Rodney McCray didn’t take a traditional route to professional baseball fame, in fact, he only mustered 14 Major League at-bats in his brief career.
But on May 27, 1991 during a game against the AAA Portland Beavers at Civic Stadium, the then Vancouver Canadians outfielder made sports blooper history when he ran through the outfield fence chasing down a fly ball.
Fortunately he was not seriously hurt, and in 2006 the Beavers commemorated his “achievement” by creating a bobble head in his honor and christening the right center field portion of fence through which he ran, “McCray Alley.”
Portland ended up winning the game 4-2. During the infamous play McCray dropped the ball, but it remained in play. Beaver second baseman Chip Hale was the batter. His hit got him to third base and knocked in the tying run. Hale later scored the go-ahead run and Portland gained a share of first place, with Calgary, in the Northern Division of the Pacific Coast League (The Oregonian, 28-May-1991).
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