Maryland DNR converts to Smith & Wesson M&P

The Maryland Natural Resources Police have converted to the Smith & Wesson M&P pistol in .40 S&W.  The whole press release is at the link, but I did actually laugh out loud at a press release, which is pretty rare.  Here’s the line that brought the lulz:

The Smith & Wesson M&P40, chambered in .40 S&W, will be issued to each officer of the Maryland NRP to replace currently issued non-Smith & Wesson firearms supplied by a European-based manufacturer. (emphasis mine)

The italicized section is PR speak for “Glock”. For some reason, it just cracks me up.

However, this does bring up something that I’ve noticed, which is that S&W has been chipping away at Glock’s marketshare as “the” pistol for street level law enforcement. I personally think that the M&P is a better pistol for cops than the Glock, primarily because of the M&P’s low bore axis and interchangeable grips. That’s a personal opinion though, and I will freely admit I haven’t fired nearly as many rounds through M&P’s as I have through Glocks, but the little plastic gun from Smith just feels good in the hand.

4 Comments

  1. The M&P is a great service gun, light years better than the crapulent Sigma and SW99 that S&W was trying to sell before. I know of two local PD’s that have switched to M&Ps (one from .40 SW99s that were complete and utter failbuckets) and are extremely happy with them.

    Two problems with the M&P for a private consumer are the difficulty in getting replacement parts out of S&W (they still require you ship the whole pistol back to them) and because S&W makes a bunch of different versions you need to be careful while shopping to not end up with a factory retarded model with a safety or an internal lock. Magazines and holsters are harder to find than for the Austrian autochucker, but that’s kind of like saying rocks are harder to find than air.

    I’m very glad to see competition return to the service pistol market. Before the M&P, PD’s had to either buy Glocks, pay too much for SIGs, or get real acquainted with Beretta’s repair department.

  2. Well, you have the same problem with the XD (which I like better than the Glock) in that it’s difficult to get spares out of Springfield. The advantage to the XD is that you can’t get a version with a mag disconnect safety.

  3. I suspect the Cops are getting a special run from Smith where there is none of that internal lock or mag disconnect bullshit, as well as the good trigger, rather than the 10# Mass Compliant trigger.

    Looks like they’re going for the thumb-safety model which is goofy IMHO but might do a bit to stop “Cop Leg”

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