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If you’ve followed us at all you’ll know there are two things that trigger us: first, the idea that there are “must have” bats; second, the notion that, save the hallucinogenic effects of magic mushrooms, there would never be a reason to buy a bat in the secondary market for more than it’s MSRP price.
Those are really part and parcel of the same revulsion. It’s absurd to believe a bat is so good compared to its peers that, in the event it sells out, it demands a price above its original.
Enter 2022.
Our barf meter has doubled down over the last few months as supply chain issues have pushed graphic designers to work overtime producing ‘Out of Stock’ signs.
Bats like the Voodoo One and The Goods have struggled to stay in stock for minutes let alone days. Luckily, as we suggested should have happened back in November, retailers began putting limits on orders for these high demand/low supply bats.
But that hasn’t stopped the onslaught.
Today you’ll struggle to find The Goods One from DeMarini and the Vandal from Victus. Rumor has it Marucci’s lines like the F5 might be next.
Despite what you might be told, there is good news in the event you can’t find one of these ‘hot’ bats. More precisely, the bats people on mushrooms are buying are good but they aren’t unbeatable. There are more than a few bats which are readily available that compete day in and day out with the 2022 crop of disappeared bats.
The best replacement for The Goods is either the Slugger Select PWR or the TRUE HZRDUS. Both scored great in our exit speed tests, competed right in line with The Goods, have the same swing weight, and price out at least a bit better.
We don’t think any bat has quite captured the feel of the Goods. But, as we say until we are blue in the face, feel isn’t performance. Neither is sound. So, while DeMarini has dialed in an unrivaled feel and sound, it has yet to beat the BBCOR test.
If you want to try something different, then look real close at the following two bats.
The Voodoo One, The Goods One, and the Vicuts Vandal are all single-piece alloy bats with a light wing. There are more than a few very similar bats that you can find on the cheap and that will perform as well as any Voodoo One—regardless of what some tell you. There are a lot of options in the light swinging BBCOR space even with these three juggernauts very hard to find in stock.
If it were us, and we were swinging a 32-inch bat or shorter, we’d start with the Omaha. The bigger sizes swing heavy, but the dynamic swing weight in the Omaha line makes for some light swinging 29 through 32-inch sticks.
Another gem is the 2022 Solo. In fact, any year will work. Although the barrel profile is small it isn’t any smaller than the Voodoo One and our exit speeds always put the Solo up top.
Updated February 11, 2022
February 11, 2022
By Brian Duryea | @BatDigest
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