Rip Tide Frightens Children During Classroom Visit
The Norfolk Tides baseball team mascot, ‘Rip Tide’ paid a “friendly” visit on Thursday to a lucky class of 3rd graders at Princess Anne Elementary. Rip Tide was asked to come to PAES’ annual “Spring Days Festival” which is held every May to teach kids about Spring. Spring of course means Baseball, so Rip Tide was a no-brainer. That was, until he showed up and only 1 member of Mrs. Gardner’s 3rd grade class knew who Rip Tide was. Most of the other 37 children had other reactions.
Many of the youngsters began to cry. Some hid under their desks. Others were sent to the Nurse’s Office to receive additional care for various reactions ranging from shortness of breath to canabalistic rage. 9 year old Cody Bates said of Rip Tide, “My parents had season tickets to the Tides last year, so I know who Rip Tide is. He does funny things and I like it when he rides on the dirt bike between innings.” Fighting back tears, 8 year old Mandy Higgins had something a little different to say of Rip’s visit, “He was big and blue and scary. One of his eyes is falling off I think.”
In an important lesson about corporate sponsorships, Rip Tide gave out free t-shirts to the entire class, but most of the students quickly tied the shirts together to build a fort to hide in, in hopes that the mascot would not be able to see them. “It’s a real unfortunate thing”, said Scott MacGregor of the Norfolk Tides marketing office. “We tend to forget that most kids freak out and get scared the first 3 or 4 times they see Rip, but usually by that 4th or 5th time, they’re able to really enjoy a fun experience at Harbor Park.”
The Tides face Lousville tonight at Harbor Park. Game time is 7:15.
