It was already bad enough when this crew engaged in hyperbolic anecdotes about how thunderstorms would kill us all due to climate change. Global warming was responsible for the spike in crime in cities like Chicago because, in the summertime, it gets hot or something. Was there ever a summer when it was never hot and humid? The intensity of the weather was another dud. Again, when has a hurricane not been a strong weather system capable of inflicting massive damage? And yes, there is a thing called ‘hurricane season’ that’s existed for generations. It’s eye-roll-worthy, almost embarrassing, how everything is now the fault of climate change. The kicker was how climate change and racism were threaded as if that would move the needle in passing new green energy legislation. These panic peddlers are weighing in on sports, which is ludicrous. It’s not doomsday banter, thank God, but they have a theory on why more home runs will be hit in future seasons: it’s climate change.
No column today (day off), but this will certainly make Monday's hit, under "Matching Media Memorandum" pic.twitter.com/6WJRyWhHGU
— Brad Slager: Just Watching Walls Moving Out... (@MartiniShark) April 7, 2023
Our friend at RedState, Brad Slager, pointed this out, even finding the full-court media press was executing to sell this theory. And it would be official if NBC’s Al Roker didn’t give it a shoutout on The Today Show. Yet, Newsbusters also highlighted a glaring blind spot in this study as well:
An energetic Roker explained that:
Heat and humidity reduce air density so baseballs can fly further. Well, guess what, they have been taken off, the baseball season has warmed over two degrees since 1970, each two degrees of warming adds 95 [home] runs per season. That's right, and that’s why we've been seeing all of these home runs. Top ten ballparks that will see more home runs with climate change, from Baltimore, Washington, St. Louis, Detroit, Chicago, Denver, even Minneapolis. So, there you have it. More home runs, but that means we are warming up as far as our climate is concerned.”
On the Saturday edition of Today, Sam Brock gave more details. Speaking on a Dartmouth study, Brock reported “I talked to the lead author. He said he's a huge baseball fan who is also a climate scientist and he wanted to test out a theory that warmer temperatures create less dense air where baseballs theoretically can fly farther. Are we seeing more home runs? What he found is 500 more home runs over the course of a decade, and that increase is expected to be more pronounced in future years.”
[…]
Continuing with the causation-correlation fallacies, Brock added, “More modest emissions could mean closer to 100 or 200 more per season. The projections for pop vary dramatically based on ballpark. The three with the lowest numbers happen to be in warmer climates, Loan Depot in Miami, Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, and Minute Maid in Houston, but they're all indoor venues, those slated to see the greatest bump, Comerica Park in Detroit, Target Field in Minnesota, and Wrigley in Chicago.”
Those numbers fail to consider the quality of the teams with indoor stadiums. In 2022, the Miami Marlins had the third worst offense in MLB. The Tampa Bay Rays were in the bottom ten. At the same time, the Rays and Houston Astros had top six pitching staffs and the Marlins were above average.
And that’s the key right there: teams must be able to hit the ball. Playing with this theory, just because there’s more heat and humidity supposedly due to climate change doesn’t mean automatic home runs will be sailing through the air. There are some things you should leave alone, guys. Baseball and climate change are incongruous regarding analyzing offense, so just switch off the global warming machine and enjoy the damn game.