July 2, 2009

Insects swarming in leftfield at San Diego are delaying the ninth inning of the Astros/Padres game. The Astros lead 6-1 with a man on first and two out in the top of the ninth. The Padres leftfielder, Kyle Blanks, came in as they appear to be bees. The people in the stands don’t appear to be bothered by them.

Update: They’re showing a picture of a Padres jacket hanging on a chair, covered with bees. The announcers are saying they are killer bees.

Update: Of course, I’m reminded of this:

Update: They cleared the fans out of the stands near the bees.

Update: I feel like I’m in a B-movie!

Update: The Padres should have Sting sing the National Anthem at their next home game.

Update: It looks like they are planning to put a big plastic trash bag over the chair with the jacket. The scoreboard, at 6:40 EDT, is saying the game will resume in 15 to 30 minutes.

Update: There’s a guest in the Astros booth from the Padres, Tom Garfinkel, president and COO, who says there are 2000 bees in the jacket attached to the queen. The grounds keeper has a bee keeper on speed dial, and the bee keeper is on his way to the park to handle the situation.

Update: The jacket belongs to one of the ball girls.

Update: The bee keeper is in his radiation suit and is spraying the inside of the jacket with something. There’s now a pile of bees on the ground. I don’t know if they are dead, or if the spray can was set for stun. I suspect PETA won’t be happy.

Update: They threw the jacket and pile of bees in a trash bag and carted it off.

Update: The game is underway again at 7:02 EDT.

Update: Berkman doubles into the bee corner and the Astros lead 7-1.

Posted by David Pinto at 6:14 pm | Games | Permalink | 1 Comment