Given their propensity for recklessly driving golf carts, performing stunts in costume, and being assaulted by kindergartners, you’d think pro sports mascots would end up hospitalized all the time. But that’s not the case. Mascots are a whole lot tougher than we give them credit for, and your Phillie Phanatic proved that last night after he was hospitalized after getting hit by a foul ball.
From PhillyBurbs.com:
The Phillie Phanatic was taken to the hospital after being struck by a foul ball at an IronPigs baseball game at Coca-Cola Park here.
A spokeswoman for Lehigh Valley Hospital-Cedar Crest told The Morning Call that Tom Burgoyne, the man inside the Philadelphia Phillies mascot's costume, was treated in the emergency room Wednesday night and later released.
The Phanatic was entertaining behind the first-base dugout in the top of the third inning when a foul ball from the Indianapolis Indians hit his neck -- the area around Burgoyne's head. The Phanatic acted wounded but kept clowning for a while until he later left the stadium and went to the hospital.
You hear that? The man kept on working even after he took a foul ball right in the freakin’ apricot. And this wasn’t even at a major league game! The guy works 81 home games a year, then heads out onto the road and even works the minor league circuit, sweating buckets through that horrible costume each night just so you can point at him and fantasize about kicking him in the groin. Now THAT is a real man. I bet he doesn’t even miss a game.
So take pride in your Phanatic, Phillies fans. Turns out he’s just as tough as you are, perhaps even more so. I guess being surrounded by eight inches of impact-cushioning foam helps, but still… OUR MASCOT IS TOUGHER THAN YOUR MASCOT.
