A Miami-Dade jury has awarded almost $1.2 million to a 21-year-old man hit in the groin by a batting-cage pitch.
The jury decided last week that the Sluggers batting cage operation at Tamiami Park in West Miami-Dade negligently failed to properly supervise its employees.
Lhyvann Felipe, who was 19 years old at the time, was hit in the groin by a 60 mph pitch, said his attorney, Gabriel M. Sanchez. He was hospitalized several days later.
The ball struck him after an employee asked him to go back into the batting cage to help pick up the balls.
The machine, which had already completed the cycle and did not have the lights on, spit out the ball, which hit him.
The Batting Cages will rise. We will fall.
Gamingboy
Posted: November 12, 2008 at 06:21 PM |
167 comment(s)
Login to Bookmark
Tags:
general
Reader Comments and Retorts
Go to end of page
Statements posted here are those of our readers and do not represent the BaseballThinkFactory. Names are provided by the poster and are not verified. We ask that posters follow our submission policy. Please report any inappropriate comments.
Would you take a 60 mph pitch directly in the nads--and I mean directly--for 1.2 million?
If I say "Yes", does it make me a bad person?
Oh god. I should say Yes, but I don't think I'd be man enough to hang in there. Unless I was strapped down or something.
Would you take a 60 mph pitch directly in the nads--and I mean directly--for 1.2 million?
Former Royals pitcher Mark Littell would!
("The ball... his groin... it works on so many levels!")
Would there be spin on it, or not?
Just spread your legs, and think of...
Getting hit in the balls by a 60 MPH baseball? Because in that situation, that's all I could think of.
I would try to think of the money, but probably all I would be thinking about would be my imminently crushed testicles.
At most batting cages I've been to, it's common courtesy to pick up the balls and toss them back in the bucket when you're done. You're expected to do it. Everyone does it. The exceptions are the outdoor circular cage places that you see at family fun parks, where that's automated.
If you'd like to test this theory, we can set up a machine that will throw both at your groin, and you can decide which hurts more.
Former Royals pitcher Mark Littell would!
Involving a Catholic High School girl in this...is just so wrong, on so many levels.
Depends on whether an attractive woman dressed in fetish gear was loading the machine or not.
-signed Kirby Puckett
hey crispix what's with the handle? did you just decide to try it on again for a while? i've been meaning to go back to my original for a while, maybe i should ...
Many variables to consider:
A) pre or post tax?
B) pre or post attorney fees?
C) from what distance? the regulation 60'6"? point blank? from back wall of cage, where you are likely to be picking up the balls?
d) rubber BP ball or standard hardball?
I'm thinking that you'll be picking them up from right beside your feet.
If there was, and she told me to "enter the garden of madness," I'd probably take one for the team.
I've been married for over 13 years. I have two kids, a mortgage, and no reasonable way to escape the legal profession any time soon. On top of that I'm bald, I live in Ohio, and my parents recently moved to a place less than two miles from my home.
Where do I f*ckin' sign up for the changeup to the crotch thing?
Damn Craig. I don't know about the crotch thing but Wal-Mart sells guns pretty cheap!
So you now have to hire people to check if your employees are wearing a cup? Yeech!
Be reasonable - that was 15 years ago. With inflation, that would work out to about $1.2M today.
Besides, everyone knows that "Football to the groin" falls into a different legal category than "Baseball to the groin".
In short:
* I'm a lousy athlete, at best - with poor reaction skills. No, I don't know why I was (normally) at third, I used to play it a lot for some reason (probably because I'm worse everywhere else).
* The hitter was easily the best player on the field - former D2 guy with a quick bat.
* The shift worked - he hit it *right* at me, a laser.
* Clearly, I had trouble adjusting to the speed of the ball. My strongest memory of the whole thing was/is the awareness of just how fast it was going and a flicker of worry about my ability to handle it.
* It lodged in my crotch, knocking me the #### out. As it stayed there after I fell over, he was called out.
* I came to a few minutes later. No external bleeding, no long term damage, but I was very sore and swollen for a few days. Not the worst feeling I've ever had, but up there.
You, sir, are a pro's pro.
Web Gem!
Is it payable in gold bullion? Or in soon to be worthless paper money?
I assume this was because you were unconscious for the really bad stuff. I'm still curious to know what happened to you that hurt worse. Maybe it's related to military service, in which case, sorry.
But, considering that you are a poster with seemingly all of his faculties remaining (at least mentally from what I can tell), I'm gonna say that yes I would take the 60 mph shot to the nuts for $1.2M. And I hadn't even considered before that I could pass out from the pain and miss the worst part. That makes it a no brainer, even if I'm not guaranteed to pass out.
Lawrence: I'll tell you what I'd do, man, two chicks at the same time, man.
Peter Gibbons: That's it? If you had a million dollars, you'd do two chicks at the same time?
Lawrence: Damn straight. I always wanted to do that, man. And I think if I had a million dollars I could hook that up, cause chicks dig a dude with money.
Peter Gibbons: Well, not all chicks.
Lawrence: Well the kind of chicks that'd double up on a dude like me do.
Gold's not going to do you any good down in your bunker. I'd advise you to invest in guns, ammo and canned tuna instead.
And of course, everybody who wishes to give their soon to be worthless dollar bills a loving new home can mail them to me. The 200 dollars I hadn't got around to exchange back since I last was in New York are worth 20% more Swedish kronas now.
I'll add my close encounter. I was a second-string catcher in high school, was way late for practice one day, ran to the field and realized I forgot to put in my cup. sure enough, somebody fouled one down and back and it one-hopped me in the nads. I didn't pass out, but I was gasping on the ground for 20 minutes or so.
not the same as a pitch straight to the nuts, but I'd suffer it again for, say, $50,000. it'd be tough to replicate the seeing-eye foul ball tho.
One of the top ten funniest movies of all time...
xanthan -- qualified yes.
preserved fish -- on reflection, no.
andrewberg -- needs more info.
shooty -- not sure.
joey b. -- needs more info.
phredbird -- no way.
ryan jones -- no.
cowboy popup -- needs an inducement besides the money.
traderdave -- needs a lot more info.
zonk -- yes, if he can have a cup and a lawyer.
derkomminsk-sar -- apparently a no, based on experience.
craig calcaterra -- ready to give it a shot.
AROM -- needs more info.
delino deshields & yarnell -- no.
justin T. -- yes (!)
sotapop -- wants to dicker (heh)
clemenza -- apparent no.
yeaarrgh -- no (handle should have been a giveaway)
barry's -- no.
NL west -- no, but only for a vasectomy.
boy, a lot of people curious about conditions, but only one straight yes. for myself, i can't believe anyone would even consider it.
Just out of curiosity, what the hell were you thinking?
While I have sympathy for your pain, that was the wrong call. It's only an out when you control the ball with your glove or bare hand. A ball stuck in your crotch is not an out, unless a teammate retrieved it before it touched the ground. Then, you get an assist!
What's the deal with Cro Cop and crotch shots? He got kneed in the groin two or three times in his fight with Kongo, too, as I recall.
Dude, he required $160K of medical work on his unit. That's a hell of a lot of medical work on an extremely sensitive area.
For comparison, the average cost of coronary artery bypass graft surgery is apparently $20K. Do you really want to have the cost equivalent of eight (8!) heart surgeries performed on Quaker Jr?
Dunno. I winced when I heard that the one ball was driven back up into the body cavity, though (unless it fled in terror).
At least he's better off than Joe Son (relevant clip starts about 2:00 in).
I dunno, I think I'd rather be punched by a fat dude than kneed by Alistair Overeem.
While each knee would probably hurt more, I'm thinking that the repeated punching probably didn't feel all that great either - especially since he could see Hackney winding up each time and had to know exactly what was coming next.
Unprotected:
1. Kick from older sister when I teased her about her boyfriend. Direct hit. Copious vomiting ensued while in the fetal position. Not pretty.
2. Lacrosse ball fired underhand at goal I was defending. It glanced off of my thigh and nailed my unprotected 'nads but only indirectly. No vomiting, but severe pain.
Protected:
1. Slapshot to the cup. I did make it to the bench. No vomiting.
2. Slapshot to the cup. Cup was, um, misaligned. Did not make it to the bench without assistance.
3. Vasectomy. Piece of cake.
Likelihood of my taking 1.2 minus .16 minus lawyer fee? Zero.
i do believe that is the level of risk we are talking about here. not a brief ouchy in the beans area. but i will say i'm not a medical expert. this site has a ton of lawyers. any doctors around who can give a little perspective?
justin T -- changed to no.
quaker -- yes, but thinking it over.
joe bivens -- no.
scotto -- no.
the voice of experience seems to be winning out.
I would have said no to the original offer anyways, but after watching that video in #77, it's a far more emphatic no. Some things aren't worth money.
Then I thought about going to a minor league game this summer that had one of those radar gun booths set up. I took two steps back, gave it everything I had, about threw my shoulder out of its socket, and posted 67 mph.
No thanks.
Two Girls, No Cup.
Oh, you thought I meant the groin thing? No, I was talking about getting arrested for gang rape.
Put a couple of extra zeroes in that $1.2m and I'll think about it.
It was still there when I came to (no one wanted to mess with that general area) - so I get the putout. (I think they called the game anyway, that detail is hazy.)
I'd do that again for 1.2 mil (with a guarantee of no damage). Otherwise, nooooooooooooooo.
More generally, I've had a number of crotch injuries (other sports ones involved catching w/o a cup in LL and getting a bit of backswing and an onion punch in a basketball game) - my wife used to worry that having kids would be out of the question. I've no idea how I've escaped serious injury.
I don't know if I can take any more stories.
A lot less than that. $400K to his attorney, $160K in medical bills, missed time from work during recovery
Don't forget the severe case of smashed dick.
This really can't be emphasized enough.
True, but it's fairly common for plaintiffs' attorneys to inflate the medical bills in hopes of recovering some multiple of the medicals in settlement or at trial. The payments might be 100% legit or maybe mostly for some sort of "massage" treatments. That's not to say that it makes the Shooty Challenge™ worth the risk.
I guess the argument that a guy named Lhyvann had no chance of ever fathering children to begin with didn't sway the jury.
I don't know if I can take any more stories.
DO NOT LOOK AT THIS!!
Although, in one of the all-time classic lines, the doctor says it was probably less painful than a "first-class kick in the nuts."
put me down for a no, i'm reading this in bed before i go to sleep and am in a half fetal position.
No way in hell would I take a 60 mph ball to the balls for money. The risk of permanant disfiguration or dysfunction is waaaaay too high...
You must be Registered and Logged In to post comments.
<< Back to main