One fan caught a home run ball for real; the other thought he nabbed it with his hat and controversially took the ball from his fellow patron.
The City of Brotherly Love had another tough showing as two home fans had a confrontation where one Phillies fan wearing a Roy Halladay jersey claimed the baseball fell from his hat that flew out of his hands, while another fan in an Eagles jersey had it ripped from his grasp.
During the seventh inning of the Phillies’ win 10-7 over the Dodgers, the fan in the Halladay jersey used his hat in an attempt to snag the ball and it instead flew out of his hands and landed a few rows back.
The fan in Eagles gear caught the ball when it fall out of the cap, but the fan in the Phillies jersey approached him and took the ball out of his hand.
The strange sequence has some wondering what is considered a catch in the wild west of the stands, as the ball certainly hit the fan’s hat.
But did he do enough to complete all aspects of a catch in order to get a fair ruling?
It didn’t appear that the green Eagles jersey-wearing fan believed so, as he put his hands in the air almost as if to say, “What just happened?” as he wondered why the ball was ripped from his grasp.
“The Eagles 33 jersey. So, man in front with the hat. His hat caught the ball. Then he got it like, ‘It’s my ball,” Karl Ravech said on the ESPN broadcast.
“Nope, Roy Halladay,” Eduardo Perez adde.
“‘It hit my hat, bro,’” Perez said, mimicking what the Phillies jersey-wearing friend said.
“Uh, OK. I guess,” Ravech said, befuddled by how the Halladay jersey-wearing fan came away with the ball.
The Pillies jersey-wearing fan may have walked away with the souvenir, but fans aren’t happy, calling him “Phillies Karen 2.0” among other things on social media.
Though oddly enough, the Eagles jersey-wearing fan did have another opportunity to go home with a ball.
Betts’ ninth-inning home run went to exact same seat but the ball went off the Eagles fan’s hands and he walked away from the game with nothing.
One could argue there are one-in-a-million odds to have two home run balls right at you, and to get one ripped from your grasp might just be one in a trillion.
Maybe this Eagles fan should try the lottery, although with his luck, he’ll have that ripped from his hands if he plays in Philadelphia.
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
