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Before they helped give away 17 runs to the Chicago Cubs last night, the Cleveland Indians bullpen gave away a slew of Apple iPads to the Boys & Girls Club of Cleveland. According to a report from the Jordan Bastian, the Tribe donated the iPads in response to Apple agreeing to pay the ransom they demanded from Brandon Moss in return for his home run ball that he hit back on June 2.
The ransom note itself quickly went viral once it hit Twitter, and it demanded an Apple product for each member of the Indians bullpen, as well as a 50 gallon drum of lube for Marc Rzepczynski. During Apple's WWDC keynote less than a week later, CEO Tom Cook came out on stage and promised to pay the ransom so Moss could have the memorable ball on his mantle.
Anyone watching #WWDC15? Yep, Brandon Moss and the 'pen have gone global -- and Apple is going to pay the ransom. pic.twitter.com/dS8dgxwVfn
— #VoteKip #VoteTribe (@Indians) June 8, 2015
All told, assuming Apple kept to their word and met all the demands of the bullpen (sans lube), the players now have an iPhone 6, four iPads, three Mackbook Airs, and three Apple Watches to play around with in the bullpen whenever Shaun Marcum doesn't require them to come in and start pitching in the second inning.
Presumably because an Apple Watch is useless to most of the population, let alone a group of children, the bullpen held onto the actual products given to them by Apple and instead pooled their own cash together and bought the Boys & Girls Club of Cleveland 12 iPads. The tablets can be used "however they want," according to a man who was in his mid-40s when the Apple II came out, Scott Atchison.
Overall it was a nice gesture that hopefully all came about organically and showed the spontaneous fun and charitable side of the game we all love.
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Trevor Bauer and the rest of the Indians starting staff also confiscated Francisco Lindor's first career hit ball on Sunday night and demanded a ransom of Samsung products in return for it, but no one really seemed to care.