White Sox To Play First Major League Game With Extended Protective Netting
CHICAGO (CBS)-- The White Sox are the first of the Major League teams to extend protective netting all the way to the foul poles. Their first game with the extended netting will take place Monday night.
Christine Loring and Ruth Hopkins, Red Sox fans visiting Chicago, picked up tickets for box seats at Guaranteed Rate Field. the seats are beyond the first base dugout, an area now behind protective netting.
"As long as it doesn't block your view, I don't have a problem with it," Loring said.
White Sox fan Sara Onoroto said it's a "good thing for safety."
The decision came after decades of hard hit foul balls streaking into the stands, injuring fans. In May, a foul ball off the bat of Cubs Albert Almora fractured the skull of a young girl.
Almora was distraught.
"I think safety matters to folks and certainly some of the tragic things we've seen happen in ballparks," Scott Reifer, White Sox vice president of communications said. "Overall it's been a positive reaction."