Is It Poor Form To Literally Rip A Home Run Ball Out Of Another Fan's Hand?

This is from Anthony Rizzo's first of two home runs yesterday ( the Pirates' collapse continues apace). I want to draw your attention not to the play, but to the two gentlemen in center, struggling over that all-important baseball. Who has the moral high ground, and the right to the ball?

In bandana guy's favor, the ball glanced off his hands before falling into the net. By the non-universal law of touchsies-keepsies, established during the California Gold Rush, he may have had the rightful claim on the ball. In polo guy's defense, having the ball and dropping the ball is an embarrassing failure, and the victim deserves all the scorn and none of the ball.

In bandana guy's favor, it's a jungle out there. With no established rules on ball ownership, he's within his rights to do whatever necessary to come up with that cowhide. It's survival of the fittest, and if this were a universe where chicks dig the guys who recover the long ball, the ladies are flocking to the the guy with the Rizzo dinger on his mantel, not the guy who "should have" had it. But, in polo guy's defense, perhaps some credit should go to the person who doesn't turn into an animal at the first sniff of a $17 baseball. In a perfect world, baseballs would never go to the person who wants them the most.

In bandana guy's favor, he totally looks like he could spit chewing tobacco in your eyes like a Dilophosaurus, even when he's not dipping. Just let him have the ball.

H/T cubsbubs