Major League Baseball's six-month season is under way with something new in a sport that typically doesn't change much. A new type of wood bat creates a buzz among players, fans and sportscasters after the New York Yankees used it in the first three games, hitting 15 homers and beating the Milwaukee Brewers each time. The funny-looking innovation, developed by a physicist, is nicknamed "torpedo bat" or "bowling pin bat" because of a bulge in the middle. It’s custom-shaped for each batter so that more wood, and thus more mass, is concentrated where the player most often smacks the hardball. It's allowed by MLB, and the Yankees' recent success – tying a record for most home runs in the first three games – spurs more teams to order the offbeat style. For more than a century, bats typically have had the "barrel" (widest part) near the end.

"Everyone across the league probably now is going to be looking into using these," says Chicago White Sox manager Will Venable. In Baltimore, Orioles hitting coach Cody Asche sees torpedo bats as "probably the next progression in hitting – finding out where you hit the ball in the sweet spot, putting more mass there." And in Detroit, Tigers manager A.J. Hinch also expects "it will get plenty of attention now. The internet has a beautiful way of bringing things to be a big deal. I hadn't paid a ton of attention to it really."

It's not necessarily a one-size-fits-all approach, suggests Cleveland Guardians manager Stephen Vogt said. Bat choices depend on "whatever feels best for each player," he notes. "It's still a human that has to hit it. It's not the bat hitting the homer. ... I think that's a complete individual feel thing for each person." Brewers manager Pat Murphy put it colofully: "It ain't the wand; it's the magician." For his part, Yankees slugger Aaron Judge plans to stick with a conventional bat because "why try to change something if you have something that's working?"

The inventor is former Yankees hitting coach Aaron Leanhardt, who now works for the Miami Marlins. Before moving from science to sports, he earned a doctoral degree in physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and was an assistant professor of physics at the University of Michigan for over six years. His game-altering bat brought stares and head shakes from some major leaguers initially. "I thought it was a joke at first," admits San Diego Padres infielder Xander Bogaerts. "I thought they edited the picture, because I've never seen anything like that." Brewers pitcher Trevor Megill mocks the new look as "like something used in slow-pitch softball."

Player says: "It gives you the feeling like you have more to work with. . . . It gives you that extra confidence in your head to go out there and hit anything." – Jazz Chisholm Jr., New York Yankees

Inventor says: "It's just about making the bat as heavy and fat as possible in the area where you’re trying to do damage on the baseball." -- Aaron Leanhardt

MLB bat rules: Must be smooth, with a round stick no more than 2.61 inches in diameter at the thickest part and up to 42 inches long.