May 30, 2025
With the health and safety of baseball players on the line, one former agent believes that he offers up an equalizer. Granted, many believe that you can get injured simply by rising out of bed. However, in Major League Baseball, the dangers involved over the years took lives and altered careers. In the modern age, pitchers reach the upper 90s on their pitches with an almost free and straightforward approach.
Meanwhile, batters need to make peace with the fact that the next trip to the plate could adversely affect the rest of their careers. While baseball remains a game of inches in various respects, someone believes that should not apply to taking at-bats.
‘Equalizer’ Batting Helmet Will Change Player Safety, Asserts Former MLB Agent
For 26 years, Jeff Berry worked as an agent. He witnessed changes in the game firsthand. Yet, through all of the innovation, one area fell behind. Despite upgrades in technology, quality attention to batting helmets lagged in every area.
Now, the Equalizer helmet looks to change the landscape. In combining with Legion Protective, a company owned by former Toronto Blue Jays second baseman Joe Lawrence, Berry hopes to make the Equalizer the standard. The former agent and current San Francisco Giants executive sat down and discussed the helmet with Buster Olney.
“I’m fine with protecting the elbow, but it seems illogical to not protect the face. The C-flap (extension of the current helmet that covers part of the jaw) only does so much. Bryce Harper wears the C-flap, and he’s been hit twice in the face by lefties. The reality is that if you get hit in the face, it’s a catastrophic injury. I also think these (helmets) are the best hitting performance that’s ever been introduced, because it gives the hitter conviction.”
From afar, the Equalizer looks like the smartest helmet tech the game knows. First, the sightlines on both sides actually aid in preferential vision while maintaining safety. Second, the jaw guards and center steel grill prevent hitters from taking a baseball to the mouth.
The sport needs something like that because, throughout baseball history, batters striking on the head and face have become a scary threat while stepping into the box. In 1967, Boston Red Sox outfielder Tony Conigliaro effectively saw his career derailed.
By 22, Conigliaro won the American League Home Run crown and earned his first and only All-Star appearance. Taking a fastball to the face, the young slugger suffered a broken cheekbone, dislocated jaw, and severe eye damage. He missed the next year-plus. While he made a couple of comebacks, the injury ended Conigliaro’s career by age 30.
If the Equalizer can do half of what Berry claims, the sport needs to make it mandatory. With every baseball team boasting multiple pitchers that will touch triple digits on the radar gun, safety needs to be the standard, and not just when a baseball drills a player.