San Francisco Giants fan says he threw banana at Orioles OF

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- An unusual prank at AT&T Park has lit up social media with anger, accusations and a lot of raw emotion on Monday. Baltimore Orioles centerfielder Adam Jones, who is black, said someone threw a banana at him at Sunday's game against the Giants.

In Europe, throwing bananas is apparently a big problem in professional soccer, where there are many African players. But in the United States, it's rare that things like that happen. So, when Jones tweeted about the incident, it became a big story.

The tweet read: "I want to thank whatever [expletive] threw that banana towards my direction in CF in the last inning. Way to show ur class u [expletive]"

Jones had just hit a three-run home run off Barry Zito.

Ben Juarez is a baseball coach at Antioch High School. He was sitting just right of the right field foul pole where he had a good view of Jones.

"I saw something float onto the field, centerfield and then he picked it up, maybe two minutes later, and dunked it over the center field fence," he said.

The season ticketholder said he doesn't know what it was that landed on the field but he said Jones definitely looked irritated.

"He looked; he shrugged his shoulders a little bit. He was a little disgruntled. He said something to one of his teammates," said Juarez

The Giants issued a statement apologizing to Jones and the entire Orioles organization.

Monday afternoon, the Mercury News reported that a man named Alexander Poulides contacted the newspaper and said he threw the banana on field. Poulides said he did it because he was upset at the Giants 10-2 loss and that it was not directed at Jones.

Poulides told the paper: "In hindsight, I wish I didn't do it and I apologize. I'm very sorry." He says he grabbed the banana off a catering cart as he was leaving the stands.

The Giants say it's their policy that anyone caught throwing objects onto the field can be ejected from the ballpark.

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san francisco giants, twitter, internet, at&t park, antioch, mlb, vic lee

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