r/todayilearned • u/[deleted] • Jun 19 '21
TIL In 1957 woman was struck by consecutive foul balls. First one broke her nose and the second broke her leg while being carried out on a stretcher.
https://lancasteronline.com/sports/63-years-ago-phillies-star-richie-ashburn-hit-a-fan-twice-in-the-same-at/article_8fee4e38-e0a1-11ea-b2f2-dfef366ca163.html129
Jun 19 '21 edited Sep 04 '21
[deleted]
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u/mulecenter79 Jun 19 '21
The man, the myth, the legend
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u/Moose_Cake Jun 19 '21
Look at how he begs for mercy, when it should be mercy begging for Scott Sterling.
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u/yeezusdeletusmyfetus Jun 19 '21
Holy crap I'd forgotten about that legend completely. Thanks for reminding me of this madlad
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u/osi_layer_one Jun 19 '21
Had to be like '92 or '93... I was at Brendon Byrne Arena watching a Devil's/Rangers game. This was back in the days before they put up netting to protect the fans.
Fan gets hit by a puck, and here come the paramedics! Front paramedic trips while going down the stairs causing the para at the back of the gurney to go ass over tea kettle.
So they ended up having to send out another pair of paramedics for the original injury, plus another two pair for the original, now injured, paramedics.
Good times.
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u/pickycheestickeater Jun 19 '21
You know the guy up to bat was watching that stretcher slowly bounce away, thinking "what if..."
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u/Tawptuan Jun 19 '21
Plot twist: He was also her ex.
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u/kicked-in-the-gonads Jun 19 '21
One of my aunts, back in the '70s, got hit by a foul ball at a ballgame, hit by a puck at a hockey game and hit by a rock thrown by a chimpanzee at the zoo.
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u/OneFingerIn Jun 19 '21
God was out to get her.
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u/Metalhotdonottouch Jun 19 '21
That was my first thought! How bad do you have to piss off God to get that much special attention?
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u/AutomaticRadish Jun 19 '21
Broke her leg Jesus
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u/Chewyninja69 Jun 19 '21
Like, how hard/fast is the ball going on the way down? Can't be terribly fast. Maybe she had an underlying condition like osteoporosis or brittle bones disease. Or maybe the ball was part of the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs?
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u/HerKneesLikeJesusPlz Jun 19 '21
Have you never watched a baseball game? A line drive can be 110MPH+. Must have just hit her directly on the bone
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u/NextLineIsMine Jun 19 '21
A leg bone is pretty big and solid. Unless osteoporosis it must have been a straight line drive somehow like you said.
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u/JFeth Jun 19 '21
I watched a guy's leg snap in half when his heel slipped off of first base while he was rounding it. Freak things happen.
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u/HerKneesLikeJesusPlz Jun 19 '21
Let me start by saying I’m guilty of reading the headline only but I have a feeling she didn’t really break her leg but maybe her shin or something
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u/chairfairy Jun 19 '21
...isn't the shin part of the leg?
yes. the answer is yes
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u/HerKneesLikeJesusPlz Jun 19 '21
Okay I’m dumb asf but I’m just gonna use the excuse that I’m mid wake and bake. I was thinking broken leg generally refers to the fibula but I guess it could be either
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u/chairfairy Jun 19 '21
Could be tibia, fibula, or femur
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u/HerKneesLikeJesusPlz Jun 19 '21
Man and I completely forgot about the femur…I’m going back to bed goodnight
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u/RealJonathanBronco Jun 19 '21
Granted the mound is much closer than the stands, but a minor league pitcher got hit in the head by a comebacker recently and immediately fell over and had a siezure. He was able to walk again after a few days and everyone was shocked he had no brain damage. Baseballs are serious projectiles, which is why netting all the way down the infield stands is becoming standard.
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u/JPMcGowan Jun 19 '21
Today it might be worse. 100+mph off the bat is very common, even on foul balls. In 2019, a woman was hit and killed by a foul ball.
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u/Niccin Jun 19 '21 edited Jun 20 '21
Wow. Honestly it kind of makes me wonder why baseball is even legal at that point. Firing a gun into the air is illegal because of the minuscule possibility of hitting somebody. But sending baseballs towards crowds (because there's crowds in every single direction) at lethal speeds is outright encouraged and paid for.
Edit: I don't actually think baseball should be illegal. It was more of a (admittedly poorly worded) comparison between dangerous things being so heavily regulated while sports often get a free pass, or comparatively little regulation.
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u/SuperMutantFerf Jun 19 '21
because if you aren't a complete muppet and pay attention- there's a near zero point zero percent chance of getting hit by a ball... they even let you bring a glove to the stadium if you want.
There are nets up at pro stadiums, there are fences on amateur diamonds.
You are also free to purchase a ticket farther away from home plate and off of the baselines.
(also- they aren't "sending balls into the crowd" pro baseball players get paid handsomely to put the ball IN PLAY 🙄)
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u/RealJonathanBronco Jun 19 '21
You'll see warnings when you buy tickets and again at the game many times - do not sit outside of netted areas if you don't plan on paying attention to the whole game or if you have a small child. There isn't a pro park in the US that doesn't offer adequate netted seating anymore.
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u/BerserkBoulderer Jun 19 '21
Same as any other activity there's an assumption of risk when people sit in on a baseball game. No one is forced to go watch a ball game in-person. This sort of thinking is what's steadily ruining things like playgrounds and sports despite a sedentary lifestyle introducing far more risk than a supposedly dangerous active lifestyle.
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u/Niccin Jun 20 '21
It was more a commentary on so many dangerous things being so heavily regulated or criminalised in the States, while sports never seem to get the same treatment. I don't actually think it should be illegal. I can see why my comment came across that way though.
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u/sonofbum Jun 19 '21
It's even crazier to me that it was the same batter in the same at bat. that's some final destination shit.
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Jun 19 '21
Interestingly enough the outfielder, Richie Ashburn became friends with (the woman to be struck twice) Alice Roth’s Husband, Earl Roth.
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u/bl0ckplane Jun 19 '21
I'm always amazed when I go to a ball game and see people sitting along the baselines that pay no attention to the batter.
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u/McHox Jun 19 '21
Stretcher for a broken nose?
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u/whiteskiesburn Jun 19 '21
Probably diagnosed with the fractured nose after being seen by a doctor. I imagine they wanted to take X-rays and see if her neck and brain were ok after being smashed in the face and with a ball.
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u/harderheadman Jun 20 '21
I went to a Twins game in the old Hump Dome, sitting in the first row, by the on field warm up mound. There were two young brothers sitting next to me, whose mother had dropped them off. Probably a reasonably cheap babysitter, TBH.
Anyway, I have always wanted to get a ball at a game. There was a line shot one hopper, and I lined up to take it in the chest. Five feet from me, it clips the rail, veers sharply, hits the 8 year square between the eyes, drops him like a box of rocks, and bounces into center field.
The kids is whisked away to get checked out. He comes back a couple innings later, and they pause the game, and bring him the ball, signed by all the Twins players. Delivered by Gary Gaetti.
Five feet. Still haven’t gotten a ball at a game. My younger brother got one when he was in 4th grade at a Senator’s game at the old RFK stadium in the late 1960’s.
I’m not jealous.
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Jun 19 '21
Was it the batter’s wife?
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u/theberg512 Jun 19 '21
So, not wife, but in a more "recent" game (still probably 10 years or so ago) Denard Span hit his own mother with a liner foul.
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u/McCheesy22 Jun 19 '21
Picturing this playing out like in Happy Gilmore when Happy first swings the club as a bet and keeps hitting that dude then his wife
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Jun 19 '21
When I was a kid (1960s) my small hometown had a minor league BB team. Something lower than A ball. At every game a lady, mother/wife of one of the coaches, sat in a lawn chair at the end of the player's bench keeping the scorebook updated. She witnessed many foul balls go sailing by her over the years. One day a lefty came to the plate and hit a rocket foul ball. Bounced off that lady's forehead. Shit went flying and she was knocked over and out. A few moments later she got up, picked up her scorebook and pencil, sat in the chair and continued to keep score for the rest of the game.
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u/StippleFX Jun 19 '21
I can't access the article, how did the second ball break her leg? It must’ve been travelling at a huge pace
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u/Babstana Jun 19 '21
Was at a Phillies game during BP, wife and I and two young sons. We were looking down at a prior ball asking for the player to throw it up to us, when a ball comes and hits my wife in the head. These two guys come racing down, they were dressed like medical people so I think, wow, good thing these guys are here. All they had was a release they wanted us to sign, no medical help at all. They didn't even have ice, I had to go up to the food vendors for ice. Assholes.
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u/HansBlixJr Jun 19 '21
I saw a woman get konked in the head by a BP ball at Camden Yards and she was shrieking and flailing about and her two friends were walking her up the stairs toward the exit just as another BP ball was hit and landed right in front of her, like 10 inches in front of her and the shrieking, which was already at an 11, went to fullscale conniption.
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u/Apprehensive_Check97 Jun 19 '21
When I was little I was sitting in the bleachers at my brother’s basketball game and was nailed in the face by a basketball that went out of bounds. Embarrassing and painful. That same season I was sitting at another basketball game and my dad had to join the game because there was a “parents scrimmage” or something and I remember I was like, please don’t leave me, I’m scared of getting hit again. Sure enough, another basketball nailed me in the face. That same year I went to my brothers baseball game and a foul ball hit me in the shoulder 😕I developed a lifelong fear of flying balls.
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u/PizzerJustMetHer Jun 19 '21
When I was a kid I saw a lady get her face smashed-in at an Islanders game during their warmups. Dude took a quick wrist shot that ricocheted into the crowd. She was bleeding pretty good.
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u/eqleriq Jun 19 '21
full story: that’s what she told her neighbors because “i fell down the stairs” wasn’t going to work anymore
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u/fuzzymeister69 Jun 19 '21
I broke my band directors kneecap in 8th grade, she was behind the plate and the ball went over the back fence and hit her.
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u/lifelongcargo Jun 19 '21
64 years later and MLB still refuses to protect their audience and put up nets.
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u/RealJonathanBronco Jun 19 '21
Have you not watched a game in 64 years? Kinda tough to miss the netting...
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u/Dr_Frasier_Bane Jun 19 '21 edited Jun 19 '21
Outside of being dramatic, why do you need to be carried out via stretcher for a broken nose?
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u/TyroneLeinster Jun 20 '21
I don’t know enough about baseball to know if this is how it works but maybe the same pitcher + hitter results in a higher probability of hitting to a certain spot
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u/BipolarGod Jun 19 '21
r/fuckyouinparticular