Zoomin’ with Zoe: Baseball season is heating up, literally
By CBS Bay Area
Baseball season is heating up – literally! Let’s zoom in on how warming temperatures are affecting something as simple as a baseball.
The 27 cities that host Major League Baseball games have warmed up by an average of 2.8° during the season since 1970.
Toronto, where the Blue Jays play, has warmed the most over that time, 5.4° on average. Phoenix, where the Arizona Diamondbacks call home, is the second highest when it comes to how much the season has warmed – Phoenix is on average 5° warmer during those months since 1970.
Temperatures in San Francisco haven’t warmed up as much, but 2.4° is still significant for the home city of the Giants.
Heat doesn’t only affect the players and fans at the game, but it also affects the baseball itself.
Temperature and humidity are the two main weather components that impact how a baseball flies through the air, and it all revolves around air density.
A quick science lesson here: More dense air has a lot more molecules to run in to and create drag, and less dense air has less molecules to run in to. Imagine more dense air being a pool of water, and less dense air being a sidewalk. It’s a lot more difficult to run through the pool than on the sidewalk.
That’s how it is, but on a much lighter scale, with different temperatures.
Warmer air is less dense, which means there are less molecules and it’s easier to move through. Colder air is more dense and harder to move through.
A similar phenomenon happens with humidity: humid air is less dense (and easier to move through) while dry air is more dense and harder to move through.
That’s why when it’s hot and humid, it’s scientifically proven that there’s also going to be more home runs because the ball moves through the air with less resistance from all the air molecules! It’s all physics!
A University of Illinois study found that when you increase the temperature by just 1°F, it adds roughly 0.33 feet to the ball’s travel distance. Obviously how fast the ball is thrown is still the strongest predictor of a home run, but temperature helps to boost the odds of one happening!
The American Meteorological Society found that from 2010 to 2019, there were an average of 58 additional home runs per year, or 577 in total due to the warming climate. This is a relatively small effect, accounting for about 1% of all home runs, but still statistically significant.
In the decades to come, that percentage will only get higher as temperatures get warmer and the ball’s distance continues to travel farther. Moral of the story: go to a baseball game during hot and humid weather for your best chance as seeing home runs!
