11-year-old hits impossible hockey trick shot, but denied prize money

Easy to say when it's not our $50k, but yes.

 

I think there are other stories that say the kid who was supposed to take the shot had just gotten a cast removed after breaking his arm, so it may not have been as simple and innocent as "he was outside."

In the '90s there was a Bulls game where a guy hit a full-court shot for a million bucks -- it created such an electric frenzy that he jumped into Jordan's arms afterward -- but it turned out he had played a few games of JUCO ball while the insurance policy said the shooter had to be someone who didn't play beyond high school. I think the insurance company refused payment on that, but it was such bad publicity for the grocery store that they ponied up.

Since the sponsor this time is a youth organization that isn't so flush with cash, I don't see it happening. It is odd, I suppose, that the insurer is willing to give $40,000 to other groups but not $50,000 to the boy.

EDIT: OK, I see now that it was actually the kid who made the shot who had the broken arm, and that's why his dad didn't write his name on the ticket. Makes it more shitty for the insurance company. But I don't imagine they are in the business of paying out just to look good.

 

It's a good lesson for the kids -- keep your mouths shut!

 

Rules are rules.

 

From the St. Paul Pioneer Press with video:

http://www.twincities.com/ci_18800905?source=most_viewed

"We weren't trying to hide anything," he added. "We just felt honesty was the best policy."

Originally, Smith said he was going to write Nate's name on the raffle ticket before the drawing. But Nate begged off because he had just had a cast removed, his father said.With one shot, 11-year-old Nate Smith fired the 3-inch puck through a 3-1/2-inch hole cut into a board from 89 feet away during a charity hockey game at Shattuck-St. Mary's School in the southern Minnesota city of Faribault on Aug. 11. But it was Nate's identical twin, Nick, whose raffle ticket won the chance to take the shot at a hole just slightly larger than the puck.

The boys' father, Pat Smith of Owatonna, said Nick was going outside with his buddies and told his brother to try.

"It didn't even dawn on me he (Nate) was going to make it," Smith told the Associated Press Wednesday.

He told organizers the next day about his sons' swap.

"You could tell they weren't feeling right about it," Smith said of the boys.

 

Lame.

 

Pay the goddamn kids.

 

the fact that they voluntarily came forward and confessed as a lesson to the twins should've convinced the company to let them keep the dough. if the company had learned of it independently and the family was trying to 'get over,' that's the circumstances in which you take back your check and send a clear-cut message to the boys that there can be a steep price to pay for deception.

instead of showing that telling the truth can 'pay off' as easily as lying, now the kids are thinking, 'telling the truth effed us.'

 

They'll be Wall Street multimillionaires in 15 years.

 

As someone who was victimized by homer refs during three seasons of basketball at a high school gymnasium in this very town, I can say these aren't the first kids to be screwed over by a bad call in Faribault, Minnesota.

 

Call the newspaper there, they might want to do a story on it.