Axe Bats and Budweiser teamed up to put beer in George Springer’s baseball bat
The reigning World Series MVP and the official beer sponsor of MLB go to bat together with limited edition beechwood bats.
For MLB players like Houston Astros outfielder George Springer and former first baseman-turned-MLB Network personality Kevin Millar, finding a bat he is comfortable and confident with is crucial. For MLB fans, finding a refreshing, reliable beverage with which to enjoy taking in the performances of those players — or at least the nearest beer — is just as crucial. And for anyone that’s ever taken a sip of beer at a baseball game and thought “I wonder if you could make a bat out of this,” Axe Bat and Budweiser have the answer.
Budweiser, the official beer sponsor of MLB, has for well over a century crafted its famous brew using chips of beechwood. The brew rests on a bed of beechwood chips for several weeks to remove undesirable flavors and help produce the clean, crisp flavor that fans of the beer are familiar with. Budweiser believes in brewing its beer “the hard way” by using human labor to fill the tanks with beechwood chips and then puts every batch through a rigorous series of tests before giving it final approval for consumption by MLB fans.
Meanwhile, Springer has found a bat that he used to help propel the Astros to their first-ever World Series title in 2017. The bat, produced by Axe Bat, features a customized handle which replicates the design of an axe handle as opposed to a traditional knob. Springer spoke about his comfort and confidence with the bat.
“I started using it August of 2016 and I haven’t gone back since. The relationship developed essentially from there,” Springer stated. “It’s for sure raised my contact rate and slowed me down some. There’s a lot of things about my swing that the Axe Bat ironed out. It allows me to be flatter in the zone, control my barrel more and I think it’s had a direct impact on my performance.”
Millar, who played 12 MLB seasons and won the 2004 World Series with the Boston Red Sox, echoed Springer’s sentiments about the importance of players finding what works for them.
“It’s funny because we change so much. Some guys rarely stay with the same bat, like Springer has stayed with this bat, that’s a gift,” Millar elaborated. “I was a guy who kind of went back and forth, one day I would grab Manny Ramirez’s bat, one day I would grab this, but the bat’s gotta feel good in your hand. I loved tinkering to see and you’d get hot for a couple of weeks and stay with that bat for a couple of months. I was always making adjustments. I loved trying out stuff.”
One of the bats players are liable to try is an afore-hinted-at beer-adjacent Axe bat. Budweiser teamed up with bat brand to create custom Axe beechwood bats inspired by Budweiser’s quality beechwood. (Beechwood was approved by the MLB for use in bats in 2014.) Experts describe beechwood as a hard, flexible and balanced wood. It’s said to have an elastic memory, creating better exit speed and increased distance.
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As both Budweiser and Springer seek continued success in their respective industries, the connection that both have to Axe Bat is important. If Springer is as successful in his MLB career as Budweiser has been in building a beverage empire, he will go down as one of the best to ever play the game.