Dunlap: Pirates Make Net Gains With Decision
PITTSBURGH (93-7 The Fan) - I don't have the data.
I don't need it. I don't need to know how many people have been blasted in the head, how many little kids have been drilled in the chest or even how many near-misses there have been. I have seen it with my own eyes time and time and time again inside PNC Park (which is the most fabulous ballpark on this Earth) and, to be frank, I cringe, then I just look down. I don't want to see the result.
Yes, a screaming foul ball heads into the stands just over the dugout.
From a seat in the press box where I generally take in the game, I just look away --- I don't want to see what, if anything, bad happened. I can't. I don't want such an image burned in my head of a bloody little kid or some towel over the face of some in-pain person who just showed up to watch a ballgame and ended up at AGH.
Even if it didn't hit anyone, I just don't want to see the near miss. It steals my breath. I just look away.
So that's why today I say "Bravo."
Nutting got netting. Yeah, Nutting got netting.
It was the right thing to do; there is simply zero downside to this.
On Monday the club announced as part of a stylishly constructed Q&A format press release that it is installing safety netting that will cover a surface more than the requisite area Major League Baseball mandates.
"Fan safety is one of our top priorities," the Pirates said. "When we decided to replace the netting behind home plate with a new, more transparent knotless netting system, we felt the time was right to extend the netting further down the baselines. The extended netting will improve fan safety, while minimizing any obstructions."
Good. Way to go.
And I challenge anyone to explain to me the disadvantage; go ahead and tell me all about the drawbacks. From my vantage, there are none.
I will let you in on something, I have talked to more than a few players about this and, to a man, they all wanted this to happen --- they all actually wish this would have happened in the past and netting would be extended in more ballparks.
Know why? Guilt. They don't want to have to live with it.
Think about it from their end. Let's say you are a player who gets a bad look at a fastball and it jumps on you in a way you didn't expect. You check swing on a two-strike count to save your soul, just wanting to defensively foul it off and you do so --- but incredibly late and awkward. Off the bat you know it's headed into the crowd at an uncharacteristic angle and, just as it missiles a few inches above the dugout roof it enters the crowd.
You see that little kid who maybe you tossed a ball to an inning or so before sitting in the first row. It all happens so fast … the ball is headed toward him, his dad is trying to react …
I'll save you the scenario from there. You can imagine. But what you probably can't do is imagine the guilt these players need to live with, understanding they just showed up to carry out their job and their action caused such a catastrophic change in someone's life.
That's real. That can and has happened.
That can be prevented, in large part, by this safety netting.
So go ahead again and tell me all about the drawbacks and bad parts of this.
Also, I can't buy the whole "if you pay attention to the game more!" crowd as it pertains to this. I don't care if you are on your cell phone or paying deep attention to the game, when you are sitting in the first few rows above the dugout, if a ball comes into that area with an exit velocity approaching triple-digits, you don't stand much of a chance.
I don't care if you are Brooks Robinson or Ozzie Smith --- that thing is humming at you from a short distance. So spare me the argument about how people need to pay attention to the game more.
What the Pirates did on Monday --- announcing the installation of new netting that will run to the end of the dugout --- is something that will make baseball, the most enjoyable spectator sport, even more enjoyable.
Colin Dunlap is a featured columnist at CBSPittsburgh.com. He can also be heard weekdays from 5:40 a.m. to 10 a.m. on Sports Radio 93-7 "The Fan." You can e-mail him at colin.dunlap@cbsradio.com. Check out his bio here.
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