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Report: MLB sent 6 teams a baseball prototype for pitchers to test

Tom Szczerbowski / Getty Images Sport / Getty

In hopes of potentially making life easier on pitchers, Major League Baseball sent six teams a prototype ball to test in spring training and the regular season, sources confirmed to Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic.

Baltimore Orioles pitchers were testing the balls when they traveled to New York for a series with the Yankees from April 6-8. The league first sampled new baseballs throughout the Arizona Fall League in 2016, Rosenthal notes, citing Jeff Passan of Yahoo Sports.

Though it's a noteworthy first step, it doesn't sound as though the anatomy of the current ball is changing anytime soon, as the league is years away from any substantial modifications, sources informed Rosenthal.

The reviews of the prototype were apparently "mixed," though MLB is expected to move on to a different one this season and will eventually test it for one year in Single-A, and so on.

The home run surge of 2017 raised several questions about the balls being used, specifically from pitchers, including, but not limited to, Justin Verlander. Several starters also suffered from blister issues last season, including Toronto Blue Jays right-hander Aaron Sanchez - who missed all but three starts - and Los Angeles Dodgers southpaw Rich Hill, who made several trips to the disabled list in early 2017. However, there's no proof of a correlation between the increase in home runs and these medical issues.

"It does raise questions about what is going on, what is behind it," Hill told J.P. Hoornstra of the Orange County Register in mid-July. "It's something that has to be looked at. When you have multiple pitchers talking about baseballs, there's got to be something going on."

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