Matt Carpenter improbably broke his bat BEFORE hitting a fastball

Wondering how hard MLB players swing a bat? I guess that’s what we can attribute this weirdness to on Sunday: St. Louis Cardinals vet Matt Carpenter took a fastball from Bryse Wilson that broke his bat.

But replays showed something bizarre — the ball didn’t break the bat! It was broken as Carpenter took his swing before it hit the fastball! That’s a fluky thing that you won’t see happen that often, and what’s more, the bat landed in the grass, embedded into the dirt. It was quite the sequence.

Here’s the whole thing, with some slow-mo to help you see what happened.

Matt Carpenter’s bat broke before he even hit the ball 🤯 pic.twitter.com/WTxnGyu39s

— Action Network (@ActionNetworkHQ) May 12, 2024

whoa this bat broke before contact pic.twitter.com/T6u5OHtQDa

— Codify (@CodifyBaseball) May 12, 2024