# How far could Superman hit a baseball? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 3, 2008, 9:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484 "2008-12-03T09:30:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![jimigorilla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/edb3f5/32.png) [@jimigorilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jimigorilla)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2008, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/81 "2008-12-15T12:55:37Z")
> [@unclelem](#): > > It’s a Flash application, so you need Flash installed to view it. Flash Gordon? ---
**Author:** ![ajdebosco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecd19e/32.png) [@ajdebosco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ajdebosco)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2008, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/82 "2008-12-15T15:13:25Z")
> [@Danalan](#): > > No. This sets off the BS meter in so many ways. . . . Can’t get the high hard one past you, eh? 😃 It is often repeated, but it doesn’t pass the smell test; first problem with the veracity is the fact that one never, ever has a catcher in the cage during batting practice… ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Carrot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@Captain\_Carrot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Carrot)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2008, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/83 "2008-12-15T15:43:44Z")
> [@Wheelz](#): > > …Incidentally (and somewhat OT), this also reminds me of an explanation of how _nobody_ can recognize that Clark Kent is Superman due to his brilliant disguise of a pair of glasses: His super-vision coupled with the glasses’ lenses create a hypnotic effect which makes everybody see Clark as a skinny weakling who bears no resemblance to the Man of Steel. I think this has been chosen as “The Most Ridiculous, Unbelievable Retcon of All Time”, beating even Cyclops’ eyes being portals into another dimension where the base energy is much higher (or some bullshit like that). ---
**Author:** ![CWatsonJr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/90db22/32.png) [@CWatsonJr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CWatsonJr)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2018, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/84 "2018-10-08T00:21:58Z")
At Dodger Stadium, a little over half a mile. At Coors Field, almost a mile. [https://what-if.xkcd.com/1/](https://what-if.xkcd.com/1/) ---
**Author:** ![CWatsonJr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/90db22/32.png) [@CWatsonJr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CWatsonJr)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2018, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/85 "2018-10-08T00:29:17Z")
> [@CWatsonJr](#): > > At Dodger Stadium, a little over half a mile. At Coors Field, almost a mile. > > [Relativistic Baseball](https://what-if.xkcd.com/1/) That was the wrong link… that was what would happen if the ball went the speed of light… Here is the correct link for Superman. > **[Weekend Diversion: Superman vs. Baseball](https://medium.com/starts-with-a-bang/weekend-diversion-superman-vs-baseball-47f413777361)** > > With superhuman speed, strength and precision, how far could the man of steel hit a baseball? ---
**Author:** ![P-man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/p-man/32/3606_2.png) [@P-man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/P-man)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2018, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/86 "2018-10-08T01:48:08Z")
Maybe the question should be whether Superman could hit a breaking ball. ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2018, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/87 "2018-10-08T14:20:09Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > For standard MLB equipment, the bat probably is the weak element. But it looks like the bat regulations are a lot more permissive than the ball regulations. The pros don’t usually use a uniform-thickness bat made of hornbeam or the like, because it’d be horribly heavy, and the weight is a much bigger issue than the occasional shattered bat. For Clark, though, that wouldn’t be an issue, and I guarantee you that a 2 3/4 inch log of good Eastern hornbeam (if you could even find one that big) would be much more durable than any stitched-leather ball. Heck, go whole hog and let him use a chunk of lignum vitae. It’s an extremely strong and tough wood with a grain grain so fine it’s practically like steel. They used to make machine bearings, gears and pulleys out of the stuff. It’s also commonly listed as the densest wood, with a specific gravity of 1.2 (yes, it sinks), compared to about 0.7 for eastern hop hornbeam. It might be a bit slippery because it has oils in it which produce a natural lubrication (another reason it was used for things like shaft bearings). But no problem for his super grip. ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2018, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/88 "2018-10-08T16:30:38Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > This premise was used in an episode of _The Greatest American Hero_ in which Ralph, wearing the alien super-suit, does indeed knock the cover off a ball in a monster home-run. > > And I recall a Superman LP (audiobooks for fogeys) that described Superman throwing a baseball and having it land in Osaka. > > And of course [this illustration](http://www.coverbrowser.com/image/superman/66-1.jpg) seems relevant. He would be called out for not wearing a proper uniform. AFAIK, there is no rule limiting the length of time the bat is allowed to maintain contact with the ball. There is a rule against hitting it twice, but just keeping contact is not that. So he could just get the bat behind the ball and just fly it to the moon. Could Superman fly to the moon? Or he could fly it round the earth. ---
**Author:** ![bardos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bardos/32/1069_2.png) [@bardos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bardos)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2018, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/89 "2018-10-08T22:48:28Z")
He would hit the ball with such force that the ball would travel faster than the speed of light and thus reach the point of endless endlessness before the light did ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2018, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/90 "2018-10-08T23:26:58Z")
If the question is how far he can hit it using a standard batting swing, no different from a professional batter, only fast-forwarded, then yeah it basically comes down to the question of the structural integrity of the items and what counts as a “ball” at the other end. If we want to engineer the question, though, I think that the super-bunt is probably not quite the optimum, yet. Superman can and has caught bullets and performed other actions implying that his brain works at a speed several thousand times ours. His life is like watching super high speed footage all of the time - so every day life should be about as exciting for him to experience as watching paint dry. With that sort of ability, added to the super strength, he would in essence want to not “strike” the ball as “catch and throw” it. Being Superman, I see no difficulty in him being able to keep the ball balanced against the bat as he does this, despite it being two convex objects. I’m not 100% certain, but my expectation would be that a batter is allowed to move his feet freely within the batters box and doesn’t even need to keep one foot in the ground at all times. If you wanted to hop while swinging, with both feet, that would be alright so far as the rules are concerned (obviously, this should be double-checked). And really the only restriction would be that his feet have to stay within the vertical space of the batters box the whole time that the ball is arriving or leaving the batters box. (?) If this is the case, then the question comes whether we’re looking for greatest overall distance or the greatest distance around Earth before coming to a rest? For greatest total distance, Superman simply has to catch the ball on the bat and then accelerate straight up - staying above the batters box at all times - until he is in space and can release the ball at sufficient speed to allow it to be free of Earth’s gravity, and continue on endlessly through space in a straight line. If, however, we’re looking for greatest Terrestrial distance, then Superman would want to launch it at some angle that gave him the maximum runway before leaving the batters box to accelerate the ball without it pancaking, while being sufficiently shallow that it could actually get some distance before air friction caused it to stop. I don’t know what that angle would be. (Technically, he could probably jump into space, roll the ball and the bat 90 degrees and toss it forward into some orbit that would allow it to eventually fall to Earth, but I feel like even Superman wouldn’t be able to aim so well that he could reliably hit the opposite side of the Earth, and I don’t think the ball could survive re-entry.) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2018, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/91 "2018-10-09T00:28:49Z")
Even oak is denser than 0.7 . And the hornbeam I’ve worked with definitely sank in water. At least, I think it was hornbeam. We always just called it “ironwood”, but that’s a fairly common name for a wide varieties of species with unusually strong wood, as well as for well-aged common hardwoods like maple. The species I’m thinking of usually has a trunk less than two inches in diameter, and has striations which resemble muscles. ---
**Author:** ![Dale\_Sams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/779978/32.png) [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2018, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/92 "2018-10-09T01:13:21Z")
Comic-book Pre-Crisis Supes could knock it out of the galaxy. A Supes in our world swinging as hard as he could would kill everyone in row one with a sonic boom and if anything is left of the bat when it hits the ball, the explosion would kill everyone in the stadium at least. ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2018, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/93 "2018-10-09T04:46:03Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Even oak is denser than 0.7 . And the hornbeam I’ve worked with definitely sank in water. > > At least, I think it was hornbeam. We always just called it “ironwood”, but that’s a fairly common name for a wide varieties of species with unusually strong wood, as well as for well-aged common hardwoods like maple. The species I’m thinking of usually has a trunk less than two inches in diameter, and has striations which resemble muscles. Hornbeam (Ostrya virginiana, also called “American Ironwood”) listed here as 0.762: [http://www5.csudh.edu/oliver/chemdata/woods.htm](http://www5.csudh.edu/oliver/chemdata/woods.htm) I think I used a different source which had a slightly lower number and I rounded down to 0.7. Wiki article on hop hornbeam, which I remember from Pa: > **[Ostrya virginiana](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ostrya_virginiana)** > > Ostrya virginiana, the American hophornbeam, is a species of Ostrya native to eastern North America, from Nova Scotia west to southern Manitoba and eastern Wyoming, southeast to northern Florida and southwest to eastern Texas. Populations from Mexico and Central America are also regarded as the same species, although some authors prefer to separate them as a distinct species, Ostrya guatemalensis. Other names include eastern hophornbeam, hardhack (in New England), ironwood, and leverwood.\[5 Ost... A large one grew in back of our house, which must have been a fairly mature specimen - that says “American hophornbeam is a small deciduous understory tree growing to 18 m (59 ft) tall and 20–50 centimetres (8–20 in) trunk diameter.” ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2018, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/94 "2018-10-09T05:17:47Z")
BTW, I’m not sure we’re on the right track for the optimum wood by bringing up very hard types anyway. You might remember a flap about maple bats in MLB a few years back. Players such as Barry Bonds started favoring maple bats because it was a harder, less springy wood than ash, which they felt allowed them to hit further. It also broke more often, and in a different way. The maple tended to shatter and create sharp projectiles, which injured some players. The league was considering banning it as a safety hazard, but the bat manufacturers started being more careful about selecting the wood for their bats, making sure the grain was straight. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Librarian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_librarian/32/402_2.png) [@The\_Librarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Librarian)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2018, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/95 "2018-10-09T05:45:35Z")
The limitation would be the max rpm the bat can withstand; that the bat shatters on contact is a given. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2018, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/96 "2018-10-09T12:18:37Z")
Well, that depends on what we’re allowing the ball to do. Is it OK if the ball comes apart, too, and we’re just measuring the distance of the largest piece, or the center of mass? Or does the ball need to stay basically intact? Because I still say that a ball is more fragile than the strongest possible regulation bat. ---
**Author:** ![Francis\_Vaughan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/francis_vaughan/32/3093_2.png) [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2018, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/97 "2018-10-09T13:57:27Z")
When a mere mortal swings a bat at a ball the best use of their energy is to get the bat up to maximum speed just as it hits the ball - and the momentum transfer occurs as the ball bounces off the bat. [This video](https://www.videoblocks.com/video/baseball-bat-hitting-ball-super-slow-motion-rkflo_bimnq3pbi)suggests the bounce occurs in the time the bat moves only about 30 cm. Superman OTOH can keep accelerating the bat after it contacts the ball - and so long as he keeps the acceleration low enough that the ball doesn’t split the ball can remain attached to the bat for probably three to five times as long gaining momentum. Eventually to avoid hooking the ball around the ball will have to be released by ceasing to accelerate bat. But doing this means the forces on both bat and ball can be limited to within the loads that would cause them to fail. So I would guess Superman could get a conventional ball up to a good fraction of Mach 1 with a conventional bat. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2018, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/98 "2018-10-09T16:41:22Z")
OK, let’s see. Superman is required to keep his feet within the batters’ box, his arms are of normal human length, and I assume that the length of the bat is governed by regulations, too. That gives us a maximum distance over which he can apply an acceleration to the ball. If we further required that the ball remain intact, and knew the acceleration at which a ball would fail to do so, then we could determine how much forward speed he could impart on the ball. OK, based on [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tujMNq7XhQg), it looks like a baseball fails at about 100 kN of force (if I’m reading that gauge correctly; it’s pretty blurry). The mass of a baseball is about 143 g, a batter’s box is 6’ long, and a bat is 42 inches long. If we assume that he leans a bit, stops the ball right at the back end of his reach, and then accelerates it uniformly forward until it’s again out of his reach, that gives us about 5 m. That gives us a final speed of sqrt(2_F/m_d), or [about 2.6 km/s](https://www.google.com/search?ei=9di8W8zdDcrS_wS_vYWIDQ&q=sqrt%282*100+kN%2F%28143+g%29*5m%29&oq=sqrt%282*100+kN%2F%28143+g%29*5m%29&gs_l=psy-ab.3...215515.232663..233544...0.0..0.338.3985.0j24j0j1......0....1..gws-wiz.......0j0i71j35i39j0i67j0i131j0i20i264j0i131i67j0i131i20i264j0i30j0i5i30j0i8i30j33i160.cxWbuEDBeBw). Which is certainly impressive, but it’s well below even orbital speed, even before we consider atmospheric drag. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2018, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/99 "2018-10-09T17:43:56Z")
> [@yabob](#): > > Heck, go whole hog and let him use a chunk of lignum vitae. It’s an extremely strong and tough wood with a grain grain so fine it’s practically like steel. They used to make machine bearings, gears and pulleys out of the stuff. It’s also commonly listed as the densest wood, with a specific gravity of 1.2 (yes, it sinks), compared to about 0.7 for eastern hop hornbeam. It might be a bit slippery because it has oils in it which produce a natural lubrication (another reason it was used for things like shaft bearings). But no problem for his super grip. Well, OK… Heck let him play micro micro baseball in a vacuum and swing a bat of a single or a cloud of subatomic particles, facing a pitcher who can toss them over a plate. Somebody page one of our physicists on that. I bet we’d see some spectacular at bats. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2018, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484/100 "2018-10-09T17:52:04Z")
> [@jovan](#): > > That’s what I was curious about. However, I still think the bat is the weak element, structurally… or maybe not, which is why I was asking. > > By the way, there was a television show here that tried to answer the question of how fast a baseball could go if you shot it out of a tank. With the help of the Cambodian Army, they actually got to test it out and the answer is: 327 km/h (about 200 mph). Cite? Not that I don’t believe you, but knowing the bizarre conditions are pretty necessary even for journalism. Plus you n any event it could lend however haphazardly sone info on the physical response of the ball. When reminds me, surely MLB and its contractors have either detailed standards on the elasticity and materials (material properties at some level) of the ball. How much is publically available? It could add some numbers to the scenarios in the thread. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-far-could-superman-hit-a-baseball/475484.md?page=6)