Seriously.  A man named John Coomer is suing the Royals and their mascot, Slugger, for being assaulted with a wiener.  From TMZ.com:

“Coomer claims Sluggerrr eventually put the (hot dog) air gun down — and started firing off the wieners by hand … when, according to the suit, things went horribly wrong.

“In the docs, Coomer claims “Slugger lost control of his throw or was reckless with his throw, and threw the hotdog directly into the Plaintiff.”

“Coomer claims the dog hit him right in his left eye — leaving him with a detached retina and the development of cataracts.”

There’s an obvious joke to be made about being cockeyed, just as there are tons of puns I could make, but I won’t.  In fact, I’m going to side with Coomer on this one and maintain that it’s a lawsuit with some merit.  It’s not as if a hot dog was lightly lobbed into the crowd where Royals fans waited anxiously, their mouths agape like starving baby birds.  No, if Coomer did indeed suffer a detached retina – and the fact that this is claimed in the lawsuit makes me assume there are medical records to back these claims – then Slugger was likely winding up to really launch a wiener, which must have slipped out of his hand and hit Commer’s eye like a missle striking a bunker.

I hope he has a claim for depression and humiliation, too.  I’d absolutely take this case.

But I guess this kind of begs the question, especially since this is hardly the first time we’ve seen a mascot in a legal action – why even bother having mascots?  Nobody likes them except kids, and kids don’t contribute to a team’s business.  Kids are poor and their opinions don’t mean anything, so as potential consumers, they’re pretty much worthless (not to mention in other ways).  It’s time to get rid of mascots at the professional level.