#5 — MAY 25: CHARLOTTE KNIGHTS (The Day Our Lives Changed)

Stadium promotions employees found us shortly after entering BB&T Ballpark and signed our children up for pregame activities on the field. We were high on life and feeling extremely blessed. We settled in our seats WAY DOWN THE RIGHT FIELD LINE enjoying the comfortable weather and were anticipating the Friday night fireworks. A slicing line drive screamed toward our seats. I lost it in a bank of lights, still thinking the ball was about to hit me in the chest. However, two seats over, I hear the thud of that baseball hitting my young daughter in the throat. The throat kept swelling internally and an ambulance had to be rushed to stadium as that swelling was a few more minutes from being fatal. Lucky for us: in the previous weeks we had visited venues hours from home... but being in uptown Charlotte, we were mere minutes from our preferred hospital. Lucky for all the other members of my family is that they never saw that baseball as it was approaching. Unlucky for me, I did. That scene replays in my mind thousands of times a day. Obviously, the story ends well and Katelyn is a hero to many, especially me.

On a quick note: all the employees of the Charlotte Knights have been great to our family. Before we rushed to the hospital, team officials gave us contact information. Through that contact, several office employees visited Katelyn in the hospital and treated us to a return trip to the stadium. We made a few more visits to BB&T Ballpark later in the season and are on a friendly, first name basis with many staff members. Hard times show a person’s character. I think the Preslar family represented themselves well as did the Charlotte Knights organization. Katelyn feels famous at the Knights due to the kind hearts of so many people we met through these unfortunate circumstances.