Reporter loses his durable laptop after it gets obliterated by a Pedro Alvarez foul ball
During a game, press boxes are usually filled to the brim with professionals typing away on their laptops, writing features, building recaps, posting game notes to their Twitter accounts and so on. One of the best aspects of sitting in the press box is the open, unencumbered view of the field that most provide since there usually isn't a glass window in their line of vision.
With this freedom, however, comes a definite risk of a foul ball crashing into the box and wreaking havoc. We sometimes see fouls land in the broadcast booth, but for those sitting behind their laptop, things can get all too real ... and in a hurry.
Baltimore Sun reporter Eduardo Encina is now the living embodiment of this crucial lesson after what happened to him in the ninth inning of Friday's 13-3 win by the Blue Jays over the Orioles at Camden Yards. As Encina shared to Twitter after it rattled the press box, a foul from slugger Pedro Alvarez more or less totally demolished Encina's trusty laptop:
Looks like I'm not filing tonight. My laptop is dead after a Pedro Alvarez foul ball killed it. #Orioles #BlueJays pic.twitter.com/wVsM7GM7GD
— Eduardo A. Encina (@EddieInTheYard) June 18, 2016
Here's video evidence of the foul itself:
What makes this an even crazier story is this was the second time this very same laptop was the target of a foul ball's ire. As he pointed out in this memorial tweet to the trusty computer, which now may be a paperweight, Gerardo Parra also hit it last August.
Sometimes the ball just finds you...and sometimes the ball finds your laptop twice in 10 months. #RIPLaptop #Orioles pic.twitter.com/SRcSP4T1Om
— Eduardo A. Encina (@EddieInTheYard) June 18, 2016
Encina penned a blog post about his laptop's demise, detailing just how it all played out:
On this night, I saw the foul ball coming straight for me, I ducked but selfishly didn't pull away my trusty laptop and the ball hit the back of my screen with a thud, knocking the screen covering off and turning the words on my screen into zagged cracks of nothingness.
Despite the hassle of now having to find a new computer with which to do his job, Encina was sure to commend his formerly dependable laptop for its resilience:
But I can't help but, more than anything, be thankful that my laptop was there for me, because on two separate occasions, those baseballs were heading straight for my dome before my screen made the ultimate sacrifice.
Two times in ten months, though? Those baseballs sure had some kind of axe to grind...
