Knife VS Bat, who wins?

[Quadstriker]

Girlfriend is downstairs making lunch and I bring up this thread. I pick up her aluminum bat nearby and say, "Grab a knife and lets settle this."

She picks up a plastic spatula to simulate a knife and says, "Okay, you ready?"

"Yes."
She then immediately throws the spatula at my chest. Bullseye. Right in the heart. "I win!" she claims.

I'm converted. Knife sounds good.

Cliff notes: My girlfriend is awesome.

[DrewDevil]

Throwing the knife is probably the single worst move either combatant can do in this scenario.

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A one-handed bat swing is going to be only moderately more powerful than a punch.

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Um, no.

[Blarg]

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mbille,

You're right that it will take multiple hits to kill someone with a bat, but I bet it only takes 1 or two hits before the person with the knife is hurt enough that he won't be able to do any stabbing.

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If a guy with a bat gets multiple strikes on you in a life and death situation before you can even get one serious stab or slice in, he has completely dominated you anyway and whatever weapon he held was almost irrelevant.

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I don't understand where the assumption comes in that it's easier to block a bat with your arm then it is to stop someone from stabbing you?

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The problem isn't seeing where a bat is headed, it's being able to stop it. You probably won't have much trouble seeing where it's headed. Swinging a bat is a large, slow, and not very deceptive motion. It's easy to block it; just not easy to deal with the broken bones when you do.

Stopping someone from seriously hurting you, disabling you, or killing you with a knife is extremely(either now or later through shock and blood loss) difficult. You don't have to hit hard with it, and how a knife is going to slice or stab you can be very deceptive, and even change back and forth rapidly.

I'd take it for granted, if I had a bat, that I would most likely be hitting an arm or two arms sent up(or down) to block it. I'd then take it for granted that if I hadn't knocked the guy significantly backward or caught him somewhere besides his sacrificed blocking arm, I'd have at the very least a life-threatening slash to deal with. I'd also take it for granted that at that point I'd be dealing with a guy trying to stab me about 30 times a second in vital organs, the neck, or across my eyes.

Given a scenario in which both people get wounded, which seems fairly likely to me, I'd rather be the knife man being carried away in an ambulance than the bat guy.

Then again, playing devil's advocate in these threads is always fun, so who knows how many times we'll all switch back and forth.

[sightless]

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one arm can block/absorb a full-power bat swing from an MLB player

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dont you think the force of this type of swing would knock the [censored] out of you? I mean no way you stand on your feet after you get hit with a swing by mlb player,

[mbillie1]

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The problem isn't seeing where a bat is headed, it's being able to stop it. You probably won't have much trouble seeing where it's headed. Swinging a bat is a large, slow, and not very deceptive motion. It's easy to block it; just not easy to deal with the broken bones when you do.

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It's fairly easy to absorb extremely powerful roundhouse kicks to the chest/head by angling your arm and glancing the blows either up over your head or down into your hip (by which time it has 1/2 power at most and won't do much more than hurt a lot). I only fought Muay Thai for 2 years and I can do this relatively easily.

The basic false assumptions being made by the bat-advocates here are as follows:

1) "By the time I hit you with a bat you'll be too [censored] up to stab me, etc" false - 1 bat strike that can be deflected, absorbed or damage-decreased is painful and will cause damage, but not incapacitate an opponent of comparable skill

2) "Range gives me a big advantage" false - range gives you an advantage for one strike. remember this fight is between two otherwise equal opponents. Also if you have ever fought in any type of martial art / mma / fought in street fights a lot, you know that the single most difficult thing to maintain in a fight is range against an opponent trying to close that range. virtually every fight degenerates to grappling range whether or not the fighters intend it.

3) "I can parry with the bat" false - unless you are a skilled fencer you are just talking out of your ass. parry a knife blow with a bat? give it a rest.

Remember a bat is only an effective weapon by virtue of the power generated by a large swing which will follow a predictable path. A knife requires very little force to be able to kill someone, only a reasonable amount of accuracy. And if you seriously think you can wreck someone with a bat before they close to stab/slice distance, take a trip down to your local martial arts studio and try to beat someone with kicks before they close to headlock/elbow range.

In a street fight or fight not to the death, a bat is a huge advantage because 1) you will be able to strike first, and that will usually deter any further attacks and 2) a bat is very intimidating. But in a fight to the death a knife is a much more effective weapon.

[mbillie1]

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one arm can block/absorb a full-power bat swing from an MLB player

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dont you think the force of this type of swing would knock the [censored] out of you?

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No, not really. If you took it perfectly straight on it would probably break your arm, but by that point you're going to be taking a stab at the completely unprotected vital organs of the other person. Also a slight angling of your arm can deflect/reduce the power of the bat strike significantly.

I mean it'd hurt, it'd [censored] you up. In a bar fight it would be enough to make you stop fighting. In a fight to the death, you'd rather have a hurt/broken arm than a blade in your neck/chest though.

[elwoodblues]

I think you overestimate skill level. I also think you underestimate how much the initial bat-blow would affect knife-wielding skills. My suspicion is that Joe Random on the street would be more inclined to try to stab with the knife instead of slash/slice.

Finally, I think what clothing is being worn would make quite a bit of difference in the effectiveness of the knife.

[sightless]

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No, not really. If you took it perfectly straight on it would probably break your arm, but by that point you're going to be taking a stab at the completely unprotected vital organs of the other person

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are you not human?

[mbillie1]

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No, not really. If you took it perfectly straight on it would probably break your arm, but by that point you're going to be taking a stab at the completely unprotected vital organs of the other person

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are you not human?

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No, I'd just have the sense to bend my elbow so my arm was at an angle to the bat, not perpendicular. A bat strike is not conceptually different than a leg strike, just quicker and stronger. Nobody would argue that you'd rather kick someone than have a knife. Also it's not like you're going to be trading blows in some sort of 1) i hit you 2) you hit me format. All you have to do is close to striking range with the knife, absorb at most 1 bat strike in this time and then aim for the stomach/chest/neck/face.

This really isn't even close.

[Blarg]

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No, not really. If you took it perfectly straight on it would probably break your arm, but by that point you're going to be taking a stab at the completely unprotected vital organs of the other person

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are you not human?

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Being scared to die can make people pretty feral.