Veteran Major League Baseball (MLB) umpire Ed Hickox has filed a lawsuit in New York's State Supreme Court against Wilson Sporting Goods and Wilson’s parent company, Amer
Sports Corporation of Finland, over injuries suffered as a result of an allegedly faulty mask manufactured by Wilson.
On April 18, 2009, Hickox was working the plate in the third-ever game at the new Yankee Stadium when a foul tip struck him hard in the mask. He left the game two innings later and sat out the rest of the season with a concussion and left ear injury as a result. He returned to duty in 2010, but he has now filed a lawsuit three years later.
MLB is not named in the suit.
In his complaint, filed by personal injury lawyers Howard Richman of Stony Point, N.Y., and Patrick Regan of Washington, D.C., Hickox accused Wilson Sporting Goods of manufacturing a faulty mask that “cracked into pieces upon impact and didn’t protect an umpire in the way it is reportedly designed to do.” He claims that a concussion and left ear injury resulted from the incident, and Hickox is asserting “mental anguish,” saying he has had several surgeries and has been subject to “ongoing medical expenses” since the original incident.
The suit does not specify how much money Hickcox is seeking in damages, but it does contain an allegation of “actual malice or acting under circumstances amounting to a willful and wanton disregard of the plaintiff’s rights.”
