this come about? I mean, why was, why would the, why would Major League Baseball commission 10 scientists to do this study in the first place?

• 1:51Speaker 02

  Well, so I can only speculate. I think that there had, as you know, as everyone realizes, there had been an increase in home runs. And last year, 2017, by the time the committee was formed, MLB was on a trajectory to have the largest number of home runs of any season in MLB history. And Major League Baseball was sort of getting a lot of bad publicity from it. There were a lot of people writing that somehow the ball had been altered and juiced in the lingo.

• 2:35Speaker 02

  And I think ultimately, they must have decided, look, we really do need to look into this. We need to understand this. So they initially called on me to chair the committee and ask for some suggestions of people to be on the committee, and we took it from there.

• 2:56Chuck Nice?

  It's just weird, because you would think that Major League Baseball would be very, very pleased, because people want to see home runs. I mean, you know, that's what you go to the park for.

• 3:07Speaker 02

  I think they're pleased at the home runs. You know, I think fans are pleased at the home runs.

• 3:15Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 3:16Speaker 02

  But I think they're quite, again, I'm just speculating here.

• 3:20Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 3:21Speaker 02

  I think they're sensitive to bad publicity. One thing about baseball is there is a real sense of the historical aspects of it.

• 3:30Chuck Nice?

  True.

• 3:31Speaker 02

  Meaning that, you know, a homerun hit today, you know, means the same thing as a homerun hit 50 years ago. And, you know, records that were set back then, being broken in the current environment, you know, if they're broken legitimately, that's fine, but if they're broken because of change either in the players, you know, the other juicing scandal of a decade ago, or changes to the ball, I think they're sensitive to that. And I think fans are sensitive to that. So I think they really felt that they really wanted to have a group of scientists with no

• 4:12Speaker 02

  axe to grind whatsoever, working independently of Major League Baseball, see if they could come up with the reasons.

• 4:22Gary O'Reilly?

  So we're talking about the purity of the sport, the purity of the game, to respect the history. So in which way do you do that? I mean, there's coefficients of restitude, you've got natural products, we've come with natural floors, i.e. wood and leather. How did you go about ensuring the purity of the game was respected, but science has its say?

• 4:43Speaker 02

  So we proceeded along two broad tracks. One was using actual data from MLB games, so the so-called Statcast data, where a combination of radar and cameras are used to track every pitch ball and every bat involved. So we analyzed those data, we had complete access to the data. So that was one part of it, to see whether we could spot anything in the data. And the second branch of this whole thing was to do our own laboratory testing of various

• 5:25Speaker 02

  properties of the baseball. And intermingled with both of those was actually a trip to Costa Rica to visit the Rawlings factory, where the baseballs are actually, the baseballs that are used in Major League Baseball are actually constructed. That was very, very informative for us to do. But yeah, so as I said, two different tracks, analyzing data from actual MLB games and taking our own laboratory data to try to figure out what, if anything, had changed about the baseball.

• 6:02Chuck Nice?

  And your findings were conclusive, inconclusive, or partially conclusive? Or what exactly were your findings?

• 6:10Speaker 02

  Okay, so we had some amount of success and, you know, one big hole in our study, which I'll tell you about. So, we sort of asked two overall questions. Is the increase in home runs due to a change in the launch conditions of a ball coming off the bat? That could come either from a higher exit velocity, which would lead to longer fly balls, or more, and/or more optimum launch angles. That would, for a given exit velocity, at a more optimum launch angle, the ball will travel farther.

• 6:51Speaker 02

  So, we looked extensively at Statcast data to see whether we could see any evidence at all for either one of those things. And, in effect, we found no evidence that you could explain the change in home runs by a change in the launch conditions, either the exit velocity or the launch angle. So, that was the second question that we asked was, was it the change in the carry of the ball? That is, once the ball leaves the bat, for given launch conditions, given exit velocity, launch angle, and whatever other things you want to put into it, is the ball carrying farther now than it did two, three years ago?

• 7:33Speaker 02

  And we found evidence in the data that that indeed was the case, and moreover, that the change in that carry was really sufficient to account for the change in home runs. So, it was not a change in the launch conditions themselves, it was a change in the carry of the ball. And we found this directly from the Statcast data. And we confirmed it with laboratory measurements. We had large samples of baseballs from various years. We're able to measure the so-called coefficient of restitution of the ball,

• 8:13Speaker 02

  which measures how bouncy the ball is, the bouncier it is. So when one talks about the ball being juiced, normally one talks about the ball being more bouncy, a higher coefficient of restitution. We found no evidence in the laboratory testing that there was a higher coefficient of restitution, more or less confirming what we found from the analysis of the Statcast data, namely that the exit velocity wasn't really changing all that much. But further, we found that there was a change in the so-called drag coefficient of the baseball. So the carry of the ball, if baseball were played in a vacuum,

• 8:56Speaker 02

  you know, the launch conditions would exactly determine the landing point. But baseball takes place in the air, and there is the effects of drag and lift. The drag is really the most important effect. And what we found was that the drag properties of the baseball had changed in an ever-so-subtle way. And by in a mouth that basically could explain the change in the home runs, okay? So it wasn't the coefficient of restitution. It wasn't the so-called launch angle revolution that people talk about, you know, batters altering their swings

• 9:39Speaker 02

  to come up with a more optimal launch angle, which then lead to more home runs. It really had to do with this subtle effect in the so-called drag coefficient. So that was the success, and it all hung together very, very nicely. What was the failure, what was missing? What was missing was, we could not, and still have not, been able to figure out what actual physical property of the ball that you could measure would lead to a change in that drag coefficient. We looked at all the obvious things. We looked at the surface texture of the ball, which affects the, you know, affects the drag because it affects how the air flows over the ball.

• 10:23Speaker 02

  We looked at the seam height. We found no change that, in the seam height, that could explain that change in the drag coefficient. And then we even started really grasping at straws and looking at really, really subtle effects. And, and, and the subtle effects that we looked for, we also found nothing that would explain things. I, I should point, and by the way, it was those follow-up studies, trying to figure out what, you know, what property of the ball had actually changed that reduced the drag, that led to the long delay between when our report was initially submitted at the end of December, to when it was finally released in May.

• 11:07Speaker 02

  That we were just conducting further laboratory studies to try to figure this out. We didn't succeed in figuring it out.

• 11:14Chuck Nice?

  So is this, is this still a mystery? Are, are we still looking at the fact that we don't know why, you know, we're getting more dingers happening? I'm, I'm, this is pretty fascinating, if it is.

• 11:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, that, that is where we are. I mean, so a lot of, so a, a, as a scientist, I have to say that it was a little bit unsatisfying for us, in that we, we sort of figured out things to a point, but then we reached a stumbling block. And we weren't, we could not find what you might call the smoking gun that explained everything.

• 11:50Gary O'Reilly?

  Professor, before, before you go on, I'm, I'm sat here thinking, and I'm, I have a devious mind on occasions. What happened if I cook the ball, or lower the temperature of the ball? So I play with that, quite literally, if I stuck it in a microwave for 20 seconds, raise the core heat and everything else, or actually froze it for a while. I'm sure you consider that, the sort of ambient temperatures that come into play.

• 12:19Speaker 02

  Okay, so the thing that you're talking about would would would not affect so much the carry of the ball. The air temperature, okay, through which the ball is going does affect the carry of the ball. So in in warmer temperatures, the air density is lower, the ball carries further. We looked at that, actually, and we we we actually and we concluded that it was not a change. You you couldn't explain the home runs with a change in the temperature. The thing that you're talking about, putting the ball in a microwave oven or, you know, in a freezer or whatever else, that would actually affect the coefficient

• 13:00Speaker 02

  of restitution of the ball, which would affect the exit velocities. And since we found that the exit velocities didn't explain things, you know, that that would not have been an effect that had been would have been seen.

• 13:15Chuck Nice?

  Well, I think it's fascinating that this is still a mystery. I'm interested to know whether or not Major League Baseball wants you to continue and and make some findings, or are they just happy with the fact that what you were able to establish is that the ball is not juiced? And they're like, all right, ball's not juiced, we're good, and that's it?

• 13:35Speaker 02

  Yeah. So there's there are two of us on the committee, myself and Lloyd Smith, who's a mechanical engineering professor at Washington State University. It's his laboratory where all the lab work was done. He and I are still involved. The rest of the committee is not. So I'm involved. So Lloyd, at his laboratory, is pursuing various ideas about what would be the cause. So, you know, one of the crazy ideas that we had was that maybe the, you know, the ball is, the center of the ball is the so-called pill. And that

• 14:17Speaker 02

  and one of the crazy ideas we had was maybe the pill is slightly off-center.

• 14:25Speaker 02

  And when it, which it could easily be, and when it rotates, it wobbles a little bit. Not in a way that you could actually perceive, but the air going over the ball would perceive it, it would change the drag. And if

• 14:38Chuck Nice?

  Absolutely.

• 14:38Speaker 02

  If the ball were now better centered than it was because somehow they've improved the manufacturing process, then that would reduce the drag. So one of the things that's happening is Rawlings, the company that makes the baseballs, is actually preparing us for us some baseballs in which the pill is purposely put off center, just so we could study the effect to see if that would play any role whatsoever. It's only speculation on our part that it might. And so those are the kinds of crazy ideas that we're pursuing. And so it is ongoing. I'm, I'm, I'm serving as, well, Lloyd Smith and I have worked together over a decade and a half of doing a variety of sort of physics of baseball type projects.

• 15:20Speaker 02

  So he and I talk with each other all the time anyway. So he and I together are still involved with this project. The rest of the committee is not, at least not yet.

• 15:35Chuck Nice?

  Wow, that I, I gotta tell you, it's fascinating stuff.

• 15:37Gary O'Reilly?

  It does open your mind, Chuck, doesn't it, to

• 15:40Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 15:40Gary O'Reilly?

  the sort of consideration that's taken place with the professor and his team on this study. And we, I mean, I remember back to the World Series last year, pitchers were saying, of course the ball's juiced. And I think that what the professor's done is just said, that's a great idea, but the facts are, it's not. We don't quite know yet, but that won't stop us trying again to find out exactly what it is. And I think on behalf of every baseball fan, that's, that's a perfect scenario unless you come up with the perfect answer first time. But it hasn't been the case. So I think everyone's pleased. I think go back to that point of purity. The sport seems to have retained its purity, unless of course, the athletes themselves have done something.

• 16:26Chuck Nice?

  Which, hey, look, look at that. That's a whole nother show.

• 16:31Speaker 02

  I have to say, it was, for me, it was an exhilarating project to work on. It just sort of put together, you know, various aspects of the physics of baseball that I've been working on for over a decade. And so for me, it was an ideal kind of project to be part of. And I, although I was disappointed we couldn't find the smoking gun, I was quite proud of what we as a group accomplished with this.

• 16:59Chuck Nice?

  All right. Well, that's great. And we are, we're pretty much out of time for this segment, but hopefully you'll allow, allow us to get back in touch with you periodically to just see how things are going.

• 17:09Speaker 02

  Sure enough, anytime.

• 17:11Gary O'Reilly?

  Professor, thank you so much indeed. Professor Alan Nathan there, who was chairman, chairperson of the study into juicing in baseball. We're going to take a short break. When we come back, more baseball. Don't forget, it's juicing, it's broken bats and it's record breakers, and we'll have them all here on Playing with Science. Welcome back to Playing with Science and our baseball special. Bit of a treat for you now. Professor James Sherwood, Professor of Mechanical Engineering at UMass Lowell, Director of the Baseball Research Centre.

• 17:50Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 17:51Gary O'Reilly?

  Yes. And exploring many of the scientific aspects of the game in terms of bat and durability and baseball compliance.

• 18:01Chuck Nice?

  Yes. Yeah, I want to get into a little bit of that baseball compliance.

• 18:05Gary O'Reilly?

  But before we do, hi Professor, welcome to the show. Hi guys.

• 18:09Chuck Nice?

  Hey. Hey, great to have you here. So can you just tell us, I mean, no sense in jumping into this without giving the listeners a bit of a background on what you're doing with particularly wood bats, because of course that's, that's Major League Baseball.

• 18:24Speaker 03

  Yeah, so in 2008, there was concern that the number of bats that were breaking into multiple pieces during Major League Baseball games was was growing.

• 18:37Chuck Nice?

  All right.

• 18:38Speaker 03

  And and that there was some concern as to how it was going to compromise the safety of the players on the field and also with the spectators in the stands with with pieces of wood flying around. So Major League Baseball assembled a technical team of wood experts and statisticians and the team we have here with Patrick Drane and myself at the Baseball Research Center at the university, which Major League Baseball did give us our initial funding to establish to look into this problem, to see if we could understand why so many bats were breaking into multiple pieces and were there some measures that we could take to mitigate this problem?

• 19:21Chuck Nice?

  Cool. And now, you know, with that being said, I just, when you just said broken bats, I, you know, we're about to have in our next segment, we're going to have Sean Green, who is a Major League Baseball player and one of only 18 players in the history of all of baseball to hit four home runs in one game. One of those home runs, he actually hit off of a broken bat. So I ask you, professor, can a broken bat help you at times? Can it actually do something to the ball, change the flight direction of the ball, make it so that it's advantageous for you to break a bat when you're hitting a ball?

• 20:02Speaker 03

  Well, great question. And the thing is, when the ball left the bat, it probably didn't know that the bat was even broken at that time. So I'll leave it to the physicist.

• 20:14Chuck Nice?

  Wait a minute, that's very, that's very much like many of my relationships. Don't go down that road. When I leave, I had no idea how much damage I had done.

• 20:26Speaker 03

  So, uh, yeah, so the ball hits the end of the bat. The sound wave travels down along the length of the bat to the player's hands. And when the player feels the, the vibration of the bat in their hands from the ball hitting it, the ball's already gone.

• 20:40Chuck Nice?

  Ah.

• 20:41Speaker 03

  And so in this case, vibration that was excited in the bat from the ball hitting it.

• 20:47Chuck Nice?

  Mm-hmm.

• 20:47Speaker 03

  Uh, that led to the breaking of the bat. Uh, that was happening after the ball had left the bat.

• 20:55Chuck Nice?

  Ah, interesting. That's very interesting. So let's talk about that vibration. Um, and, uh, everybody who's played baseball, um, has hit the ball in such a way, I don't care how hard it was thrown, it's just a certain spot on the bat, you hit it and it stings your hands. You're like, just like, God, what did I just do? So, one, what causes that? And when you talked about the vibration, what breaks the bat? Is it the force or velocity of the ball hitting the bat? Is it that vibration, kind of the way a crystal glass breaks when the opera singer sings? What's going on? Can you explain the whole process to us?

• 21:35Speaker 03

  Sure. So, uh, so there's a spot on the bat called the sweet spot.

• 21:39Chuck Nice?

  Yep.

• 21:40Speaker 03

  Uh, and if you hit it on the sweet spot, you're not going to feel this vibration. So for, to use, uh, to use an instrument here to help me, uh, explain this, although I realize this is a podcast, right? So, uh.

• 21:53Chuck Nice?

  That's all right. People are, there are some people who will see it as well.

• 21:56Speaker 03

  Oh, okay. So, uh, if we're looking at the bat and, and I'll try to bend this pen as best as I can, I'll even turn it this way so it shows the university logo right here for you. Uh, in the first bending mode, there's going to be a node, it, let's say this is the handle right here and this is the barrel of the bat out here. And if you hit off of one of these vibration nodes for this first bending mode of, uh, of, of vibration for the bat, then you're going to feel this stinging. I mean, if you hit it right on this node right here that's out in the barrel, which is very close to where the sweet, sweet spot is on the bat, uh, you're not going to feel the sting in your hands. And so that's what causes it.

• 22:39Speaker 03

  Just hitting it anywhere outside of this location of this node, this sweet spot area on the barrel of the bat.

• 22:46Chuck Nice?

  What sort of size is this sweet spot on a baseball bat?

• 22:49Speaker 03

  So that's a really good question. Some people would say that, oh, the sweet spot on an aluminum bat, it's three times, four times bigger than it is on a wood bat. And likewise, saying the same thing for the composite bats that that people are using now. The sweet spot is really just a spot. And, uh, you know, so the the the batted ball speed coming off the bat, if I'm looking at the the barrel of the bat right here, the the sweet spot is going to be, we're going to get the maximum batted ball speed out of the bat. And then it's going to go down in a sort of a parabolic fashion as you go left or right of that sweet spot. The further you get away from it, the lower the batted ball speed is going to be.

• 23:34Speaker 03

  So if in some cases, when they say the sweet spot is bigger on an aluminum bat or a composite bat, what they're really saying is that, okay, off the sweet spot of the bat on an aluminum or composite bat, it's going to hit better than wood. And now there's this region that's so long right here, maybe three inches, four inches, where you're going to get a hit that is as good or better than what you're going to get off of a wood bat. So it's such a marketing thing, saying that the sweet spot is bigger on some bats than other.

• 24:05Chuck Nice?

  Gotcha. For Major League Baseball, I would assume all the bats have the same specs that they have to be manufactured to, very specific specs. And does that include a type of wood? And why use that type of wood in a bat? What is that wood and why do they use it?

• 24:23Speaker 03

  Yeah, so the two major types of wood that are used in Major League Baseball are Northern White Ash and Hard Rock Maple. And then there's also some bats that are made out of yellow birch. They probably comprise a very small, a negligible amount of bats. So there's probably a split between maple and ash for the woods that are used. And, uh, there's also a range of densities that you're allowed to use for these of these woods for the bats, because the strength of the wood, the the elastic modulus or the stiffness of the wood increases with the wood density.

• 25:04Gary O'Reilly?

  So with the density comes the weight, correct?

• 25:07Speaker 03

  Correct.

• 25:08Gary O'Reilly?

  And each bat has a defined weight? Or is it a parameter from one to another? Or is it, it has to be precisely that weight?

• 25:17Speaker 03

  So, there's a range of weights. I believe the, the regulation right now is that a bat can't be any lighter than three units. So, we call these minus three bats. And the way that we calculate this minus three number is we take the length of the bat and we subtract from that the weight of the bat. So, many players are swinging thirty-four inch long bats. And they like to think that they can hit better with a lighter bat than they can hit with a heavier bat. So, they may choose to have a thirty-one ounce bat. And so, we would call this a drop of three ounces of the weight compared to the length of the bat. And so, that's a minus three bat. Some players might choose to use a minus two bat.

• 26:03Speaker 03

  So, there, there's, there's typically not a problem with setting an upper limit on the weight of the bat. The, with the players, our challenge is with, with that lower weight limit is. And it's going to vary with the very, the profile of the bat. So, there are dozens and dozens of different shapes of the wood bat profile. It's going to be hard to discern maybe one shape for, from another shape. There can be very subtle differences. But it's going to come down to what's the volume of that shape, that profile of the bat? And what wood density you use in that bat?

• 26:40Chuck Nice?

  You know, I want to switch gears for just a quick second. Um, just because I know you work with fabric reinforced composites. This is, and which is really exciting stuff. I mean, for a geek like me, but, uh, and, and probably Gary too, because he loves this stuff. So, uh, you know, I, is there anything that you have worked with? Or are currently working with? That would inform your research and your work with, uh, Major League Baseball?

• 27:10Speaker 03

  So with Major League Baseball, it's only going to be wood bats.

• 27:13Chuck Nice?

  That's it.

• 27:14Speaker 03

  That's it. It's they're never going to allow aluminum bats. They're never going to allow composite bats. Major League Baseball is very much a game of tradition.

• 27:22Chuck Nice?

  Tradition.

• 27:23Speaker 03

  It's wood.

• 27:24Chuck Nice?

  It's wood. So I mean, I was just thinking, I mean, wouldn't it be a little more exciting? If you were able to have maybe just two other bats that you were allowed in so that the player had a choice of, you know, a regulation wood bat and then perhaps a composite bat that maybe depending upon circumstances or the type of pitcher you were facing that you might be able to use. It would add an element of chess, of a chess, a greater chess match to the game. I think it would be a really exciting thing to include that kind of stuff.

• 27:59Speaker 03

  Yeah, so that would be an interesting experiment. And we'll just leave that to happen at the high school level and the college level because there they can choose to use aluminum, composite, wood. And you can see how the differences shake out there.

• 28:15Chuck Nice?

  And how do you feel about it? I mean, are you a traditionalist? Are you a purist? How do I got a feeling that you are?

• 28:22Speaker 03

  Yeah, so just a little bit of history, how I got started in doing this baseball bat stuff.

• 28:28Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 28:28Speaker 03

  So this was in the late 90s and the NCAA and the high school federation were very concerned that the aluminum bats and the composite bats were getting to be better and better than wood. They were initially brought into the game as being cost competitive. That you would, you're going to break, you're not going to break an aluminum bat during the course of a season compared to wood bats. And then as engineers realized how they could take advantage of the material properties and different designs, the bats started getting better and better. So that's when the NCAA and the high school federation stepped in and said, we need a process to test the performance of these bats. And what we were seeing is, yeah, they were hitting probably five miles per hour.

• 29:14Speaker 03

  Or better than wood bats, these composite and aluminum bats. But over a period of 10 years, uh, we were able to work with the bat companies to get these things toned down. So now the aluminum and the composite bats actually hit no better than whatever you want to call the best wood bats.

• 29:33Chuck Nice?

  Gotcha.

• 29:34Speaker 03

  So they, they, they kind of hit all the same right now.

• 29:37Chuck Nice?

  Wow, look at that. And, and that's basically why they, why they employed you, that and the safety issues as well. Cause I mean.

• 29:44Speaker 03

  So, so they were concerned about safety, but I want to make it very clear. I have, I'm not a safety expert and so I never have said anything about one bat being safe over another bat.

• 29:57Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 29:58Speaker 03

  There could be some legal implications with making statements like that.

• 30:01Chuck Nice?

  Okay.

• 30:02Speaker 03

  The only thing I can say is these bats hit essentially the same.

• 30:06Chuck Nice?

  All right, that's, and listen, we, we, we appreciate your indemnifying yourself.

• 30:10Gary O'Reilly?

  No, of course. Is, how about the balls? Do you, you work on the bats, but do you work on the balls as well, don't you?

• 30:16Speaker 03

  Yeah, so one of the, uh, primary activities that we have with Major League Baseball is ensuring that the compliant, that the baseball is compliant with the Major League Baseball specifications, that its coefficient restitution is within a specified range, uh, that the size is, is within the max min specs and likewise, uh, the, the weight of the baseball.

• 30:43Chuck Nice?

  So is there, is there any, is there anything that can be done? Now, and believe me, we know that there's a lot that can be done to change the ball so that it performs differently. There was a bit of a controversy, was it last year?

• 30:54Gary O'Reilly?

  Last year, but plus in 2000.

• 30:56Chuck Nice?

  And in 2000?

• 30:57Gary O'Reilly?

  The professor was asked through, uh, the baseball research center to analyze the potential of juicing on baseball. And you, you proved that that wasn't the case, it hadn't been juiced. But how, I mean, what Chuck is saying, I think is how can you? Is, is, is not a baseball a defined size or is it a game within parameters?

• 31:18Speaker 03

  So the, I gotta give credit to Rawlings. They make a very consistent ball. I mean, the, the weight of the baseball is supposed to be between five and a five and a quarter ounces. They pretty much hit the middle for that, uh, at five and an eighth ounces. And with respect to the size, it's supposed to be between, uh, what nine and nine and a quarter inches is the circumference of the ball. And once again, they hit that right in the middle. You know, with respect to changing the performance of the baseball, you've got this rubber pill that's in the center of the ball.

• 31:52Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 31:52Speaker 03

  There are three windings of wool around the ball. And I don't have the capabilities within my lab to, to make baseballs with different windings and different pills and such. But there are those ingredients that, uh, can be, uh, played with to, to change the performance of the ball. And once again, Rawlings does a great job of making sure that every rubber pill is essentially the same. The widening is essentially the same, so that the nominal behavior of the ball is consistent.

• 32:28Chuck Nice?

  Cool. Well, it's good to know.

• 32:30Gary O'Reilly?

  Yep.

• 32:31Chuck Nice?

  Next, next time I'm out on a major league baseball field, I'll feel more comfortable.

• 32:36Gary O'Reilly?

  Yes. Professor, thank you so much for your time and your insight and explaining to us exactly what is happening in the world of baseball. Uh, time to take another break.

• 32:47Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, thank you so much, Professor.

• 32:48Gary O'Reilly?

  Thank you to James Sherwood there, Professor, uh, UMass Lowell. Uh, right, when we come back, record breaker time, Shawn Green.

• 32:56Chuck Nice?

  Shawn Green will be here.

• 32:56Gary O'Reilly?

  A man with more records than you could shake a stick.

• 33:00Chuck Nice?

  Yes.

• 33:01Gary O'Reilly?

  Or a bat, or anything else.

• 33:02Chuck Nice?

  By the way, he broke the record of shaking a stick at records.

• 33:06Gary O'Reilly?

  I believe he did.

• 33:12Gary O'Reilly?

  Welcome back to Playing with Science and our baseball show. Record breaker, doesn't quite cover it, but I'll fill in the gap.

• 33:21Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 33:21Gary O'Reilly?

  Shawn Green.

• 33:22Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 33:23Gary O'Reilly?

  A man with a past. Toronto Blue Jays, Los Angeles Dodgers, Arizona Diamondbacks and the New York Mets. And as I said just prior to the break, more records than anyone has ever shook a stick at. Right Chuck, do you want to go in?

• 33:37Chuck Nice?

  Not to mention, he's a two-time All-Star, a Golden Glover. He's a Silver Slugger Award winner. And more importantly, the man is known for probably being one of only 18 players in all of baseball histories. So think about all of baseball and all the players that have ever come across, every single team. Only 18 dudes have done what Shawn Green has done and that's hit four home runs in one game. And he was the 14th to do it. Shaun, how are you, man? Thanks for joining us.

• 34:13Speaker 04

  Yes, I'm great. Thanks for having me.

• 34:14Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, man. So like, super excited to have you on because like I just said, first of all, I just found out a really interesting little tidbit.

• 34:26Gary O'Reilly?

  Go on then.

• 34:26Chuck Nice?

  There have been more perfect games thrown in baseball than people who have hit four home runs in one game. You're more rare, you are more rare than a perfect game, my friend.

• 34:43Speaker 04

  That was pretty wild. No, it's, it's one of those things that, you know, all the stars, if they line up correctly, there's a lot of guys who could do it, but it just worked out perfectly that day. I was, I got really hot and no, it's, it's definitely a club. I'm also in the four strikeout in the game club. So it's nice to be in the four homer club as well.

• 35:00Chuck Nice?

  Ah, yeah, but one's a lot easier to join than the other and you know it. Speaking of which too, when you, you were, you were kind of in a downturn when, when that game came about, right? You were, I think it was Milwaukee, right? And you were kind of going into the game in a bit of a downturn. So can you kind of walk us through like what you were, what you were going through mentally? Because I'm sure that had to be a wild emotional ride to come from being kind of downtrodden, you know, in a bit of a slump.

• 35:30Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 35:30Chuck Nice?

  And then boom. So can you, can you walk us through mentally what happens?

• 35:36Speaker 04

  Yeah, so I, the year before, it was my second year in L A and I had, I had signed a big contract, had a lot of expectations. It had, you know, a mediocre first year. And in my second year, I hit forty-nine home runs, and that's the, you know, the Dodger record. And so all of a sudden, I set the bar really high. And then fast forward now to two thousand two. I got off the first quarter of the season, I had three home runs. So you, you guys are science guys, do the math. You know, that's about twelve, thirteen home runs I was on pace for. And I was getting, I was over eighteen in the home stand until my last at bat. And I was getting booed at home for the first time in my career. And it was, it was rough. I was, I was really down. Um, worked really hard, you know, throughout the season, but you know, stepping up some of the routines in the cage and

• 36:20Speaker 04

  actually got my first day off of the year, um, the Saturday, played Sunday, my last at bat, I hit a double. And that kind of got me going. And then the first game in Milwaukee, I was really happy to get the gray uniform on and be on the road because I was, uh, not wanting to get the home crowd booing me every time I fouled off a pitch or took a strike. And, uh,

• 36:38Gary O'Reilly?

  Home fans are great, aren't they?

• 36:40Speaker 04

  We hit Milwaukee in the first game, I hit two home runs. So I was like, okay, I'm starting to feel this. The next day I hit a triple. And then the next day, I, I, everything just kind of clicked and, um, I got in the zone. I was, and I was six for six with, uh, four homers and a single and a double.

• 36:53Gary O'Reilly?

  When you're in this moment, I'm thinking about it. You've either had a time machine and used it, and you know exactly what's being dialed up and coming over the plate to you. Or you have got the most amazing sense of what the pitcher's thinking and the vision must be outrageous. Because I don't believe you get that lucky.

• 37:17Speaker 04

  No, you, you get, I think lucky in that the opportunity, um, arises because, you know, the game could be in a situation where they walk you because they know you're, you're swinging a hot bat. But it, it was, it was a blowout. And my, my good friend and teammate of ten years, Carl Stogato, did it a year later.

• 37:33Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah.

• 37:33Speaker 04

  And he, four home runs, four solo home runs, I think. And, um, and they lost. So our situation was a blowout. So they, getting pitches to hit. And, um, yeah, no, I mean, everything slowed down. My vision was, you know, my, my timing was great. And what's, what's interesting about it that was different than other times I, I got locked in was I, I wasn't overthinking it because sometimes like, oh my God, I feel so good. I don't want to waste this time. But I just sort of settled into that feeling. And as I said, I had two home runs the first day and For the next day, the next day we went to Milwaukee, I hit a homerun, my fir- the first pitch I saw and had two more hits and then two more ones the next day. So it's

• 38:12Speaker 04

  went from this like crazy slump to this, you know, nine home runs in five games, which was something that, you know, I I would have never guessed was gonna happen the way the season started out.

• 38:21Chuck Nice?

  Are you working your way out of something like that? I mean, um, you know, I, and what, what do, and Gary's a prof- a former professional player as well. So, uh, but in football, soccer.

• 38:35Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 38:35Chuck Nice?

  Uh, but, you know, I'm trying to figure out from a mindset when, you know, when, when it's not going well. What are you doing inside your head? What are you saying? Like, I gotta work harder? Do you, I gotta wear different socks? I mean, what do you do? To, to work your way out of that?

• 38:53Gary O'Reilly?

  When you get down to the point where you're looking at wearing different socks, you have been through everything. Am I right?

• 38:59Speaker 04

  You're right. Now, baseball players are very superstitious. So, yeah, I, cause you know, one thing that's different about baseball than really any other professional sport is the, the sheer amount of games you play.

• 39:09Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 39:09Speaker 04

  Very short. Alright, so you get about two or three days a month where you don't have a game. So you're playing every day. So the routine becomes your preparation. And it's, it's to the point of eating the same meals or, um, you know, getting in the stadium and, and getting changed in the same way, like, it kinda sounds weird, but you know, maybe you put your socks on, like, you just kinda get in this routine and that helps get your, kinda, your mind kinda funneling down. So you start off each day in this space and you get narrower and narrower of your focus and the routine is, is the process. So, so I, I focus when I struggle, you know, it's easy to say now, I mean, I spent a lot of nights staring at the ceiling in some hotel, God knows where, frustrated and stressed out, not, not being able to sleep. But then I just try to remind myself to focus on the process and

• 39:53Speaker 04

  you know, being in a, a hot streak or being in a slump, it's just sort of a wave that you have to ride and you know each of those two are gonna pass and you just hope you can extend the, the hot streak as long as possible and shorten those slumps.

• 40:06Gary O'Reilly?

  We, we spoke to, uh, Dr. Heather Berlin, who's a, a neuroscientist. And she was telling us about when you dial up and you dial down and you learn to control the brainwaves that are coming through. And how you are in a state of flow. Once you tapped into that, as you said in the Milwaukee game, did you feel able to dial it back up almost at will?

• 40:33Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, I think it's it's like a muscle, right? I mean, you work out, everyone gets stronger in the gym. Um, I used to do brain exercises, you know, way back in the with some software and I think that helped. But I I I'm a meditator. Um, so I've been into that type of thing as well, always kind of trying to tie the eastern approach into in in my performance because it's it's something I think that gets overlooked quite a bit. Um, it's easy to know, hey, if I go to the gym, work out or do certain types of sprints, I'm gonna get faster, stronger, in better shape. But training your your focus is a really um kind of nebulous type thing to get to get your arms around. And so I tried to come up with ways ways to do that. And you know, when I was in a hot streak, I felt like it was never gonna end, but I knew

• 41:18Speaker 04

  through experience that, hey, this is gonna end, just to to try to keep things in perspective and and just ride it out as long as I can.

• 41:25Chuck Nice?

  How did your teammates react to you taking these techniques forward and using them for your own benefit?

• 41:32Speaker 04

  Yeah, I I mean, people are are pretty open. I think, um, you know, I was one of the early baseball players to start doing yoga and things like that. And and, you know, now I I think it's rare for players to not do yoga or some type of, uh, you know, breath, mind, body type exercise. And um, so I I think people were receptive and the better you perform, that people are like, hey, what are you doing? I want to try to do what you're doing. And I think that's that's what happens. I my career sort of took off at the same time. Um, and plus, I think age is a factor. You know, I was like twenty five. I was like textbook prime twenty five to twenty nine. Um, but it's also, I think, as these things started to to take root, um, that's when I got better.

• 42:17Chuck Nice?

  Let me get a little just a little basebally. I just want to know, uh, so like, uh, so that day, what we're talking about, that was all right field. But you're also known for going the other way. Like, you're good at, like, hitting over the shortstop, center left. Is that something you worked on? Or is that is that something that happens organically for a hitter? Or do you like, do you practice that? How's that? How's that come about?

• 42:43Speaker 04

  That's a good question. It's sort of a complicated, you know, response, but I'll, I'll keep it as brief as I can. But, you know, my swing was naturally sort of a, an opposite field type swing. Um, other guys like that, I, I modeled myself after guys like John Olarude, who was my teammate in Toronto.

• 43:00Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 43:01Speaker 04

  You know, Don Mattingly, Wade Boggs, some of those, the great left-handed hitters, when I was growing up, um, a lot of them were line drives over the shortstop's head. Um, and I think also as I grew into my body, my, my arms are really long. So it's, it's easier for me to get to the outside pitch. The inside pitch is, is a little tougher because I have, I had to get it out front more because my arms are, are, are long. So I think that, that was a big part of it. Even like the homerun game, um, the game where I hit all the home runs, um, one of them was straight away left field. And, and what I did is I, I used to play a homerun derby game in batting practice, which is sort of counterintuitive because you're tra- you're taught to not, um, you know, over swing in batting practice. But Carlos Dogado, the same guy who hit for

• 43:42Speaker 04

  the year after me, we, um, used to do a homerun derby game where we set up points and kind of make, make a, a fun time of it. And right field was out of bounds. Like we'd set, we'd set, you know, right center, almost center field, and we'd have a point system. And we took it really seriously. We, we tried to hit the ball as far as we could to center field, basically.

• 43:59Chuck Nice?

  Wow.

• 44:00Speaker 04

  On every swing. And, and what I, what I found is I, I was teaching myself to hit home runs. And I was teaching myself to swing hard and, but under control. When I got into these counts like two oh and three one, and you get a good pitch to hit. And that's when I really learned how to do it. And, and my thought was as well, if I could hit the pitch outside, out to left field, just like a right-handed hitter would hit out to left field.

• 44:23Chuck Nice?

  Right.

• 44:23Speaker 04

  That gives such an advantage because when you're hitting home runs, pitchers try to throw away because they're scared to come in and have you, you know, hit it to your pole side. So it, it actually worked in my advantage to, to get better at hitting the ball out the other way.

• 44:35Chuck Nice?

  Yeah, man. Yeah. And actually, you know, I'd never thought of that though. But in the pitching, in the pitching batter battle, um, what you said, the pitcher is now looking at you because he's studied you.

• 44:47Speaker 04

  Mm-hmm.

• 44:47Chuck Nice?

  And so he's looking at you like, wow, I can't go in like that because I, this guy is going to make me pay for it. So I, that's really interesting.

• 44:56Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's really, it gets a lot easier when you're hot, not just because you're in a zone, but because it becomes really easy to know how they're going to pitch you.

• 45:04Gary O'Reilly?

  Right.

• 45:04Speaker 04

  You're sort of forcing them, I sort of, that would force them to my strengths.

• 45:08Gary O'Reilly?

  Cool.

• 45:09Speaker 04

  That's kind of how it works.

• 45:10Gary O'Reilly?

  It's funny, we did a show last year with a fabulous guy, Ron Darling.

• 45:14Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 45:15Speaker 04

  Yeah, it was great.

• 45:16Gary O'Reilly?

  Love Ron, isn't he? And he said, I would set batters up earlier on in the season by throwing a certain ball that was absolute garbage.

• 45:26Speaker 04

  Yep.

• 45:27Gary O'Reilly?

  And then later on in the season, I know I'd probably be facing them in a playoff situation. And they'd be thinking, oh, he threw me that garbage before, that's what he's got. And he said, and then I'm gonna slice and dice them. How did they, did you, did you ever feel you, you were getting set up by a pitcher?

• 45:43Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, I think it worked both ways. Sometimes I was setting them up too. I mean, it's, it's part of the game. It really becomes a chess match and, and players don't forget how guys are approaching them. I actually did a lot better against better pitchers because I understood what they were trying to do. Guys who weren't as good, you know, all these guys are major leaguers, so they all have good stuff. But the guys who really knew how to pitch, I felt were easier in some ways to hit against because I knew what Greg Maddux's plan was. I understood, I understood his thought process and if I was him, how he would pitch me. Um, and then you have some, some young guy come in that was throwing a ninety-five and, you know, I, he didn't really know what to do. He was kind of like, you're not supposed to throw that pitch there.

• 46:25Speaker 04

  You know, so you have that type of mentality, but it's, there's a lot of setting up. What I got really good at, um, over the years, and there was actually an article I saw with the Red Sox Yankees game the other day, where they had Luis Severino's pitches. They, he was actually tipping his pitches by the way, he was holding his glove. And that was something that I learned and got really good at and was able to determine what a guy's gonna throw a lot of times before he threw it.

• 46:48Gary O'Reilly?

  Cool. What are you into now as regards, uh, what exercises your mind? Cause you're not swinging a bat anymore.

• 46:55Chuck Nice?

  Actually, I'll do one better. Like, uh, why don't you just take this time and go ahead and plug, uh, Greenfly, which is your, which is your digital platform, because I, I know you're doing some work. What is that about?

• 47:09Speaker 04

  Yeah, so it's a enterprise software platform. So we sell to a lot of brands and it's really what we are is a hub for collaborating with a brand storyteller. So that could be their employees, their influencers who are at app as well as a backend and they could create galleries of content, share the content through their influencers or staff and it's a kind of a two-way street. And so we work with a lot of big brands and media companies and sports leagues and teams with just the publishing and creation of content.

• 47:43Chuck Nice?

  Wow, man. That is impressive.

• 47:45Gary O'Reilly?

  Okay, so there's a little bird tells me you may have a family relationship with science.

• 47:51Speaker 04

  I do. I do. I have a very-

• 47:53Gary O'Reilly?

  Are you prepared to share?

• 47:55Speaker 04

  Uncle. Yeah, so my mom's sister's husband, you guys got that?

• 48:00Gary O'Reilly?

  Yeah, we're paying attention.

• 48:02Speaker 04

  He's, he was for a long time, I don't know the exact department, but he was basically the head of cell biology at Harvard. His name's Mark Kirschner. And brilliant guy. I mean, he's, you know, doing all kinds of stuff with cell division and, you know, things obviously tied to cancer research. And he's been, he's, you know, in his seventies now, so he's been at it a long time and done some great work, for sure.

• 48:24Gary O'Reilly?

  Very cool. And we have one thing to say. Thank you.

• 48:28Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 48:29Gary O'Reilly?

  It's been brilliant talking to you and it's been a pleasure.

• 48:33Gary O'Reilly?

  Chuck, that's us.

• 48:34Chuck Nice?

  That's our show, man.

• 48:35Gary O'Reilly?

  So Juiced Balls, Broken Bats and a Record Breaker.

• 48:38Chuck Nice?

  Yeah.

• 48:38Gary O'Reilly?

  It's not bad for a show.

• 48:39Chuck Nice?

  Not bad for a show. I like this show.

• 48:41Gary O'Reilly?

  I like it too. And guess what? We'll be back with more, but it'll be a different show next time. Hopefully you'll join us on another Playing with Science. I've been Gary O'Reilly.

• 48:50Chuck Nice?

  And I've been Chuck Nice.