Mike Pence's fly presents: Great insect moments in sports

Bees not only forced a 35-minute delay at Riverfront Stadium, they attacked the Giants, stinging “several” players as they swarmed the on-deck circle and visitors’ dugout. “The situation took a turn for the worse when Reds officials sprayed the bees in an attempt to rout them,” the Associated Press wrote, but local exterminator Walter Howard and beekeeping hobbyist Floyd Hastings, fans at the game, “quelled the furor by removing the queen bee by hand from he swarm which covered the microphone above the dugout.” The Giants, already smarting from all those bee stings, then took an 11-0 pounding from the Big Red Machine.

Midges swarmed Yankees reliever Joba Chamberlain in the eighth inning, then threw a wild pitch that allowed Cleveland to tie the score. Chamberlain got out of the inning without further damage, but the game wound up going to extra innings, where Travis Hafner singled home the winning run off Luis Vizcaino in the 11th.

A swarm of bees interrupted Grapefruit League action in Tampa, leading to Mark Teixeira hatching a brilliant plan to squeeze honey out of those little plastic bear bottles, creating a line for the bees to follow out of Steinbrenner Field. The groundskeepers did not follow that plan, instead dispersing the bees with measures that were actually based in science.

After James Rodriguez scored on a penalty kick for Colombia, he was joined in celebration by a positively enormous insect, which landed on his sleeve. The best flutter of the game, though, was David Luiz’s free-kick that proved to be the deciding goal for the hosts in Fortaleza.

Jason Heyward was stung “at least 10 times” by a swarm of bees that came after him in the third inning, and which he could not escape by climbing the outfield wall, nor disperse by waving his cap. “I wasn’t thinking to get out of there until it just got crazy,” he said. “I just tried to get out of the way. I should have went over the fence.”

Another swarm of bees decided that San Francisco and Cincinnati would not get going on time, causing an 18-minute delay as they buzzed around home plate before flying into the stands and terrifying fans in the upper deck.