There are literally millions of baseball fans who go to the ballpark for one reason only—to catch a foul ball.
Update: Bill just caught #5. pic.twitter.com/jSa5CxgpFp
— Detroit Tigers (@tigers) April 11, 2016
One Detroit Tigers fan may have just earned himself a spot into the Hall of Fame for doing it, too, because some dude named Bill Dugan snagged not one, not two, not three, not four, but FIVE baseballs during the Tigers-Pirates game today, even being cool enough to pass them out to nearby kids rather than keep them for himself.
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Dugan, who was sitting behind home plate, became an instant celebrity for his golden glove, even admitting that this isn’t the first time he’s accomplished something like this, per the Detroit Free Press:
“I just gave the last one away,” Dugan said. “I couldn’t deny someone I said I’d give a ball to … I’ve got a room full of them, so I can’t be too greedy.”
At home, he has 200-300 baseballs he’s caught from games over the years.
“My record’s eight — four during a game and four during batting practice,” he said, during the fifth inning. “So I tied my record during a game just now.”
Minutes later, Dugan had set a new record for himself.
Two of today’s catches were straight out of the air, the others were off bounces. The lifelong Tigers fan and season-ticket holder still remembers his first ball from the early 1980s.
“My first ball that I ever got, my dad reached out with a poster, pulled it in, hit off of Cleveland Indians’ George Vukovich.”
Sounds like this guy has the secret formula for catching foul balls, so if you’re headed to a Tigers game, you might want to find your way towards him, because you’ll almost definitely leave with a souvenir.