GOSHEN — High school baseball fans who notice less hitting and scoring this season are on to something.

High school baseball in Indiana and across the country has gone to a new type of bat in the interests of safety. The new bats, known as BBCOR bats, while cutting down on the speed of balls flying off the bat, are also causing coaches and players to rethink their approach to the game.

Balls don’t travel as far with the new bats; They feature a much smaller sweet spot — the area on a bat that yields the most solid hits.

And according to some area coaches, they are a chance to get the game back on a level playing field and back to basics.

Goshen High School head baseball coach Hal Farmwald says the lower-scoring games this season are placing pitching and defense at more of a premium than ever.

“Good pitching and defense is always important,” Farmwald said. “And we talk to our pitchers all the time about not issuing walks. That’s becoming more important now with the new bats.”

On one level, good hitters will always be good hitters, Farmwald said. But the ones who continue to excel with the new bats will be the ones who adapt quickly.

With the older aluminum bats, the sweet spot measured about eight inches. The new BBCOR bats have cut that down to about four inches, Farmwald said.

“Our seniors have struggled the most adapting to the change,” Farmwald said. “It’s a matter of figuring it out, and making the adjustment. It’s a little bit frustrating at first, but you have to fight through it and keep battling.”

Goshen junior outfielder Austin Henke has gotten several extra-base hits with the new bats so far. “The ball doesn’t go as far as it used to, but when you hit the sweet spot, you know it,” Henke said.

Senior Diego Garcia said the bats have made him a more disciplined hitter. “You really need to be careful what you swing at, because your chances of getting the good part of the bat on a pitch are less,” Garcia said.

NorthWood sophomore Kyle McCoy feels the same way. “I see them as an opportunity,” McCoy said. “It’s a change, but you can adapt to it if you’re patient.”

One of the keys to getting hits with the new bats, coaches and players agree, is keeping your shoulders square in the batter’s box. That has led to extra time in the batting cages both before and during practice, honing batting mechanics.

Small ball

Since the odds of hitting the ball out of the ballpark — or even getting extra-base hits — is not as great as with the previous bats, many coaches are adapting their approach and playing what’s commonly referred to as “small ball” — getting runners on through walks or hits, bunting them over, and taking advantage of any opportunity available to get them home.

For NorthWood last week in its home game against Goshen, that included calling suicide squeeze plays on consecutive batters.

“Good hitters are always going to be good hitters,” NorthWood coach Zach Benko said. “But we’ve got to score runs, and we’re going to do that any way we can.”

At Wawasee, it’s pretty much business as usual: The Warriors have one of the largest ballparks in the NLC, so homers have always been the exception to the rule. There have only 12 homers in the entire history of the field.

Warrior coach John Blunk, who has guided the Wawasee nine for 25 seasons, said the small ball way is how he and his team play ordinarily.

“We focus on the little things, getting runners on, moving them over, getting them in however we can,” Blunk said. “But good hitters are always going to find a way to get hits.”

Different composition

BBCOR stands for “Batted-Ball Coefficient of Restitution.” It’s a scientific formula for determining inbound and rebound speeds of a batted ball. A pitched ball holds energy, which can be seen in the spin and speed of the ball. Wooden bats — required in professional baseball and most summer collegiate leagues — cause the ball to lose much of that energy on impact, as the ball compresses.

With a hollow-core or aluminum bat, the ball compresses less, and thus retains more of its energy. That energy is added to the bat speed, and the net result is harder-hit balls that travel farther.

The idea, according to the National Federation of State High School Associations, is to narrow the gap in performance between wood bats and non-wood bats.

College head start

The NCAA went to the new standard for bats in 2011. College baseball has already seen a decrease in both power hitting and scoring. According to NCAA statistics, home runs went from 3 percent of balls in play in 2011 to just 1.7 percent in 2011 — a decrease of nearly 50 percent.

Runs per game — another key offensive indicator — declined from 6.98 in 2010 to 5.58 in 2011 — the first time below 6 since 1977. And batting average dropped from .301 in 2010 to .282 in 2011.

And home runs decreased to .52 per team per game in 2011, down from .94 in 2010 and the all-time high-water mark of 1.06 in 1998.

On the other side of the ledger, pitching appears to be benefitting from the new bats. Earned-run average (ERA) was 4.70 — the best mark in that category since 1980 (4.59).

Additional expense

The new bats generally run from $250-300 apiece. And in an era when many school districts are already cash-strapped and budget-conscious, the new bat standard has meant an additional expense.

At Goshen High School, a special fundraiser was held to help defray the costs of the new bats. A total of eight new BBCOR bats were purchased: Four for the varsity, two for the J.V. and two for the “C” or freshman team.

At West Noble High School, athletic director Tom Schermerhorn bought seven of the bats to be shared across the Charger baseball program’s several levels.

Schermerhorn said he and his staff found the money in the existing budget. He added that he is supportive of the new bat standard.

“It’s all about safety,” Schermerhorn said. “We knew this was coming a year ago, so it’s not like we were unprepared for it. You find a way, and you just do it.”