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Yankees Bobble The Ball On Mariano Rivera Giveaway Night

Fans lined up early Tuesday outside Yankee Stadium because it was Mariano Rivera Bobblehead Night. But the dolls didn't arrive on time and things got chaotic later when they finally got to the stadium.
Kathy Willens
/
AP
Fans lined up early Tuesday outside Yankee Stadium because it was Mariano Rivera Bobblehead Night. But the dolls didn't arrive on time and things got chaotic later when they finally got to the stadium.

Mayhem. Chaos. Fiasco.

Choose your favorite. Those words and others are making their way into headlines about what happened Tuesday night at Yankee Stadium.

It was Mariano Rivera Bobblehead Night, and the first 18,000 fans through the gates were supposed to get jiggly statues of their soon-to-be retired star pitcher.

But the truck bringing the bobbleheads to the stadium broke down. So the thousands of fans who had gathered outside the gates were given vouchers instead.

Then, after the bobbleheads arrived in the third inning, fans were told to line up to get them.

As CBS New York reports: "Fan Lou Licameli told WCBS 880 that even vouchers were in short supply." When the announcement was made to line up, "long lines soon formed, with people cutting in and arguments erupting, Licameli said."

"There's a lot of mayhem, people cutting in line, aggravation," he said. "It's ridiculous. And we're sitting here missing the majority of the game, which we bought our tickets to see. The way they handled this, someone's head should roll over it."

Pictures and messages about the mess started popping up on Twitter, of course. This video gives a sense of the scene.

To make things even worse, the Yankees were beaten by Tampa Bay Rays 7-0.

All in all, it sounds like a night to fuhgeddabout.

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Mark Memmott is NPR's supervising senior editor for Standards & Practices. In that role, he's a resource for NPR's journalists – helping them raise the right questions as they do their work and uphold the organization's standards.