MLB broadcaster Rick Rizzs shook off what he described as a “pretty good shot” to the back of his head on Monday after he got hit by a foul ball during a spring training game between the Seattle Mariners and the Milwaukee Brewers.
The frightening encounter occurred in the fifth inning after Seattle pitcher Carlos Vargas threw a fastball to Milwaukee first baseman Rhys Hoskins, who fouled the ball back, over a net and through a window toward Rizzs, the Mariners’ radio broadcaster.
The game wasn’t televised, The Seattle Times reported, but the moment the ball struck Rizzs was heard over the broadcast.
“Swing and a foul,” said Rizzs before the contact caused quite a stir in the visiting radio booth at American Family Fields of Phoenix.
“Did it get you?” asked his broadcast partner Gary Hill.
Rizzs — following a seconds-long daze sparked by the hit — quietly replied, “Oh man, it hit me in the head.”
After Hill tossed to a commercial break, he returned to explain what happened to Rizzs as he emphasized that his broadcast partner was “doing OK” and “fine.”
“Just a scary situation,” Hill remarked.
You can listen to the on-air moment, shared by the “Call To The Pen” podcast, below.
Rizzs, who once avoided getting hit by a foul ball while in the booth back in 2022, later returned to his broadcast duties in the seventh inning to tell fans he was “sore” and had a “good-sized bump” on his head but was going to be OK after the hit.
“My mom always said I’ve had a hard head, Gary, so it paid off today. I could not believe that ball got up here so quick,” said Rizzs, who thanked Brewers’ medical staff as well as Mariners’ medical director Dr. Hank Pelto for their help.
He later quipped, “I’m going to have a heck of a headache tonight.”
The bump on the broadcaster’s head shrunk overnight, according to The Seattle Times, and he is still set to call Seattle’s game against the Kansas City Royals on Wednesday.
