One of the best baseball stories I heard this year had little to do with people swinging at pitches, running the bases, chasing down batted balls or wins and losses. It was about how much baseball interacts with individuals’ lives and how their lives can interact with baseball.

On June 6, 2019 Shohei Ohtani was sidelined with yet another blister, and because of a baseball- and knitting-loving astrophysicist, we now understand more about why Ohtani’s blister developed.

Although a shock to his many fans, Ohtani’s injury represented just another data point in an increasingly frequent problem. Since 2016 more and more major league pitchers have been dealing with blisters on their pitching hands, but what was different about Ohtani’s was not the nature of the injury, but its timing.

Only hours before he was forced from the mound at Angels Stadium, someone at last had an answer for the blisters.

Enter Dr. Meredith Wills, an astrophysicist who had made a career of studying the cause of solar storms. Major League Baseball believed its ball had not changed, but Wills discovered the laces on current balls were thicker, and the likely cause of the surge in both home runs and blisters.

You can find my original story on Kyodo News’ free website HERE.