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Why did tagging runners make it possible to use a harder baseball?
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History of baseball
Giants legend Barry Bonds hitting his record-setting 756th career home run, August 7, 2007.
In the early development of baseball, the transition from the "Massachusetts game" (which used a softer ball) to the "New York game" was defined by a significant change in rules regarding how a runner was put out. Under the new rules formulated by the New York Knickerbocker Base Ball Club, a runner was no longer put out by being struck with a thrown ball, but rather by being tagged with it.1
This shift in the method of recording an out removed the necessity of using a soft ball to prevent injury from being hit by a thrown projectile. Consequently, this change facilitated the adoption of a harder baseball, which in turn allowed for the development of a larger-scale, more competitive game.1