The only thing I wonder about is, you can only hold the bat one way. So you will wear out the sweet spot. I believe when these guys take BP, they rotate the bat a quarter turn each time.
I also remember something from the Louisville Slugger factory tour I took, that a certain type of grain in the bat is stronger, and yield more "pop" if you will. On your typical bat, you can ensure to put that portion of the bat forward. On the ax handle, I guess you have to get lucky as a player that the wood grain you like lines up with the direction of the handle.
On another note, Luke Scott used to chop down trees for an offseason workout. He too would probably prefer the ax handle.
I never heard that about rotating the bat... I was taught that there's exactly 1-and-only-1 way the grain is right: you want the ball hitting the edge of the grain... which is why the label is where it is WRT the grain, so you can have the label up and know the grain is aligned properly... hit it some other way, and you're asking for a weaker hit and likely a broken bat...
At least that's what I was taught... so I made a point of making sure I didn't align it any other way... which in turn means I don't know what it's like to hit it with the grain oriented differently... (I had my favorite Louisville Slugger forever, and it never broke...)
As for player preference, I'm sure these guys can get a bat made however they want it to be...
The bat factory in Louisville is great... I spent a half-hour just looking thru that window at the big rack of reference models they have of everybody's bat... but I got PO'd that they wouldn't sell me a Ted Williams bat without authorization...
