This is the silly part, played a pretty good team last weekend I thought would've been at a bigger tournie than a little backyard All World tournie. I know they can hit but a guy on our team plays league ball on a team with several of them, says to play deep, lot of dirty sticks. They were relaxed & hitting the ball everywhere we weren't, put on a display. I don't know if they were actually swinging dirty or not but they didn't need them, they were just good hitters
This is my take on it, there are so many & so common place that it's not a big deal, just gear up & do the best you can. Getting hung up on what's dirty vs what isn't & whether it makes a difference is self defeating. Worry about what you're doing, playing your game, & you give yourself a better opportunity to win.
New bats just changed the shaving game, a lot have figured out you only take .5-.75oz out, instead of 1-2oz out like the old stuff. Hasn't stopped or slowed it down, it actually surprises me how many low league guys that can't really hit with anything know about doctoring bats. I'm talking about guys who barely know what what a composite bat is.
This is a similar reason to why I don't start swing dirty. I don't really care about whether it's fair, right/wrong, or sportsmanlike. It's so commonplace I don't see it really matters sad as that sounds. Be kinda like hanging out at the Mustang Ranch to get some but don't believe in having *** until after marriage. I don't swing dirty cause I don't want the smidgen of skill I do have attributed to the bat instead of me.