Three days into the 2025 season, the biggest story in baseball was the New York Yankees’ bats.
On the first Saturday of the year, the Yankees—using innovative “torpedo” bats exalted by announcer MIchael Kay—crushed the Milwaukee Brewers 20–9 and watched both leagues raise their respective eyebrows. Soon, the bats were everywhere.
Not even fancy bats, however, could stem the tide of regression to the mean. New York is now a good-but-not-great 8-6, and the extent to which its initial detonation may have been a sample-size mirage was on full display Sunday against the San Francisco Giants.
With his team up 1–0 in the second inning, shortstop Anthony Volpe swung out of his shoes and flung his “torpedo” bat into the stands.
“Somebody just caught the torpedo,” Kay said as the fan who caught the bat could be seen feeling its barrel.
Volpe is slashing .240/.339/.540 with four home runs and 13 RBIs so far; it remains to be seen whether he can keep those career-best numbers up.
