Posts Tagged ‘Little League’

January 6 roundup

Goodbye to metal bats?

The family of a New Jersey boy severely injured by a line drive has reached a $14.5 million settlement with the maker of the metal baseball bat and other defendants that include Little League and a sporting goods retailer. Plaintiff’s lawyers have argued that metal bats raise the risk of injury on the diamond by imparting too much force to the ball. [New York Post, Point of Law (CPSC failed to find metal bats any riskier than wood), earlier here, etc.]

“Little League teams lose court battle to play championship game”

“Rain delays kept postponing the game” — this was Seattle — and eventually authorities disqualified both teams. Court action resulted: “‘I asked my daughter, she asked us to fight, so we fought,’ said Patrick Jones, one player’s father.” Because of course parents are supposed to be guided by their kids’ wishes as to whether to set loose the lawyers in such matters. [KING 5]

February 12 roundup

Welcome Free Range Kids readers

As readers may have noticed, I’m a big booster of Lenore Skenazy’s wonderful Free-Range Kids website (subtitle: “Giving our kids the freedom we had without going nuts with worry”), and yesterday she returned the favor with some more than kind words about this site (“great, nay mindblowing”) and a discussion of our recent post about a Staten Island mother’s suit against Little League and volunteer coaches. Interesting reader discussions ensue. (Also, more on her book here.)

While on the topic of that Little League suit, Rick Reilly of ESPN Magazine has a new column that a lot of people are talking about: “A tale of two Little Leaguers

12-year-old’s slide injury to cost Little League $125K

Staten Island, N.Y.: Little League Baseball Inc. and the New Springville Little League have agreed to pay $125,000 to settle Jean Gonzalez’s suit charging that negligent coaching and the use of a stationary base were responsible for her son Martin’s knee injury, incurred while sliding into second base. Two coaches were named personally in the lawsuit. “The defendants countered that Martin had been taught the proper sliding technique, and the bases used, detachable ‘Soft-Touch’ ‘pop-up’ bags, were compliant with all safety standards” and considered safer than the alternative design. The family’s lawyer was Alan C. Glassman of Brooklyn. [Staten Island Advance; our earlier coverage]

Sun glare on the diamond? You might hear from our lawyer

Parents of a young pitcher at an American Legion baseball game were worried that the way the sun shone right toward the pitcher’s mound could hurt their son’s eyes. The next thing you know they were talking about a future lawsuit and the risk managers swung into action. The upshot is that Northwestern University, owner of Rocky Miller Park in Evanston, have told the teams that they can no longer play their home games at the park. Head coach Frank Consiglio said, “When it comes to the sun, you could say that about any ballpark in the country at any time. … It’s unfortunate that one person can ruin this.” (Dennis Mahoney, “Lawsuit threat forces NU to ban evening Legion games”, Pioneer Local, Jun. 26 via Chronicle of Higher Education and Pero)