A Rangers-Indians game ground to a terrifying halt in Texas last night when a man flipped over the upper deck railing and plunged 30 feet to the seating area below. The fan was sitting in the front row, and reached out too far trying to catch a foul ball, witnesses tell MLB.com. He was still conscious when carried off on a stretcher, and is currently in the hospital. Four other people sustained minor injuries.
“Crazy. I looked up and saw him start to come down,” said left fielder Trevor Crowe. “He hit the luxury box, and then came down. It was the one of the scariest things I've ever seen.” The incident delayed the game 16 minutes. “We were going to wait as long as we possibly needed,” says team president Nolan Ryan, who added that the fall was a freak accident, and not a result of a railing malfunction. (More baseball stories.)