Baseball and Cattle By-Products

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Even though I am not a Royals fan, they sure have been fun to watch this season. They have been especially fun to watch this post season. Their excitement and drive to not ever give up on a game is something that all of us need to keep in mind.

As I was watching the game the other night, I began looking at the baseballs and fielding gloves. I was wondering how much of these things that are needed in order to produce these items used to make high quality entertainment.

The University of Nebraska Agriculture Research and Development Center put together a nice bulletin that describes some of these processes that can be found here. One hide from a cow will produce 144 baseballs. One hide will also have enough leather to produce 12 baseball gloves.

For example, a typical baseball game will go through 100-120 baseballs in 1 game. By products from 1 cow hide should cover this. But each team has 25 players on their post-season roster which each of the players having at least 1 glove, resulting in the need of a little over 4 cow hides needed to produce these products.

While only 5 hides may not seem like a lot, take into account that is all that is needed for that 1 game. That is not taking anything into account for all the other games played throughout the year, players in the minor leagues, or any other products used from cattle by-products. The meat from cattle is used for food source, but also car seats, medical products, soap, shampoo, and lubricants are just a few examples of products that all contain cattle by products in them. The number of cattle needed to produce this high level entertainment grows exponentially.

For all of the Royals fans out there, I hope they continue to excel through the rest of the playoffs. They sure have been fun to watch!

Until next time,

Miles Theurer