Frivolous or legitimate lawsuit?

[manifold]

WAYNE, N.J. - The family of a boy who suffered brain damage after he was struck by a line drive off an aluminum baseball bat sued the bat's maker and others on Monday, saying they should have known it was dangerous.

Link

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080519/ap_on_re_us/boy_s_baseball_injury;_ylt=AgPdzakZtrJ4KtqyeZgtit2s0NUE

 

[AllieBaba]

I have a little bit of a problem with our kids entering into these gladiator sports at such young ages. When boys of 10 play football, there are injuries galore because there's such a HUGE spectrum of size and weights in that group. My boy broke both bones in his forearm when he was tackled by his best friend, who weighed a good 75 lbs more than him, and was probably a foot or more taller.

Sports are dangerous, though. Riding horses is dangerous, too. Are you going to sue the people who make the fences people hit their noggins on because they should know how dangerous they are? The people who make the jumps because they should appreciate the hazards?

Who knows? Maybe just make all the kids wear helmets all the time in baseball.

 

[manifold]

I have a little bit of a problem with our kids entering into these gladiator sports at such young ages. When boys of 10 play football, there are injuries galore because there's such a HUGE spectrum of size and weights in that group. My boy broke both bones in his forearm when he was tackled by his best friend, who weighed a good 75 lbs more than him, and was probably a foot or more taller.

Sports are dangerous, though. Riding horses is dangerous, too. Are you going to sue the people who make the fences people hit their noggins on because they should know how dangerous they are? The people who make the jumps because they should appreciate the hazards?

Who knows? Maybe just make all the kids wear helmets all the time in baseball.

Your kid was an exception. Statistically speaking, football is actually one of the safest youth sports around. Your kid suffered probably the worst injury possible, a broken bone or two. Baseball and soccer injuries are much more likely to cause permanent brain damage.

As a side note, I'm surprised your youth football league allowed such a weight disparity, and with all due respect, I question the veracity of your claim. Around here, weight determines which team one plays for, not age.

 

[AllieBaba]

You probably have a bigger pool of kids. Here, if everyone doesn't play, there's no team. I complained about it, and asked about weight and they said there was no requirement/limit.

They start at 10 in the league, and I think the cut-off age was 13? 14? Maybe it was 8th grade.

It's a true enough story. He fell on his back with his hands holding the ball on his chest. His forearm snapped on the front of his shoulder pads.

He came out and stood by the coach, who kept trying to put him back in. I was watching from the car. He was holding his arm. Then he was kneeling by the coach, who was still trying to get him to go back in. Then I saw him sway and I ran and got to him at the same time as the EMT. We took one look at his arm and said, "It's broken". It had a big dip in it. Coach was like, "But it's not bruised" and I said "There's not enough flesh there for it to look bruised...".

It wasn't compound, mercifully, but it was broken almost off all the same. He wore two casts...a big one for weeks,then a small one for weeks. This is the kid who the week the cast came off, he went snowboarding and broke his other arm (not as badly) when his arm went into the snow and he wiped out.

 

[manifold]

You probably have a bigger pool of kids. Here, if everyone doesn't play, there's no team. I complained about it, and asked about weight and they said there was no requirement/limit.

They start at 10 in the league, and I think the cut-off age was 13? 14? Maybe it was 8th grade.

It's a true enough story. He fell on his back with his hands holding the ball on his chest. His forearm snapped on the front of his shoulder pads.

He came out and stood by the coach, who kept trying to put him back in. I was watching from the car. He was holding his arm. Then he was kneeling by the coach, who was still trying to get him to go back in. Then I saw him sway and I ran and got to him at the same time as the EMT. We took one look at his arm and said, "It's broken". It had a big dip in it. Coach was like, "But it's not bruised" and I said "There's not enough flesh there for it to look bruised...".

It wasn't compound, mercifully, but it was broken almost off all the same. He wore two casts...a big one for weeks,then a small one for weeks. This is the kid who the week the cast came off, he went snowboarding and broke his other arm (not as badly) when his arm went into the snow and he wiped out.

I'm still surprised they don't have weight limits (minimums or maximums). I still remember fat kids trying to cut weight to make the B team and small kids wearing workboots and heavy cloths to weigh-in at the other extreme. But still, by and large the injuries suffered in youth football heal.

 

[AllieBaba]

I'm trying to remember if they weighed them when they signed up. They weighed for everything, so they might have.

But my son weighed 80 lbs. Phillip weighed 155, and they were both on the team. We had no "A" or "B" team.

Around here, if every person doesn't play, you have no team at all. I remember in high school all the boys harassed (and they didn't do it in a mean way, we didn't have enough students to choose your friends......) one boy for being a hold-out in football. Because without him, they couldn't play that year.

This isn't just small-town America like suburbs. This is RURAL America, and it's not the same.

 

[manifold]

I'm trying to remember if they weighed them when they signed up. They weighed for everything, so they might have.

But my son weighed 80 lbs. Phillip weighed 155, and they were both on the team.

You probably could have sued...and won a few grand. But your pal Jill would know better about that.

 

[AllieBaba]

Thanks, my sister's an attorney (and a good one) and was a prosecutor at the time.

I wasn't interested in suing. It's football. Like you said, he healed up just fine.

 

[Larkinn]

You would have probably lost if you had sued, and these people will probably lose. Generally people give implied consent to the risk of being injured when they play sports, so unless someone else is clearly negligent (as the people in the original case are saying the bat mfr. was), it generally won't fly. And I can't really see how the bat mfr. was negligent since its the ball that hit the kid, its not like the bat broke or something.

 

[mattskramer]

It is a frivolous deep-pockets lawsuit in my opinion.
Parents and consumers must be responsible for the products that they use.

 

[Ravi]

You would have probably lost if you had sued, and these people will probably lose. Generally people give implied consent to the risk of being injured when they play sports, so unless someone else is clearly negligent (as the people in the original case are saying the bat mfr. was), it generally won't fly. And I can't really see how the bat mfr. was negligent since its the ball that hit the kid, its not like the bat broke or something.

Except that supposedly aluminum bats hit harder and make being hit by a ball more dangerous.

 

[manifold]

It is a frivolous deep-pockets lawsuit in my opinion.
Parents and consumers must be responsible for the products that they use.

Just to play devil's advocate...

They weren't the ones using it, the kid on the other team was.

 

[Larkinn]

It is a frivolous deep-pockets lawsuit in my opinion.
Parents and consumers must be responsible for the products that they use.

Thats a terrible line to draw. So if you buy a car that catches on fire whenever its rear-ended, thats somehow the consumers fault?

 

[manifold]

Thats a terrible line to draw. So if you buy a car that catches on fire whenever its rear-ended, thats somehow the consumers fault?

Nope. It's Lee Iacocca's fault.

 

[Larkinn]

Except that supposedly aluminum bats hit harder and make being hit by a ball more dangerous.

Hmm, maybe. More dangerous than what? How dangerous? Has this sort of thing happened before? It still seems like a flimsy case to me, but it might get somewhere.

 

[Ravi]

Hmm, maybe. More dangerous than what? How dangerous? Has this sort of thing happened before? It still seems like a flimsy case to me, but it might get somewhere.

It happened a couple of years ago and there was a big push to ban aluminum bats in little league. I think it was in New York. From what I remember there was no proof at the time that aluminum bats were inherently more dangerous and I don't know if the ban was ever approved.

More dangerous than wooden bats.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

Except that supposedly aluminum bats hit harder and make being hit by a ball more dangerous.

Not proven though and in fact Little league statistics indicate that injuries have gone down not up over the last years, while still using metal bats.

 

[Ravi]

Not proven though and in fact Little league statistics indicate that injuries have gone down not up over the last years, while still using metal bats.

Really? I could only find inconclusive statistics. It makes sense that you can hit harder with an aluminum bat...aren't they lighter yet stronger? And wouldn't you rather get beaten with a wooden bat than an aluminum bat?

 

[manifold]

Not proven though and in fact Little league statistics indicate that injuries have gone down not up over the last years, while still using metal bats.

It sure has been proven you knucklehead.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

It sure has been proven you knucklehead.

Provide the evidence.