Mantle corking bats? Article on Yahoo Sports

[brob28]

Originally Posted by deadballfreaK

Do you suppose a person selling a Mantle bat might come up with something to spur interest in the auction? More likely to me that someone would take a legit Mantle bat and cork it to make money.

Ken, I never saw Mantle play, but I thought the same thing when I read the article. Just because there is a Mantle bat with cork in it, does not mean it was there when he owned the bat.

[shelly]

During the 54 season Al Rosen's bat flew apart. He had nails in it. I think corking came later.
news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1964&dat=19540520&id..

[ruth-gehrig]

Originally Posted by brob28

Ken, I never saw Mantle play, but I thought the same thing when I read the article. Just because there is a Mantle bat with cork in it, does not mean it was there when he owned the bat.

Exactly!!

[the 'stache]

Good post, Craig.

Again, I don't know what Mick did or did not do. All I'm saying is this article does nothing to diminish Mantle's accomplishments in my mind, even if he did try a corked bat later in his career.

I have HBO's Mantle documentary "save until I delete" on my DVR (which means it's there until they pry the remote out of my cold, dead hands). I never had the pleasure of seeing him in person, but knowing what I do about baseball, I can say categorically that Mantle did not need a cork in his bat to hit home runs.