Bat rolling question?

[SpikeDmax]

What are some opinions on bat rolling? My son has a COMbat 29" 17oz that is new and it seems like a dud, the balls just doesn't pop off it like his COMbat 30-18. I'm considering having it rolled but want to get some input first.

[KevinOK]

Single walled bats do not benefit from being rolled. Mulit-walled bats do. Spent a good chunk of money and tested several myself just to see if there was something to it and that in a nutshell is my findings.

In fact, single walled bats that are rolled have a much shorter life.


I would just have your son keep hitting your 29/17. My son has had combats especially the B2's take about 1K hits before they came to life.

The B1's vary, out of the several we've owned, I think one took a long time to heat up, rest were hot within a couple hundred hits.

Finally go to your local post office and weigh it the 29/17 and make sure it is within 1/2 oz.

I had one virus that was like 3 oz heavy, Combat replaced it. Likely it had thicker walls than it was suppose to.

[cps]

I have noticed that the B1s are not consistent on break in as well. My son's latest B1 is taking a lot longer to break in than his previous B1s. I am not sure if the bats differ, or if it is the outside temperature. The last previous bats were broke in during winter (North Florida), and they seemed to break in much faster.

[dsore1218]

I can only recommend AGAINST rolling your bats. The data from scientific studies does NOT support rolling bats. They might get hot quicker but they will not reach their potential and they will die much sooner.

Google Dr. Russell, dampening and browse the articles on the sight.

[socalguy]

IMO, the shorter barrel B1s do not have the same pop as the longer barrel. do not roll the B2s, they will not last long. the B1s can be rolled but I dont think you gain much from it.

[Baseball 12]

Rolling may cut the life of the bat... but how can ya recommend to hit it more when its impossible to hit the barrel in the exact spots to break it in right. Seems as if it would be a no brainer to compress the bat alittle and roll it to break the bat in the same amount all the way around and the full length of the barrell which is impossible to do with just hitting the ball 100's of times which also cuts the life of the bat. JUst asking.

[KevinOK]

From our experience just hitting the bat in general seems to break them in just fine. Bat rolling single wall bats IMHO is a waste of money and shortens the bat life a bunch. I understand that it seems logical that rolling the bat is the perfect way to break it in, but my experience is you gain nothing doing it that way on single walled bats versus just taking extended BP.

[jayhawk]

kevin,

The only bats that I heard of the are double wall would be the Demarini CF models and the virus from Combat. I read somewhere that those type of bats are for the stronger hitters.
Would it benefit a weaker player to help them hit the ball farther when rolled?

When it comes down to it, people roll the bats for a more trampoline effect to get more distance in bats. One website that offers the service even states that rolled bats are more durable.
In your experience, why would a single wall rolled bat have a shorter life?

[KevinOK]

Double walled bats are stiffer than single walled bats. You roll a double walled bat and it will loosen it up better or at least quicker than normal BP. Double-walled bats are really for longevity sake, not performance gain. A weaker hitter in my opinion would not benefit any more from a rolled double-walled bat over that of a similar high performance single walled bat. And I'm talking composite bats not metal say like a techzilla.

Single walled bats nowadays are almost always hot out of the wrapper or within a few hundred hits give or take.

I've conducted my own tests and found double walled bats performance does increase once rolled. Single walled bats I found no increase in performance and only a decrease in life of the bat. You'd have to watch and listen to a bat being rolled to understand how rolling works, breaking down the glue and fibers, poping sounds coming out of the bat.

Which lead me to my final testing. Double-walled rolled versus single walled not rolled but broken in via BP.

One kid (my son) test case and maybe 200 hit balls via BP for each bat over the course of several days.

The difference between performance of both type of bats, same size, manufacturer, null.


Understand though my testing and money went towards only youth bats, not adult softball bats where rolling really came to life at. Understand manufacturers have to build adult softball bats to withstand adult batspeed and not break until past warranty.

As for the advertisements from rollers about increases in distance et al well they likely do on softball bats, that given normal lifecycle, similar to double-walled youth bats, take a good long while to loosen up or increase performance.

As for the advertisements from rollers that the process be it parellel or length ways increases the durability of single walled bats I would shake my head on that claim.

Also read the white paper on rolling effects to bats at the Kettering University study.



All I can tell you is I spent a good chunk of my own money to see what is what and based on my non-scientific tests. I do feel like I had good lengthy tests with a strong swinging 8-9 year old, my conclusion is this.

Buy good high performance single walled bats for your kid and don't roll them.

[socalguy]

I would agree with KevinOk. I have rolled many softball bats and the performance increase with them is very noticable, depending on bat. with youth baeball, I have rolled a few eastons, Miken and Combat. I have not seen the same performance increase with rolling them. The composite baseball bats all seem more brittle than the softball counterparts, you cannot roll them as hard without cracking them. The B1 seems to offer the most flex of any I have seen

[jayhawk]

Thanks Kevin and Socalguy for both of your responses.
btw socal, went to costco on july 3. Combat b2's are under 100.:eek:

[mcp]

under $100.... ?

WOW!!! ...I guess I'm gonna head over and see if ours has any :D

[r14]

I was told this bat will be available in a couple of weeks. I was also told they were sending a few of these bats out to replace broken Omaha cp-91 bats. Does anyone have this bat? What kind of performance are you getting with it.