Ella Scott
The father who was forced to give up a home run baseball to a woman, has recalled how she wouldn’t stop ‘yelling in his face’ despite his 10-year-old son actually holding it in his mitt.
American sports events have seemingly been awash with eyebrow-raising moments over the last few months.
Donald Trump made headlines after refusing to move during Chelsea’s Club World Cup trophy lift; a US Open attendee snatched a Polish tennis player’s cap from the hands of a child, and now we have a woman and a devoted father allegedly squabbling over a baseball.
The incident took place at LoanDepot Park in Miami after Philadelphia Phillies’ outfielder Harrison Bader crushed a home run against the Miami Marlins in the fourth inning.
Advert
The ball headed into the stands, which saw multiple fans scurrying over to retrieve it, including Drew Feltwell.
After a quick scrabble, the devoted dad was crowned the lucky punter. However, his victory was short-lived.
After managing to grab the ball and bring it back to his son, Lincoln - who was celebrating his tenth birthday at the National League East Division game - an unnamed woman came towards him and allegedly demanded he hand it over.
During an interview with NBC10, he insisted that he had reached for the ball and heard a female fan claim it was hers.
"I don’t know if she was standing up. Maybe?" he said. "But I was watching the ball from almost the bat to where it went into that seat and kind of jumbled around and I was already going in and coincidentally, as soon as I was going in, it stopped in one spot and I just picked it up.”
He said as he walked back to his family, the woman continued to chase him across the stands.
Providing his version of events, he explained: "I didn’t even see her walk up, and as she reached for my arm, she just yelled in my ear, ‘That’s my ball!’ like, super loud.
"I jumped out of my skin, and I was like, you know, like ‘Why are you here?’ you know, ‘Go away.’ And she’s like, ‘That’s my ball! You stole out of – those are from our seats.’
"And I said, ‘There was nobody in that seat,’ you know. She said, ‘That’s from where we were sitting,’ and she just went on and on."
The father claimed he didn't want to make the situation worse as he 'pretty much just wanted her to go away'.
"I don’t even remember what she said, it was, you know, a lot of eyes on us by that time and the ball was already in his glove and she just wouldn’t stop," Drew explained.
"And I mean, I’m literally leaning back as she’s in my face yelling and yelling, and I pretty much just wanted her to go away because I had a fork in the road: either do something I was probably going to regret or be dad and show him how to de-escalate the situation, so that’s where I went."
He decided to give the ball to the woman and apologised to his son for the situation.
The unnamed woman was put on blast by ESPN SportsCenter anchors Nicole Briscoe and Michael Eaves, who criticized her for ‘throwing away the great value of sportsmanship’, as per Marca.
As a gesture of goodwill, the Marlins organization subsequently visited Lincoln and his sister, gifting them baseballs.
Moreover, Bader met personally with Lincoln, handing over a signed bat and taking photos with the family to mark the milestone moment.
"I wish I had the ball for my son to put in his room next to the bat, but if I had the ball, I probably wouldn’t have gotten the bat, so it worked out fine," Drew added.
Can't we all just get along?