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By Bat Digest – February 11, 2023
If you want to see what bats we think are best overall, check our Best BBCOR, USSSA, USA and Fastpitch articles.
As a dad, we’d choose the 2023 Atlas in BBCOR over the 2023 Voodoo One. Although it might be a smidge heavier, it runs true to its length, is in stock, and is $50 cheaper than the 2023 Voodoo One. It hits the ball just as hard as the Voodoo One. As a player, considering the nearly unprecedented hype and marketing around the Voodoo One, we’d probably choose the Voodoo One as our bat. It hits the ball well, swings light, and most kids can get away with swinging a bigger “33” inch bat (even though it technically measures as a 32-inch).
The differences between the 2023 Voodoo One and the Slugger Atlas are that the Atlas swings 2-3% heavier than the Voodoo One; the Voodoo One’s barrel measures about 7/8-inch shorter than a comparable Atlas, and the Atlas is $50 cheaper. In terms of measured exit speeds, we find the Voodoo One and Atlas to perform similarly. Both are BBCOR bats and, through our years of testing, there’s rarely been a BBCOR bat that has beat the limit. Neither the 2023 Voodoo One or 2023 Atlas break the barrier.
The 2023 Voodoo One gets unprecedented levels of hype. Most of that is unwarranted, but it is a great bat that hasn’t changed much over the last 5 years of its release. As such, if this business is about confidence at the plate, few who own the Voodoo One think they have anything less than the best. And what’s $50 more bucks in the world of travel baseball? We’ve already lost our minds. In technical terms, too, the bat swings light, has a great stiffness to it and when you can square it up hits the crap out of the ball.
The 2023 Louisville Slugger saves you $50, gets you out of the lemmings camp and shuffles money around from one side of Wilson’s pocket to the other. What’s not to love about that? As well, the bat is the full length that’s stated on the barrel (a 33-inch measures 33-inches, not 32 1/8 of an inch like the Voodoo One). As well, since this is BBCOR, the Atlas clearly hits the ball as hard as the Voodoo One.
Both bats are great sticks, and kids who want a single-piece alloy bat should like these. Generally, we think more would like a two-piece composite, but that’s not what we’re here to talk about. The Voodoo One and Atlas make a great choice, and while we’d lean more towards the Atlas because we were paying for it, we’d likely be willing to go all in on the Voodoo One, assuming we could find it in stock. Under no circumstance would we ever pay more for the Voodoo One than what it is supposed to cost. Paying opportunist resellers for that bat should be a crime. 🙂