In one of the most disgusting sequences you’ll see in sports, a man was watching a home run courtesy of Juan Soto hit a young fan’s glove in a royalty Sunday match. The video went viral as the thief remained anonymous, until now.
The person who stole the ball has been identified as Mark Kirsch. The Royals discovered and shared his name in an email sent to The Kansas City Star. He is known for pulling planes and cars in an online series called Man vs. Impossible.
The young fan named Bruce Williams, who has been a lifelong Royals fan, received tickets to Sunday’s game for his upcoming 18th birthday. He told The Kansas City Star that he made the two-hour drive from his home in Stockton, Missouri, to Kauffman Stadium.
“It was my first time sitting on the Pepsi Porch and watching us play the Padres. Because of how interesting the Royals’ pitching has been these days, I thought, ‘Juan Soto is going to throw one out on the porch at the party, so I better get my glove,’” Williams told the newspaper.
Sure enough, Soto threw a right hand at him in the seventh inning and Kirsch can be seen trying to intimidate the 17-year-old for the ball, but Williams still grabbed him. However, when Kirsch saw Williams make the catch, he used his other hand to pry the ball out of his glove in a split second.
“And I saw it coming at me, so I put my glove on real quick and stood up in my seat,” Williams told The Kansas City Star. “Like it was fair to me. And then all of a sudden someone was rolling over me. He was bumping into me, he pushed me to the side trying to grab the ball and I reached over him and caught it out of the air.”
Williams said Kirsch quickly went to get a couple of Royals jerseys and tried to give them to him, but he said, “No, I don’t want your jerseys. Give me the ball.” Williams said Kirsch’s response was, “No, I’m not going to,” before fleeing the stadium.
In the Royals’ email, the team said: “At this time we are not barring Mark Kirsch from the stadium.” However, after speaking with a security guard who witnessed the whole thing, Williams received two signed baseballs. One came from Kansas City shortstop Bobby Witt and the other from Soto himself, with some of his accomplishments written on the ball and the other side said “sorry.”
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Source: www.si.com