Burning Question

The Rockies sure think so. Denver is both high and dry, and in Colorado's ongoing effort to keep home runs down at Coors Field, the team has been storing game balls in a humidor this season. Lo the average runs per game has dropped from last year's whopping 15.1 to a manageable 9.8. "The low humidity in Colorado certainly contributes to a livelier ball," says J.J. Crisco of the National Institute for Sports Science and Safety at Brown.

That is in direct contradiction to conventional baseball wisdom, which says that balls travel farther on humid days. But two years ago the Silicon Valley-based Lansmont Corp. tested the impact of humidity by bouncing baseballs off a wall in varying conditions. "The higher the humidity, the less the ball rebounded," says Kevin Gilman, the engineer behind the study. The specific reasons involve scary terms like coefficient of restitution, but in short, says Gilman, "a moister ball rebounds with less force."

Some pitchers also think damper balls are easier to grip, another possible reason for the decrease in offense at Coors. "If you can't grip the ball well, you really don't have a chance," says former major league reliever Jerry DiPoto, who had a 4.21 ERA in four seasons with the Rockies. The current staff is less convinced. "Maybe the pitchers are just better," suggests reliever Rick White.

Several clubs have complained about the Rockies' ball moistening tactics, but the league, happy that scoring in Colorado has dipped to levels more consistent with other parks, isn't concerned. Says MLB spokesman Pat Courtney, "That's probably the way that balls should have been stored there all along."