Christopher Horne, a sports photographer, shared two photographs from a baseball game in Orlando on his microblog on March 7th. The images depict a man who shielded a child from a baseball bat. Within a few hours, the photographs had gotten over 2,000 retweets, and Western media sources ran articles with headlines such as “Father saves son from baseball bat hit.”

Later, it was revealed that the story’s primary heroes were Sean Cunningham and his son Landon. Sean is a fireman and used to be a member of a baseball club. He was able to protect the boy’s face from a powerful impact due to his rapid reaction. Landon, 8, was attending his first professional baseball game; it was a birthday present for him.

During the game, the bat fell from the grip of a Pittsburgh Pirates player and soared into the stands. Landon was preoccupied with his phone at the time, attempting to send a snapshot of the game to his mother via Facebook.

Following the event, Sean Cunningham was invited to various television appearances, and online users generated a number of photo alterations.

It’s not the first time a bat has flown out of a player’s hands during a game and landed on fans or other athletes. As a result of such circumstances, fresh batches of baseball-related picture alterations and local memes develop on a regular basis.