Cleveland Indians star shortstop Francisco Lindor is speaking out after another scary incident involving a fan hit by a foul ball.
In the sixth inning of Sunday’s game against the Kansas City Royals at Progressive Field in Cleveland, a Lindor line drive down the first base line went into the crowd and hit a young boy. The boy is 3 years old and was hospitalized, according to Cleveland.com.
“It stinks, man,” Lindor said to reporters. “You don’t want to get nobody hurt. I have heard the kid is doing well. He’s in the hospital. He’s getting checked, and all I know is he’s in stable condition and he’s doing good. In a way, that makes me happy, but it sucks. You don’t want that to happen to anybody, especially a little kid.”
The Indians had no comment, citing health privacy regulations, when reached by CNN.
Calls for increased fan safety began in May when a 2-year-old girl was struck by a foul ball during a game between the Chicago Cubs and Houston Astros at Minute Maid Park in Houston. The girl sustained a fractured skull, subdural bleeding, brain contusions and a brain edema, according to her family’s attorney.
“I encourage every MLB team to put the nets all the way down,” Lindor said. “I know it’s all about the fans’ experience of interacting with players, and I completely get that. You want to have that interaction with the fans, getting autographs and stuff, but at the end of the day, we want to make sure everybody comes out of this game healthy, and we got to do something about it.”
Last year, Major League Baseball announced that all 30 ballparks were extending protective netting to at least the far ends of both dugouts. That includes Progressive Field.
Some clubs go beyond those guidelines. Two teams are scheduled to play their first home game with extended netting on Monday. The Chicago White Sox host the Miami Marlins at Guaranteed Rate Field, where the netting now runs from the ends of each dugout down to the foul poles on each side of the field of play. The Washington Nationals, who face the Colorado Rockies, have installed additional netting down each baseline at Nationals Park.