For their home opener, the Minnesota Twins brought a bald eagle to soar around the stadium as part of the pre-game festivities.
Instead of landing with the trainer, the eagle landed on Seattle Mariners pitcher James Paxton, who barely flinched when the eagle landed.
“It was coming right for me and I was like, ‘Alright, the guy is over there. And I’m not the eagle guy,'” Paxton said after the game, via MLB. “But I guess this eagle was just confused — apparently the first time ever. I was just standing there trying not to panic.”
He added, “I was just kind of like, alright, we’ll see what happens. When it first started flying toward my face, I ducked it. But it was just trying to stand on my shoulder. I think it was just confused, thinking I was the [trainer.] It actually fell off my shoulder because I didn’t have the perch thing on my shoulder to grab onto.”
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