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When selecting a baseball there are many factors that play into the final decision. The are two possibly three types of bats you can choose. There arm the traditional metal bats, a newer synthetic design, the composite bats and the classic, woods bats. If you play in a wood bat league or are in the minor leagues, you are required to use a wood bat so that would narrow your options down quick. But if you play little league all the way up to collegiate baseball you can use metal or composite which provide a huge advantage over wood which is why everyone use them. The metal bats are more durable and have special design that helps the increases the trampoline effect when the ball meets the bat shooting the ball off farther than wood. But this is also a common misconception because the real advantage of a metal bat is the size of the sweet spot. Wood bats have a much smaller sweet spot, but if you hit it correctly the ball will go farther because the sweet spot in a wood bat is denser than the hollow metal bats so ultimately when hitting a ball solid with a metal and wood bat, the wood bat would win. Once you decide which bat is better for you you need to find the median between price range and performance. Clearly, like everything in the world, the more expensive it is, usually the better it is. Bats can go anywhere from $15 - to $400 for a brand new top of the line -3 bat. This brings me to my next point of sizing the bat up properly so that you will have the combination between power yet still having control. There is no actually formula for the weight of a bat really as it all depends on who's swinging it. Some smaller kids may be very strong and able to control a 20oz. bat while some taller bigger kids may not be as strong and unable to control it. But when choosing a length, there is a common way to get a bat about the right length. You put the knob of the bat in the center of your chest and measure it out the the tips of your fingers. The correct sized bat should be within 1" of your tips. So just short or long is fine as long as its in the correct range. According to physics and momentum and inertia a heavier bat moving fast will hit a ball farther than a lighter bat moving fast so there is a happy-median that you need to find to provide you with the greatest advantage. But really the most important thing is, is to be a good hitter. Your bat doesn't really affect how you hit its just contacts the ball. Yes it does affect it in minor ways but the hitter really defines who he/she is. You have to be able to make adjustments because one days you may face a pitcher throwing 50 mph and the next maybe 80mph so you may have to choke up against the faster pitcher. If you can adjust to the pitcher than your bat will not matter that much. So again its not so much the bat thats makes the batter as much as the person swinging it.

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