I read with interest and Feb. 1 article in the Daleville Sun Courier, “Big Changes Coming to Baseball.” It says the National Federation of State High School Association, the organization that enforces rules and changes to high school athletics, established the change.
Starting this season, all bats must be certified by BBCOR, which stands for Batted Ball Coefficient of Restitution. The article stated that scientist spent years of testing in order to determine the BBCOR standard. If a player doesn't have a BBCOR certified bat, he cannot play.
Up until this season the standard was BESR, which measured the speed of the ball coming off the bat. The BBCOR standard does the same, but also measures the speed when the ball comes in contact with the bat. Whoopee.
What this means for high school baseball remains to be seen. The added cost of the bats is also something that schools have to deal with, as BBCOR certified bats are several hundred dollars each compared to their older counterparts.
I don't know how the average taxpayer feels about this, but the question I have is what role did the Federal Secretary of Education or the superintendents in each state have in making this decision? If they did not have a say in this decision, then why not? This means that every city and county school in every state is affected. I don't know how many bats each program must have, but you can quickly understand that millions of dollars will be spent.
All we hear from these “elite eggheads” managing our educational systems is that they want more money. If they were managing the dollars that they have, I don't think the taxpayers would mind giving more.
When they fail to manage organizations that have the power to change rules in high school athletics that waste this type of money, it makes it easy to understand why the taxpayers don't want to give schools more funds. It also makes one wonder what the money trail looks like on the certification of the new bats.
George Barbrey
Newton
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