Shattered bats pose danger to players, coaches (and fans)

And you thought that the big danger about baseball bats was a bounce-off effect from metal composites. And sure, there is still a lingering problem in youth baseball and rec-league softball, where 21st-century engineering can produce bats that have a trampoline effect on whatever strikes it, firing the ball at speeds that are faster than the reaction time of the typical player.

But 19th-century technology still has its dangers as well.

In the early 2000s, Barry Bonds' use of a maple bat instead of the traditional ash created a frenzy among pro baseball players. Now about half of the players in the majors use maple, thinking they can hit the ball like Bonds.

(Alas, it doesn't look like the bat was the correct variable.)

Anyway, maple is a harder wood, and many players swear by it these days. But there's a reason maple wasn't used in the first place. While ash cracks under pressure, maple shatters, sending shards of sharp wood everywhere.

In the dugout of a game on April 15 in Los Angeles, the maple bat of the Pittsburgh Pirates' Nate McClouth bat shattered on a hit and a piece of the bat flew into the dugout, opening a huge gash in the cheek of his hitting coach, Don Long.

“Didn’t see it at all,” Long told Jeff Passan of Yahoo Sports. “It just hit me. I backed up. I saw the blood coming out on the card I keep and on my shoes.”

The piece of maple cut nerves in Long's cheek and a doctor had to remove the wood before he sewed in 10 stitches.

Who will be next? Perhaps a player or an umpire or, worse yet, a fan. And studies show very little difference between ash and maple in performance.

What will happen next? A movement is afoot to either ban maple or at least change the shape of the bat handle. Passan carves into the issue more on Yahoo Sports.

Photo: Outfielder Nate McClouth of the Pittsburgh Pirates poses for photos with his maple bat during spring training media day in February 2008 in Bradenton, Fla. (Photo by Marc Serota/Getty Images)