 | |
| Industry | Baseball |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1997; 28 years ago (1997) |
| Founder | Sam Holman |
| Headquarters | , Canada |
Key people | Arlene Anderson (president, co-owner) Jim Anderson (co-owner) Paul Balharrie (co-owner) Sam Holman (co-owner) |
| Products | Baseball bats |
| Website | sambat |
Sam Bat, officiallyThe Original Maple Bat Corporation, is a Canadian company based in the town ofCarleton Place, Ontario that manufacturesbaseball bats.[1] It was the first company to supply baseball bats manufactured from maple wood to professional baseball players.[2] As of 2013, it is one of 32 licensed baseball bat suppliers forMajor League Baseball (MLB) andMinor League Baseball (MiLB) players.[3] It is also a bat supplier for baseball leagues throughout the world, including Germany, Japan, Korea, Italy, Mexico, and the Netherlands. It is the official bat manufacturer for theAustralian Baseball League.
The company was founded in 1997 by Sam Holman, who manufactured bats in hisgarage at the company's inception.[1] Its president is Arlene Anderson, who with her husband Jim and investor Paul Balharrie acquired shares in the company in 2008.
Sam Holman was raised inKansas City and ruralSouth Dakota. After serving in theUnited States Army, he married a Canadian woman and moved toOttawa. They later divorced, after which he became astagehand carpenter at theNational Arts Centre. He quit in 1994 after sustaining aknee injury.[4]
Afterspring training in 1996, Holman's friend Bill Mackenzie, who was working as an MLBbaseball scout for theColorado Rockies,[5] told him that baseball bats were breaking too frequently,[1] asking Holman if he could "do something about it".[4] Holman read about thephysics of baseball and researched baseball batpatents.[6] After some trials withironwood,[7] he eventually settled on using maple wood, which has greaterdensity than the traditionalash wood, to manufacture bats.[4]
He manufactured his first bat in hisgarage from a stairwaybannister, and tested the 33-ounce bat with local children before Mackenzie suggested a test trial with theOttawa Lynx, a nearbyTriple-A minor league team in theInternational League.[4] Among the players to test the bat wasFernando Seguignol,[8] who became the first professional player to hit ahome run with a maple bat.[6] In April 1997, Holman went toToronto, where he met withJoe Carter,Carlos Delgado, andEd Sprague Jr., convincing them to test his bats duringbatting practice.[5]
Holman established the company with financing from his sister in 1997[9] following the successful trial of his bats by theToronto Blue Jays.[1] Carter used a Sam Bat, which was not officially licensed by MLB at the time, by sneaking it into a game during the1997 season,[10] hitting a home run in one of hisat-bats.[5] He became the company's first MLB client.[11] In 1998, MLB approved the maple bat for use in games, and Sam Bat became an authorized licensee of MLB.[9]
Holman continued to manufacture baseball bats in aworkshop at his home until opening a 29,000-square-foot (2,700 m2) factory on a 2-acre (8,100 m2) site inGatineau in late 2001.[4][12][13] In November 2011, the company moved to North Industrial Park in Carleton Place.[7]
Holman's brother Nathan designed the batlogo.[9]
The company does not disclose the source of wood for its bats, neither supplier nor region.[1] In the past, it has sourced its wood from a supplier in theCatskill Mountains.[8] The bats it manufactures are made fromAcer saccharum, also known asrock maple orsugar maple.[1] The company purchasesveneer-grade cylindrical billets having 8% moisture weighing between 4.9 to 6 pounds (2.2 to 2.7 kg).[14] The billets are sorted by weight after being weighed "to the thousandth ounce", and the slope of the grain is visually graded; billets with the straightest grain are reserved for MLB players.[14]
Each bat model can be manufactured using billets in a small range of weights (for example, the bat manufactured forMiguel Cabrera is made from billets between 5.380 to 5.420 pounds (2.440 to 2.458 kg), usually 5.400 pounds (2.449 kg)).[14] After a final visual inspection, it is mounted into a woodtracer lathe, which in up to four minutes shapes the billet to match a template, leaving sufficient material forsanding.[14] The bat's handle and barrel are then measured with acaliper to ensure it meets the template's specifications, and for models that require it, the end of the barrel is cupped (a small indentation is carved into the head of the barrel to shift the bat's centre of gravity toward the handle).[14] The superfluous ends are cut off, and it is then mounted into a sanding lathe, which smooths the bat to its desired weight.[14]
A drop of ink is placed about 12 inches (30 cm) from the base of the handle, and follows the wood's grain.[14] The path it follows is measured with aprotractor using amagnifying glass, and those diverging by more than 3° are rejected.[14] This "ink-dot test" is required by Major League Baseball to ensure bats used in MLB games are less prone to break.[14] Microscopic scratches are smoothed, the bat is painted to the specifications defined by the player for whom it was produced, and the player's name and bat model are laser engraved on the barrel.[14] Each bat is labelled with the logo of abat and the term "Rideau Crusher", a reference to the nearbyRideau Canal.[4] It is finished with a coat ofvarnish and dried overnight before being shipped withsilica gel, adesiccant that controls humidity to ensure the moisture in the bat does not change.[14]
After the1997 Major League Baseball season, Carter became a free agent, playing for theBaltimore Orioles and later theSan Francisco Giants. While with the Giants, he told sluggerBarry Bonds about the maple bats.[10] Holman brought a set of bats to spring training in the1999 season, where he met Bonds, who tested them during batting practice.[5] In the2001 season, Bonds hit 73 home runs using the Sam Bat, setting asingle-season home run record.[15]
Bonds became Sam Bat's best client,[10] citing the personal contact with "the man who's bent over making the bats",[15] and the popularity of maple-based bats increased significantly after he began using them.[2] By 2015, the company had 185 MLB players as clients, among themRyan Braun,Miguel Cabrera,Yoenis Céspedes,Dustin Pedroia,Troy Tulowitzki, andChase Utley.[16]
In 2006, Holman listed the company for sale oneBay for $3.5 million,[10] citing his age and that the company was underfunded.[17] In addition to the factory, machinery, and kilns, he advertised the company's patents and a "client list of the world's top hitters in baseball".[17] At the time, the company had nine employees, produced about 17,000 bats a year generating sales of US$1.3 million ($2 million in 2024), with about 150 Major League Baseball hitters as clients.[17]
Holman did not expect any bids from the listing, which he used partly as a means to advertise the sale of his business.[13] This also provided Holman some time to find investors.[18] Three of five parties that eventually contacted him about purchasing the business learned of it as a result of the eBay listing.[13] In 2007, Paul Balharrie,[12] and husband and wife Arlene and Jim Anderson bought shares in the company.[19] The Andersons own 50% of the company,[7] and Arlene Anderson became the company's president.[16]
Bonds worried that his bat supply may no longer be guaranteed, wrote acheque for $40,000 to assure delivery of 80 bats during the season.[10] This stabilised the company's finances, enabling it to buy wood it needed to manufacture the bats.[10]
Initially, Sam Bat was the only company producing maple baseball bats for use in professional and amateur games. With its success, by 2006 there were 30 companies that had developed maple baseball bats to compete with Sam Bat.[17]
The company now earns 85% of its revenue from international markets, including France, Germany, Japan, Korea, Italy, Mexico, and the Netherlands.[6][20] It is the official bat manufacturer for theAustralian Baseball League.[20]
In 2004, Holman received an invitation to meetGeorge W. Bush (President of the United States) andCondoleezza Rice (United States Secretary of State nominee) during astate visit to Ottawa.[17] On 26 November 2004, a member of theOffice of the Prime Minister asked Holman to prepare a bat as an official state gift for the president, an avid baseball fan who had previously owned theTexas Rangers.[21] During a reception at theCanadian Museum of History on 30 November, he presented two bats, one inscribed with "Prez 43" and "to the future commissioner of baseball", the other for his fatherGeorge H. W. Bush inscribed with "Prez 41" and "to the father of the future commissioner of baseball".[21] Later at the reception, Holman arranged a telephone conversation between Bonds and his fan Rice.[21]