A bunt is a special type of offensive technique in baseball or fastpitch softball. In a bunt play, the batter loosely holds the bat in front of the plate and intentionally taps the ball into play.

The primary goal in bunting is to ground the ball into fair territory, as far from the fielders as possible, generally while staying within the infield. This requires not only physical dexterity and concentration, but also a knowledge of the fielders' positions, their relation to the baserunner or baserunners, their likely response to the bunt, and knowledge of the pitcher's most likely pitches.

The bunt is often characterized by the batter turning his body toward the pitcher and sliding one hand up the barrel of the bat to help steady it. This is called squaring up. Depending on the type of bunt, the batter might square well before the pitcher begins throwing, or as the pitch is being batted

In a sacrifice bunt, the batter will put the ball into play with the intention of advancing a baserunner, in exchange for the batter being thrown out. The sacrifice bunt is most often used to advance a runner from first to second base, although the runner may also be advanced from second to third base, or from third to home. The sacrifice bunt is most often used in close, low-scoring games, and it is usually performed by weaker hitters, especially by pitchers in games played in National League parks. A sacrifice bunt is not counted as an at-bat. In general, when sacrifice bunting, a batter will square to bunt well before the pitcher releases the ball.

Bunt may mean:

See also: Bundt cake.

Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond. Players on the batting team take turns hitting against the pitcher of the fielding team, which tries to stop them from scoring runs by getting hitters out in any of several ways. A player on the batting team can stop at any of the bases and later advance via a teammate's hit or other means. The teams switch between batting and fielding whenever the fielding team records three outs. One turn at bat for each team constitutes an inning and nine innings make up a professional game. The team with the most runs at the end of the game wins.

Evolving from older bat-and-ball games, an early form of baseball was being played in England by the mid-eighteenth century. This game was brought by immigrants to North America, where the modern version developed. By the late nineteenth century, baseball was widely recognized as the national sport of the United States. Baseball is now popular in North America, parts of Central and South America and the Caribbean, and parts of East Asia.