Nope. We were behind home plate until the 7th, when we saw the first row of seats open up, along with our prime opportunity to heckle Fabio.
Oh god, this is why baseball sucks in recent years. THis entire story is assinine. There's no reason for those idiot broadcasters to not only show the guy and make the kid seem as if he was dissapointed -- the kid didn't give a ****!!! THere was no reason to go and interview both people. Complete and utter crap. This again is why baseball is and will be suffering for years. They AREN'T the NBA. I don't know how they think they can market to kids like the NBA; baseball is a SLOW and BORING sport to some -- ESPECIALLY YOUNG KIDS!!! I personally like the pace of baseball; it's an entirely different spectator sport than basketball. So the guy reached into the row in front of him and got a foul ball; big deal. The kid couldn't reach it. It's not as if he snatched it from the kid's hands. That kid could've jumped on the ground for it if he really wanted it. And it was those broadcasters who made the guy seem 'evil'. This guy did nothing wrong. If I were in the same position, I probably would have given the ball back, but in this guy's shoes it was probably the first time he's ever had a chance at a foul ball and of course he wants to hold onto it. But going back to my point about baseball... In my opinion what baseball needs to do is NOT market to kids; for osme reason they get this idea that they like Little League so of course they will like to watch MLB games. Bad reasoning because the attention span for a child <8 is nonexistent. 8 out of 10 times I go to a baseball game (most notably Turner Field) there are these little kids playing in the aisles, blocking my view and disrupting my enjoyment of the game. And that's not mentioning the kicking of the seats as well as other things. I would personally like to see MLB market to the 21+ crowd. I mean come on, no one can argue this: If people like this '*******' is paying $10 for a beer, THAT'S THE TYPE OF FAN YOU WANT AT A GAME! The most notorious fans (for instance the Bleacher Bums) are drunk assholes...but they love the game and are willing to spend more and more $$$ to see these games. I don't think families should be discouraged from attending a game, but for years it's been marketed as a family outing. I just don't see it that way.
Kind of an understatement. Reaching implies that he stuck his hands in front of him and caught the ball that was heading toward the row in front of him, rather than the reaching so far forward that he falls onto the kid and his family and ends up kicking the kid out of his way and then almost knocking the kid down when he's trying to get back to his mother. If some guy falls on top of me and kicks me out of the way going for a foul ball, I'm probably not going to be all that happy about it, either. To me, it's not the fact that he went after the ball, it's that, to do so, he had to jump on top of a four year-old kid who was just sitting in his seat (or standing in front of it anyway) and knock him out of the way twice. If he had kicked my kid and nearly knocked him over like that, he would've gotten his nose flattened free of charge.
Really, people on this board siding with the guy know that if somebody (especially a big somebody) knocked around their kid for a damn baseball they would do the same thing.
It was all over the local news here...The kid got a bunch of balls and a bat from the Cardinals... I bet he feels like a azz this morning...
Not to mention that he didn't even go for the ball until after it had already landed. Not as if he was going for the ball as it was falling and just fell into the people in front of him. He waited for it to land and then jumped over, knocking the kid (who wasn't even going for the ball) out of the way.
so, i kinda have to side with the jerk on this one. for one thing, the kid didnt even try to get the ball! the dude didnt steal it, he just jumped for it and picked it up. number 2, that kid isnt gonna remember any of that 20 years down the road, he was just there with his parents and probly wanted some ice cream or something. number 3, i cant believe the kid got a bat for that crap! at his age, what significance is that bat gonna have for him? none! cut the guy a break, he just wanted a souveneir. if he wanted the kid to have it, why would he even try to catch it in the first place?
A couple of years ago at a UT football game, the cheerleaders were launching Schlotzsky footballs into the stand. I reached up and snagged one. My hands touched the hands of the person behind me. During the game, I noticed the person was a girl. I felt bad then I started thinking what if the ball was meant for her, but I was also calling for one. If she had asked, I would have given it to her. Oh well. I got me a football.
I know, why not kick a kid if you can get a foul ball hit by some spare ballplayer. If a ball falls in the row in front of me, I'll know I'll step on whoever I have to step on to get a ball, especially one hit by GARY MATTHEWS, JR! Would you really wait for a foul ball to land and then jump over the seats where people are sitting in order to get it on the ground? I mean, forget the idea that he kicked this kid, I'm sure that wasn't his intention, but he knew he would be jumping on top of people to get the ball.
Gut reaction. I wouldn't purposefully hit the kid. Hell, if I saw the kid go for it and I went for it too, I would have stepped back and given him the ball. But if I see no one going for it, I'm diving for the ball and apologizing for anything I did to the kid by buying him some ice cream. I don't like kids, I don't have kids, I don't want kids, so maybe that's why I feel no sympathy.
I went to a game this weekend, and I swear Smarty Jones was there, and Smarty was all like running down foul balls and he'd all like get the foul ball in his teeth without slobbering on it and then like he'd find the cutest, youngest, most disabled & chemotherapied kids in the crowd and give them the foul balls! I didn't like Smarty before, but now I'm a fan!
Was anyone else going for the ball? Why couldn't he have applied a little more care in attempting to retrieve it?
Of course, he didn't go for it until after it landed. It's quite possible he wasn't paying any more attention to the reality of the game than the kid was. You see it sitting on the ground, and you jump for it, even though it's at the feet of some lady who's next to a four year-old kid. At that point, if they haven't noticed the ball ended up at their feet, I'm just going to tap them on the shoulder and tell them rather than trying to jump on top of them. Given how small the rows are, he had to know when he jumped that he was going to knock somebody over. Let's say it had been some big guy there, would you have jumped for the ball then?
