For generations, white ash from forests along the Pennsylvania-New York border was chopped, milled and shipped to Kentucky, then turned into bats for major league hitters. (More on them later.) Louisville Slugger, a brand built on ash baseball bats, was born in 1884 when Bud Hillerich made a bat for Pete “The Louisville Slugger” Browning. And that caused a bit of a panic in me because it’s something I’m very, very used to.”Īsh, the preferred wood for most of baseball history, is on its way out. That’s when I was informed that ash was not going to be available going forward. “Good bats, in my experience, haven’t done that,” Votto says. They were “falling apart,” Votto says, with cracks cutting through the grain right in the center of the bat. Votto asked a Louisville Slugger rep why the wood on the barrel of his bats - an ash M356 model double-dipped in black finish - was fraying. After seeing his production wane since an MVP runner-up season in 2017, Votto had revamped his swing and approach in the second half of 2020 and gotten to a point where he thought it would work, where he could once again, even at 37, be in the MVP discussion.īut everything needed to be perfect, and his bats weren’t. “It’s as safe as I can keep it,” Votto says.Ī year ago, before this space became a storehouse for ash’s last stand, Votto was preparing for a pivotal season at first base for the Reds.
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