Tulsa Law Review Volume 38 Issue 3 Torts and Sports: The Rights of the Injured Fan Spring 2003 A Foul Ball in the Courtroom: The Baseball Spectator Injury as a Case of First Impression J. Gordon Hylton Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.law.utulsa.edu/tlr Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation J. G. Hylton, A Foul Ball in the Courtroom: The Baseball Spectator Injury as a Case of First Impression, 38 Tulsa L. Rev. 485 (2013). Available at: https://digitalcommons.law.utulsa.edu/tlr/vol38/iss3/3 This Legal Scholarship Symposia Articles is brought to you for free and open access by TU Law Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Tulsa Law Review by an authorized editor of TU Law Digital Commons. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Hylton: A Foul Ball in the Courtroom: The Baseball Spectator Injury as a A FOUL BALL IN THE COURTROOM: THE BASEBALL SPECTATOR INJURY AS A CASE OF FIRST IMPRESSION J. Gordon Hylton* The sight of a fan injured by a foul ball is an unfortunate but regular feature of professional baseball games. Similarly, lawsuits by injured fans against the operators of ballparks have been a regular feature of litigation involving the national pastime.' While the general legal rule that spectators are considered to have assumed the risk of injury from foul balls has been reiterated over and over, injured plaintiffs have continued to sue in hope of establishing liability on the part of the park owner.2 Although the number of such lawsuits that culminated in published judicial reports is quite large, it is somewhat surprising that the first cases to reach the appellate court level did not do so until the early 1910s, nearly a half century after the beginnings of commercialized baseball.' * Professor of Law, Marquette University.