The opening series of the 2025 MLB season was historic for the New York Yankees. They launched 15 home runs over their first three games of the season, tying an MLB record. Initially, this was not just a hot streak. It was the result of purposeful engineering — the emergence of the hot topic “Torpedo” bats. These innovative bats, which feature a unique weight distribution and a larger sweet spot, were already making a significant impact on the Yankees’ offense, but as the season progressed, batters without these bats have been the most productive.
The Torpedo bat is completely legal, even with its non-traditional barrel placement being closer to the hands, providing the hitter with greater control and a larger sweet spot. According to the Yankees’ analytics department, this design allows players to make more consistent contact, particularly on balls that would normally be jam shots off the handle of the bat. The idea is simple but effective: by extending the barrel’s area where the ball is most frequently struck, players can boost their chances of making solid contact, resulting in higher exit velocity and more home runs.
Currently, Torpedo bats are in the hands of Cody Bellinger, Paul Goldschmidt, Jazz Chisholm Jr., Anthony Volpe, and Austin Wells. Meanwhile, others like two-time MVP Aaron Judge and Ben Rice have opted to use more traditional models.
For a moment, the innovative bat design appeared to pay off. In the first two weeks of the 2025 season, the Yankees led all of Major League Baseball in total barrels (39), hard-hit percentage (48.7%), and average exit velocity (91.1 mph).
After these first two weeks, Chisholm Jr. ranked 13th in MLB with a barrels-per-plate-appearance, while Volpe ranked 19th, according to MLB’s statcast site Baseball Savant (baseballsavant.mlb.com). Even Wells saw an increase in average exit velocity from 88.4 mph in 2024 to 91.3 mph early in 2025.
But the Torpedo bats that symbolized a new era of Yankee dominance have cooled off, and the players using traditional bats are now leading the charge. Volpe’s OPS, which was 1.073 in early April, has now dipped to .734 as of April 22nd. Chisholm, Wells, and Bellinger each have a batting average under .200, with Jazz ranking dead last out of the everyday starters with an average of .161.
Meanwhile, Judge is doing MVP things again, leading the MLB in batting average (.390), hits (32), RBIs (25), and OPS (1.202). Alongside him, it is Goldschmidt who lands second in baseball with his .361 average as well as third in total hits (30). Ben Rice has been on fire as well, ranking fifth in barrels per plate appearance (15.6%) and second in hard hit percentage (66.0%), according to Baseball Savant. In fact, the players sticking with traditional bats, Judge, Goldschmidt, and Rice, have not only outperformed the Torpedo using teammates but are also atop the league in multiple offensive categories, suggesting that old reliable might still be best in the Bronx.
Even some baseball fans had doubts about this new technology before the falloff. “I’m not sold on the Torpedo bats just yet,” said Red Sox fan Sam Torosian (‘26) in a quote from two weeks ago. “Sure, the Yankees are putting up big numbers, but we’ve seen plenty of hot starts that eventually die out. It’s one thing to have a few guys hitting well early on, but let’s see how they hold up through the grind of a full season. I’m not convinced a new bat is something that is going to stick.”
On the other hand, there are still Yankee fans out there who have not given up on the bat’s potential:
“I still think we’re too early in the season to write off these [Torpedo] bats,” said Joseph DiDomenico (‘26), a Yankees fan. “Yeah, Judge and Goldy are tearing it up with their regular bats, but Jazz is still tied for first on the team in home runs. I can see this just being a slump for some of these other guys using the [Torpedo] bats, and if they break out of it, these bats might really start to shine as the season goes on.”
While the Torpedo bats initially sparked excitement with record-breaking performances, their impact has faded as the season has progressed. Players using traditional bats, like Judge, Goldschmidt, and Rice, are now leading the offense, outperforming their Torpedo-using teammates. Despite some fans holding out hope for a rebound, the early struggles of key players with the new bats suggest that the traditional approach may still be the key to the Yankees’ success.
