MLB reportedly used two different baseballs last season

MLB confirmed two different balls were used during the 2021 season, but claimed it was due to COVID-19 causing production delays, according to Business Insider.

“Every baseball used in a 2021 MLB game, without exception, met existing specifications and performed as expected,” the league said. But after approving the shift to the new “re-centered” ball for 2021, it said, COVID-19 forced Rawlings to backtrack and use older balls to cover for production delays. “Rawlings manufactures Major League balls on a rolling basis at its factory in Costa Rica,” it said. “Generally, balls are produced 6-12 months prior to being used in a game. Because Rawlings was forced to reduce capacity at its manufacturing facility due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the supply of re-centered baseballs was not sufficient to cover the entirety of the 2021 season. To address this issue, Rawlings incorporated excess inventory into its shipments to Clubs to provide a full complement of baseballs for the 2021 season.”

Wills’ research doesn’t support MLB’s statement. Each MLB ball contains a batch code that lets a person know the date the ball was manufactured. Wills said those batch codes showed the ball fluctuated multiple times since 2019. MLB reportedly used the new, lighter version of the ball last October. It then reportedly switched back to the old ball in January, and continued to use that ball as recently as August, according to the batch codes.