Posted on 06/06/2015 7:22:10 AM PDT by BenLurkin
A fan whose head was bloodied by a broken bat that flew into the stands at Fenway Park was in the hospital with life-threatening injuries, police said.
The game between the Oakland Athletics and Boston Red Sox was halted in the middle of the second inning Friday as emergency crews tended to the woman and wheeled her off the field on a stretcher.
Oakland's Brett Lawrie broke his bat on a groundout to second base for the second out of the inning and part of it hurtled into the stands. Boston police spokesman David Estrada confirmed the woman was seriously injured.
She was taken to Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Hospital in Boston. Hospital spokeswoman Kelly Lawman said she is still gathering information regarding the woman's condition and identity on Saturday morning and hopes to have more information later in the day.
Alex Merlis, of Brookline, Massachusetts, said he was sitting in the row behind the woman when the broken bat flew into the seats just a few rows from the field between home plate and the third base dugout.
(Excerpt) Read more at bostonherald.com ...
I agree with several posters here. I LOVE baseball, but..
-over $100 for two decent seats
-have to drive thru Detroit to get there.
-long long season; who wants to sit out there in 40 degree weather?
-way overpriced food.
Why? When I can sit home and see every game up close? I do miss the experience and still try to get to one game a year, but I miss the good old days when baseball was a relatively cheap pleasure.
Prayers for this lady & her family..supposedly her kid was with her, watched the whole thing happen..horrible.
Looks like the jagged, splintered edge caught her right across the forehead & from the amount of blood-probably split open her head.
What’re the odds?? Hope she recovers well.
Foul balls or a problem. Saw a lady get nailed directly in the top of the head one time. Knocked her out cold. They carried her away on a stretcher.
I saw this happen in STL, late 50s or early 60s. High pop foul behind the plate and the woman was just looking forward and a guy behind her missed catching the ball completely. Hit her right on top of her head and bounced into the second deck.
The tickets specifically say the ticket holder voluntarily assumes all risk of injury from flying objects including balls and bats. No one reads it though.
I have tickets to a game at Fenway in July. Third row and in the same area as this lady. Maybe we should bring helmets.
That's why I never get hit by a broken bat. With the seats I usually get on the rare times I got I am far more likely to be hit by a flying mammal bat than a baseball bat.
First game that my future hubby & I attended was on 3rd base line..pretty close.
We went with another couple & of course, he knew the girls would be chatty so first thing he said when we sat down was..when ball in play, you two pay attention & keep eye on the play..talk after.
But it’s amazing how many people don’t pay attention! I saw a lady behind home plate get nailed & she had her back to the field. She had no idea what was going on. Think it was Angel game few years ago.
Yep. Exactly what happened in Denver. We watched the whole thing is the ball arched slowly and surely as it returned to Earth. She was talking to the person sitting next to her and wasn’t paying attention. The human head must be pretty hard because like your story the ball bounced off of her head at least 60 feet into the air. She never knew what happened.
Lots of fast moving balls along 3rd base.
I've watched a few Astros games this season. The only really sparse areas I've seen are in the outfield.
I used to be a huge baseball fan. I went to a lot of games in the Astrodome. I basically lost interest after the strike in the mid-90s. Once baseball came back after the strike, I found that I didn't miss it all that much. I used to defend the sport when people said baseball was boring. Now, I find it pretty boring myself. Add to that the fact that the stats have all been messed up by 'roid junkies. I basically only tune in to a game if nothing else is on.
Interesting you mention steroids and MLB records on a broken bat thread. Steroids almost certainly aided the MLB power surge in the ‘90s. But it was the skinny disintegrating maple bats (starting in ‘97) that maxed out the power surge. Now the ‘roids are reined in and the maple bats are more closely regulated, and the home runs have declined dramatically.
About a month ago at Fenway a lady was going back to her seat in the front row right behind home plate. She had her back to the field. The batter fouled a ball straight back into the net. However, the net flexed in because of the force of the ball a hit the lady right in the back of the head. It knocked her out cold. They stopped play to haul her away.
When I took my son to his first game at Fenway I told him that he had to pay attention to the game because of fly balls, etc.
So many Pink Hats go to Fenway now and spend most of the game on their cell phone.
Someone else mentioned making aluminium bats OK in the majors.
Are you nuts. People would be getting killed every week in the stands. Aluminum bats should not be legal in Little League much less the major league.Infielders have to wear helmets and face masks now because of the velocity that the ball comes off a metal bat. They would also need to make all the parks bigger because every player would be hitting 550 foot home runs.
I hope this lady is OK. I also hope everyone around her learned a valuable lesson to PAY ATTENTION to the Game.
If MLB switched to aluminum bats, there would be a dead pitcher within a year. The ball rockets off an aluminum bat; combine that with the velocity of a big league pitcher and the bat speed generated by some of the hitters, and the guy on the mound can’t react fast enough when batter sends a screamer back up the middle.
Prayers for the woman hit by the bat at Fenway last night, but if you’re sitting in the box seats, especially along the baselines, you’ve got to watch for the ball (and anything else that may fly into the stands).
Teams get half the money for two games. Can't have that.
You must be in the “front row,” with Mr. Uecker:
I was kidding. Aluminum bats would totally change the game.
They haven’t had a winning season since 2008.
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