I understand ejecting a fan who gets enthusiastic about catching a towering fly ball and leaning out into the field a bit, not paying attention to the player who would otherwise be making the play. Fine, kick that guy out. Makes sense. Guy like that, he was just a dummy, but he should have known better. Slap his wrist. He learned his lesson.
But grabbing the outfielder and deliberately yanking the ball out of his glove?
The official announcement, apparently, is that these guys were ejected and will be unwelcome at the following game, and their ticket purchase has been refunded.
Really? That’s it?
This is being discussed a bit already in the MLB playoffs thread but I’d like to have a broader discussion about this incident and the general policy around gross interference and extreme behavior.
It seems to me these guys — and anyone who does anything this obnoxious and indefensible — should be immediately and permanently banned for life from any MLB event. And no refund on the tickets, either. You made the choice to be an asshole, you pay the price. Read the fine print. Suck it up, cupcake.
Is the only reason there isn’t already such a policy in place is that nobody has previously crossed the line so egregiously, and thus the league hasn’t had a reason to create a response plan for such an event? Now that this line has been crossed, will we see a policy put in place? Does the league have defensible legal grounds to impose such a penalty now, in the absence of said policy? Should we expect a follow up announcement strengthening the punishment? Or is the league limited by some legal constraint until they do implement and announce a policy around behavior like this?
I think the league can do what they want. They’re a private organization. As long as they’re not discriminating against a protected class, they can ban anyone for any reason at any time.
ETA: I’m not advocating for a life time ban. Let him sit in the 300 level seats next year.
This should be assault and battery, not just ejection and a series ban. Unless it happened at Comiskey Park, of course, in which case fan interference and throwing glass containers at the opposing team is just a part of the game in that venue.
I’m with you. A lot of us fantasize about catching an MLB ball and I’d probably instinctively reach for one heading my way, too. But this clown went so far beyond reasonable exuberance, he’s lucky he isn’t in handcuffs. AND a lifetime ban, of course.
It’s not unprecedented. I highly doubt that MLB and the stadiums themselves don’t have policies in place that allow them to remove and permanently ban anyone they want (save for protected classes).
Why? A Utah Jazz fan caught a lifetime ban from the arena for just SAYING shitty things, let alone putting his hands on a player. Let 'em sue, that’s definitely gonna go well for the plaintiffs.
Any Orioles fan of the mid-90s will remember the name Jeffery Mayer, a Yankees fan who reached over the fence and grabbed a probable catch from Baltimore’s Tony Tarasco and turned it into a home run, changing the tone of the whole series.
I think he became a politician in NY? I don’t really want to look him up and remind myself.
A lawsuit for what? Nobody has an inherent right to attend a Yankees game. And the Yankees wouldn’t be banning him because of race, sex, religion, age, etc.
Not quite the same, IMO. Although both incidents had never happened before, to my knowledge. But I don’t think you can equate the two. One had fans on the field attacking a coach, and the other interfered with a fielder trying to make a play.
I’m hoping that MLB will ban those knuckleheads for life. I’m not sure, however, how they could enforce it, unless there’s facial recognition in all stadiums.
Any Yankee hater (like me) remembers that crap. Replay, of course, would now overturn the call, which the gutless umpires in that game would not do. And IIRC, the Yanks gave Mayer box seats in the next game.
ETA: ESPN Sportscenter just reported that those two tickets have been given to a cancer survivor.
I would not be surprised to learn that Mookie had an injury to his wrist or hand with they way they were pulling and twisting on him. That makes it a pretty egregious act to me and think they should not have been refunded.
That’s what I always wonder. It’s not like the ushers are making any sort of verification. You could ban their credit card from purchasing from the ticket office, but it’s all just a wrist slap at this point.
I used to host a corporate “tailgate” at an NFL stadium. Basically a very overpriced buffet and bar in a tent near the stadium. My employer entertained clients there before the went into the stadium, the top tier clients to the skybox and the middle tier ones to the nice seats near the 50 yard line.
The football team would provide the corporate tailgaters with a photo op when th the cheerleaders. Of course there were a few occasions when a client managed to get blotto by 11am and misbehave with a cheerleader. At which point he would be escorted from the property by the security staff and banned from the stadium. They’d get his name from us if he wouldn’t provide it himself. This would piss off the client, but if we didn’t oblige, we’d all be tossed and banned. And NFL hospitality was far and away the biggest perk we offered clients.
I asked the security guy how they’d be able to tell if he just bought a ticket and came in for the next game. This was in the 1990s, no cameras, never mind facial recognition software. He said the threat of a criminal trespass prosecution was enough to keep people out.
I was skeptical. If you’re the CTO/CFO of a big regional bank and you get drunk at 11am and grab a cheerleader’s ass, I’m not betting you’re as risk averse as they assume.
Now with facial recognition the risk-reward relationship is very different.
Madison Square Garden already uses facial recognition technology to ban people (mostly lawyers working for firms who have lawsuits against it). From a NYT article, Yankee Stadium ““is equipped with mechanisms to identify people who are excluded,’ said a person briefed on stadium security protocols who was not authorized to speak publicly.”
They were(?) season ticket holders, and they planned together what to do if a foul ball ever came their way. This wasn’t exuberance, this was a planned effort to benefit their team by assaulting an opposing player. They were interviewed after the incident and admitted exactly what they did was what they agreed to beforehand.
You might have seen it, but it wasn’t like they interfered with Mookie"a ability to catch it. He had it secured in his glove and his glove closed. One of them pried open the glove to pull the ball out while the other held his other hand so he couldn’t do anything or get away.
I don’t know what’s worse than “egregious”, but this was deserving of every extreme descriptor you can think of.