Why won't they let you keep a bat swung into the stands

[godwulf]

Not all MLB stadiums prohibit having bats in the stands. Chase Field never has, for one. On the other hand, I've been to Minor League fields, like Kino Stadium in Tucson or Hank Aaron Stadium in Mobile, where if you bought a gamer in the team shop, you either had to take it out to your car right then or pick it up after the game.

I don't see how someone who refused to give a bat back to a player would have a legal leg to stand on. The fact that something falls into your lap during the course of the game doesn't convey ownership. If the guy sitting next to you accidentally drops his wallet at your feet while paying for his beer and you pick it up, do you get to keep it? If a player falls over the wall trying to field a foul ball, do you get to keep HIM?

I don't think I've ever been to a minor league game where they made you give foul balls back, although I can see it maybe happening in the very low minors, where budgets are extremely tight. In the Arizona Fall League, only the Giants make you give them up when they're playing at Scottsdale Stadium. The policy during Arizona League games seems to vary from year to year; I've seen them sending players out to demand balls back from little kids, and I've seen one kid collect a dozen balls in the course of a game and no one says a word to him.

By the way, I'd always read that in Japan they demand that foul balls be given back - sometimes not very nicely - but I was talking to a Japanese tourist last year and he told me that the teams aren't really doing that so much any more.

[stasman]

That makes sense..

[sox83cubs84]

Not all MLB stadiums prohibit having bats in the stands. Chase Field never has, for one. On the other hand, I've been to Minor League fields, like Kino Stadium in Tucson or Hank Aaron Stadium in Mobile, where if you bought a gamer in the team shop, you either had to take it out to your car right then or pick it up after the game.

I don't see how someone who refused to give a bat back to a player would have a legal leg to stand on. The fact that something falls into your lap during the course of the game doesn't convey ownership. If the guy sitting next to you accidentally drops his wallet at your feet while paying for his beer and you pick it up, do you get to keep it? If a player falls over the wall trying to field a foul ball, do you get to keep HIM?

I don't think I've ever been to a minor league game where they made you give foul balls back, although I can see it maybe happening in the very low minors, where budgets are extremely tight. In the Arizona Fall League, only the Giants make you give them up when they're playing at Scottsdale Stadium. The policy during Arizona League games seems to vary from year to year; I've seen them sending players out to demand balls back from little kids, and I've seen one kid collect a dozen balls in the course of a game and no one says a word to him.

By the way, I'd always read that in Japan they demand that foul balls be given back - sometimes not very nicely - but I was talking to a Japanese tourist last year and he told me that the teams aren't really doing that so much any more.

This is going back to the 1980s, but, while they wouldn't hassle fans in the park who caught a foul ball, both the defunct Evansville Triplets and Kenosha Twins sent someone out to retrieve foul balls that left the stadium. In Kenosha, the retriever was a park vendor who sold them, and usually got his way by being nasty and loud. If you got past his yelling and screaming without caving in, though, he'd give up. In Evansville, though, the team actually called the police when a Chicago Ballhawk (not me) refused to return a "roof ball", as such out-of-the-park foul balls were called.

Dave Miedema