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July 3, 2000
FINAL THOUGHTS: By Tom Leyden
Tonight, let's talk a little bit about
26
year-old Greg Sweeney. You may
have read about Greg today on the second page of
the Daily News- he was the
guy arrested yesterday for reckess endangerment
at Shea Stadium.
Here's what happened; John Rocker came
out of the
Atlanta bullpen to warm up
Braves left-fielder Reggie Sanders before the
bottom of the seventh inning.
After throwing with Sanders for about two
minutes, Rocker flipped the ball
into the stands, perhaps offering his favorite
fans an olive branch souvenir..
The ball was caught by a New York City
policeman, who handed it to Sweeney.
As thousands of fans chanted for Sweeney
to throw
it back, he must have been
thinking, "Should I throw it back? Should I keep
it? Should I sell it on
e-bay?" Well, Met-pride took over and Sweeney
tossed the ball back on the
field, a playful way of saying, NO THANKS, JOHNNY
BOY!
He didn't throw it at Rocker. He didn't
throw it
at anybody. It landed
about 12-feet away from good 'ol #49.
Well that's not how the NYPD saw it. Within
seconds, Sweeney was surrounded
by six officers, thrown in handcuffs and taken to
the 110th Precinct.
Think about itâ¤|at Wrigley
Field, Cubs fans
throw back the ball from any home
run hit by an opposing player into the bleachers.
As a matter of fact, when
Gary Carter hit his 300th career homer at
Wrigley, the only reason he was
able to keep the ball was because of this ritual.
So if close to 100-150
balls a year are thrown back on the field at
Wrigley, that means the Chicago
PD might have a good case against a whole slew of
Bleacher Creatures, right?
You get where I'm going here?
A high-ranking New York police official
said, "I
think the officers who
arrested Sweeney don't know anything about
baseball."
I couldn't agree with that officer more.
Let's
hope Greg Sweeney gets let
off easy.
And that's my final thought.
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