Ban on metal baseball bats looks to be swing and miss

Despite pleas from an injured baseball player and a pair of anguished parents, a proposal to ban the use of metal bats by Chicago players between the ages of 8 and 18 is looking more and more like a swing and a miss.

On Wednesday, a joint City Council committee held a nearly four-hour hearing on the issue, prompting Mayor Daley, a parade of aldermen, and the Chicago Public Schools to line up with Little League Baseball and bat manufacturers in opposition to the proposal.

“You have to be very careful how you venture into the sports arena,” said Daley, who has steadfastly opposed the now-repealed foie gras ban and other City Council intrusions into Chicagoans’ private lives.

The 18-year-old son of Ald. Frank Olivo (13th) is recovering from a fractured skull suffered after being hit by a ball that came off a wooden bat while he was pitching at an indoor batting cage seven weeks ago.

Olivo acknowledged that his son's injury might have been worse had the bat been aluminum. But, he nevertheless opposed the Chicago ban.

“It has to be done on a level playing field” at the state or federal level, Olivo said, agreeing with school officials that a Chicago-only ban would put city players at a competitive disadvantage.

As the hearing wound to a close, Ald. Anthony Beale (9th) called for a vote that would have killed the proposal to ban metal bats.

The absence of a quorum spared Ald. Robert Fioretti (2nd), chief sponsor, the embarrassment of a certain defeat. But, the ban is clearly going nowhere.

Arguing that government has no business sticking its nose into sports, Beale said, “At some point, we’ll start getting into what kind of golf clubs people can use, what kind of cleats people can use. It just gets out of control.”