A New York Yankees fan who fell asleep during an April game is now suing two ESPN commentators for $10 million after they included him in their coverage of the game.
According to The Associated Press, Andrew Robert Rector filed the lawsuit in the Bronx Supreme Court on Thursday, also naming ESPN, Major League Baseball, and the Yankees as defendants.
The suit acknowledges that Rector "briefly slept" during a game against the Boston Red Sox on April 13, and goes on to accuse ESPN announcers Dan Shulman and John Kruk of using an "avalanche of disparaging words" against him, including "fatty cow" and "stupid."
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Because of this, Rector claims he has suffered "substantial injury" to his "character and reputation" and "mental anguish, loss of future income, and loss of earning capacity."
The New York Post reported that Rector is a used car salesman by day, and solicited comments from those involved in the suit.
His lawyer, Valentine Okwara, declined to comment on the suit beyond stating, "We'll settle this in court."
Rector's mother appeared to defend the lawsuit with her comments, saying, "It should send the message that idiots need to stay out of peoples' business and not make fun of people who are harmless."
The day after the game, the MLB uploaded a segment of the televised game to YouTube with the title "Fan sleeps in stands during game vs. Red Sox."
In the partial clip, Shulman asks Kruk if the fan, Rector, is "Not a cousin? Not a relative?" because of their physical resemblance, to which Kruk responds, "No, I don’t think so, but you never know. I didn’t get a good look at him because of the head tilt. But I mean physically he could be, yeah."
The clip does not seem to include the "fatty" or "stupid" comments alleged in the suit.
In a statement about the lawsuit, ESPN said as much: "The comments attributed to ESPN and our announcers were clearly not said in our telecast. The claims presented here are wholly without merit."
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