The amazing photo last week of a heroic dad saving his son from getting smashed in the face by a flying baseball bat at a Braves spring training game shows the inherent danger of having good seats.
Shaun Cunningham’s catlike reflexes saved 9-year-old Landon from serious injury, as the dad stuck out his arm to take the brunt of a potentially life-altering impact. The boy, who was taking in his first Major League game, was texting his mom a photo of the proceedings when a Pirate batter let his hickory stick fly.
Major League Baseball knows its fans are at risk and has been putting warnings on tickets since Babe Ruth was slicing fouls into the stands. The Braves and other teams are fighting lawsuits from injured fans and, as a defense, have repeatedly pointed to those warnings that say fans need to be attentive.
“Stay Alert!” the Braves’ website cautions. “Fans assume all risk and danger incidental to the game of baseball … the danger of being injured by thrown or batted balls, thrown or broken bats … all guests must stay alert and be aware of their surroundings.”
A line-drive foul tailing off into the stands comes at 100 mph. It’s hard enough reacting when you’re a Major Leaguer with a mitt leaning forward in anticipation. It’s a bit harder when you’re reaching into your pockets to pay the vendor for a hot dog.
MLB knows fans can’t always be on guard, so on Dec. 9, the league encouraged clubs to extend protective netting down toward the dugout.
In a statement that day, the Braves said they planned to adjust the height of their current foul-line netting from 10 feet to 35 feet. That’s the same height as the netting directly behind home plate. The team said it did not plan to extend the netting any farther down the foul lines.
The next day, on Dec. 10, at a Cobb County Chamber of Commerce luncheon, the Braves and their corporate partner, Comcast, gushed about the high-speed fiber optic cable at the new SunTrust park.
For example, the system would allow every single fan to watch a video on their phone of the rival Mets playing elsewhere and also watch the local team live on the field, a Comcast exec told the crowd, according to the Marietta Daily Journal.
“The entire stadium live-streams that game and lets out with a thunderous cheer when the Mets lose the game because of a walk-off home run in the ninth,” the exec said. “While I’m not saying that terabit capacity is going to win any ballgames for the Braves, I am telling you that the capabilities will enrich the fan experience so you can have all 41,000 fans in attendance streaming a live program without bogging down the network.”
So, let me get this straight: One day after Braves said they were going to (somewhat) expand the protective nets, and even though they still expect fans to “Stay Alert!” the Braves has its corporate partner come in and — in essence — tell fans, “Gawk at your phone while you sit in an expensive seat, sip an overpriced beer and watch another team play as balls fly around you.”
The Braves did not call me back to comment on the perceived mixed messages. But I understand the team’s lawyers are suggesting that the club pass out 41,000 catchers’ masks to fans entering SunTrust park, which will have seats even closer to the action than Turner Field.
Each year, some 1,750 spectators get hurt by batted balls at MLB games, according to a 2014 analysis by Bloomberg News. Interestingly, Bloomberg noted, “That’s more often than a batter is hit by a pitch, which happened 1,536 times last season, according to Elias Sports Bureau Inc.”
The Bloomberg article featured an 8-year-old boy who was seriously injured by a foul ball at a game in May 2014. It added that three other fans were injured at that game, according to a “foul-ball log” and first-aid records at Turner Field.
I get why the team is doing the ballpark Internet rollout. Comcast is building a large office on land in the Braves mixed-use complex, part of the so-called corporate synergy for companies to plug each other.
The park will have a prominently displayed Xfinity Lounge. Xfinity is Comcast's edgy brand mixing the cool of X Games with the wonder of Infinity. Besides, the term Comcast just makes people want to punch someone in the face.
No doubt, the omnipresent Wifi at SunTrust (another synergy) will enable fans to look on their phones and get half-priced chicken wings at an adjoining brewpub or $2 off a Cobb Chairman Tim Lee bobble-head.
I’m sure I’m showing my age by asking why you’d want to stare at a video on your telephone when you’re paying to watch a live game with real-live human beings? But baseball has increasingly bombarded its fans between innings — and even between at-bats — with sonic and video assaults, believing people now have the attention span of gnats on Ritalin.
The Braves will no doubt provide apps that will cheer, so the fans don’t have to use their own lungs. Judging by the quality of the team the Braves will be trotting out this year and next in 2017, fans will have to find Boo! apps, too.
And in between ads, your phone will systematically remind you, dear fan, to DUCK!!!
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