Saturday, June 25, 2011

Never draft a baseball player with blue eyes?



Blue eye
Josh Hamilton of the Texas Rangers blames his difficulties on the field on his blue eyes. Sounds crazy right? Not really.

Having blue eyes can make it more difficult for a baseball player to see during day games compared to players with darker eyes. Blue eyes have less pigment in them than darker eyes resulting in excessive light entering the eye which scatters to cause unwanted glare. Optometrists know the phenomenon as "intraocular light scatter".

Apparently Hamilton is struggling to find a sunglasses that he is comfortable with. He should find something made of polycarbonate (for impact resistance), with no-glare coating and with polarization. Polarized sunglasses allow light waves traveling in only one direction to enter the eyes, eliminating the natural, scattered way that light travels and making vision sharper and clearer.

Also, given the high rate of baseball eye injuries, why not use baseball-specific saftey glasses?

Watch this video from ESPN where the announcer talks about Buck Showalters's advice never to draft a blue eyed player because they can't see as well. Fortunately for these players, there is eyewear for the problem.

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Image courtesy of Idea go / FreeDigitalPhotos.net