Edwin Encarnacion Has Already Lost 4 Bats This Season

Coming home with a souvenir from the ballpark is a time-honoured tradition. It might be a pennant, a jersey, or for a lucky few, perhaps they are able to snag a foul ball. But with Edwin Encarnacion at the plate, you could go home with something else entirely; a bat.

You see, Edwin Encarnacion has a tendency to toss his bat into the stands. Not on purpose, but for whatever reason, on occasion EE has a habit of loseing his grip on the bat and send it flying … more so than any other player in baseball.

How many bats has Edwin Encarnacion lost already? Four.

And when Encarnacion loses hit bat, it doesn’t just fall out of his hands … it goes hurling into the stands at an astronomical rate. It’s no wonder someone hasn’t been hurt already.

Edwin Encarnacion has lost four bats in 46 games played, which translates to one errant bat every 11.5 games. At his current pace, Encarnacion could potentially toss away 14 bats by season’s end.

Bat One: March 31st, 2014

Edwin barely even waited for the season to begin to dispose of his first bat of the season. It was Opening Day against the Tampa Bay Rays when he let the lumber fly.

Bat Two: April 1st, 2014

Not wanting the fans in Tampa Bay to go without a souvenir, Edwin Encarnacion launched yet another bat into the stands at Tropicana Field for the second straight game.

Except this time around, the fans had a creative way to solve the dilemma of who would be awarded the bat; rock, paper, scissors. Kudos to the young man for opting to throw paper … gutsy move given the circumstances.

Check out bats three and four after the jump.

Bat Three: April 20th, 2014

GIF courtesy of /r/OPhilcial

With a throw like this, I’m convinced Edwin Encarnacion would perform extremely well in the hammer throw event at the Olympics. Perhaps the Dominican national team should start recruiting him for the 2016 games in Brazil.

Bat Four: May 17th, 2014

This is course was the most contentious bat of them all, as the group at Group Life Stadium in Texas got in a heated battle over Edwin Encarnacion’s lumber. After nearly being choked by the bat, the older gentleman eventually wrestled it away.

Images courtesy of AP, Getty Images, and Chris O’Meara/AP Photo