Athletics Bat Boy Stewart Thalblum Takes Down Drone in Left Field

Photo : AP

On Monday night, something strange happened during a baseball game at Sutter Health Park. The Oakland Athletics were playing against the Chicago Cubs when a drone suddenly appeared near the left-field wall. The drone made the game stop for a little while.

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Stewart Thalblum, the Athletics' bat boy, saw the drone and decided to help. The drone was trying to fly away, so Thalblum grabbed a bat to stop it. He used the bat carefully, making sure not to hurt himself with the spinning blades of the drone. He hit the drone with the bat to make it fall to the ground. Once it was on the grass, he handed it to a security guard.

Thalblum, who is 22 years old and has been the bat boy for six years, said he was worried about getting hurt by the drone’s sharp spinning blades. "I didn’t want to cut my fingers off. I always see on the news how people hurt themselves with drones,” Thalblum said. “So I grabbed it carefully, and then I started using the bat to break the wings so it wouldn’t fly away.”

This was the first time something like this had happened to Thalblum during a game. He saw the drone before the last at-bat and noticed nobody from security was doing anything about it, so he took action. “I wasn’t sure who was supposed to handle it, so I decided it was my job,” Thalblum said.

Cubs manager Craig Counsell also saw the drone and told the umpire, Adrian Johnson, who hadn’t noticed it. "I guess that’s the world we live in now," Counsell said, laughing. "It looked like the drone was trying to fly away with Mikey's son too. It’s a funny moment in 2025."

Stewart’s dad, Mikey Thalblum, who works as the Athletics’ clubhouse manager, was proud of his son for acting quickly. “I’m proud of him for a lot of things, not just stopping the drone. He’s a good kid,” Mikey said with a laugh. "He’s a great clubbie."

After the brief delay, the game continued. The Cubs ended up winning the game 18-3, but the drone incident was something no one will forget. It reminded everyone how surprising technology can be, even at a baseball game.