What Are The Odds: MLB Player Hits Foul Ball To His Father

A remarkable event happened Wednesday night in a game between the Kansas City Royals and Texas Rangers at Globe Life Field in the Lone Star State.

Royals shortstop Bobby Witt Jr. was at the plate and hit a long foul ball into the stands. The man who ended up with the ball was his father, Bobby Witt Sr. (a former MLB player himself).

The Royals posted a clip of the improbable event to their Twitter account.

Odds of Catching a Foul Ball

Countless factors determine the theoretical probability of catching a foul ball at a baseball game you attend. The most obvious is where you are seated. Arguably the second-most obvious is the number of fans at the game, which impacts the distance you can cover to catch a foul ball. By catching a foul ball, we mean retrieving it. Literally catching the ball with your hands or glove (or beer cup) is much less likely.

According to FanGraphs, the odds of catching a foul ball are roughly 1-in-1,000 based on the number of foul balls hit each year into the stands and the number of fans who attend games. That’s just a rough estimate. According to Ladbrokes Sportsbook, the odds could shorten to about 1-in-600 if you are seated in the lower levels of a ballpark, where many foul balls land.

Witt Sr. was in a luxury suite on the first-base side, so his odds of catching any foul ball that game might have been worse than 1-in-1,000 due to his location. Still, he was in a spot where it was possible to catch one. Many fans sit where it’s almost impossible to get a ball.

Now, here comes the craziest part. What are the odds of catching a foul ball from a specific player? There were 20 batters in the game between the Royals and Rangers, which the former won by a 10-1 score. Some players see more at-bats than others, make contact more often, and so on.

For the sake of this crude thought experiment, let’s assume all batters were equally likely to hit a foul ball where Witt Sr. was seated. It would be about 1-in-20,000 of him catching a foul ball from Witt Jr. Improbable indeed, but still way better odds than winning the Powerball lottery jackpot, for example, which has astronomical 1-in-292.2 million odds.

The Witt-to-Witt foul ball arguably isn’t the most impressive foul ball feat in history. Just a handful of years ago, a fan was recorded literally catching two balls on consecutive pitches.

Let’s conclude by returning to the Royals. Some baseball fans are incredibly superstitious. The Witt-to-Witt foul ball might tempt some fans to think this will be a magical year for Kansas City. That’s unlikely, as the team is +25000 in the MLB futures market to win the World Series.

The Royals last won the championship in 2015.