YouTube Gold: The Great Sidd Finch April Fool’s Prank
What a wonderful stunt that was
Over the years, we’ve seen many great April Fool’s pranks. In 1957, the BBC ran one on spaghetti trees. In 1980, the Beeb claimed Big Ben would go digital, which apparently didn’t go over very well. A Danish prank in 1965 claimed that Parliament required all dogs to be painted white to reduce accidents. Touché!
However, all April Fool’s pranks must bow to the greatest of all time: the 1985 masterpiece by George Plimpton.
Plimpton worked with Sports Illustrated and the New York Mets to sell the great and elaborate Sidd Finch hoax.
The basic idea was that Finch was a guy who grew up in an English orphanage, learned Buddhism in Tibet, and could throw a 168 mph fastball with absolute precision.
Finch supposedly had a heavily guarded tryout with the New York Mets and quite a few of the Mets were involved in the prank.
The anticipation to see this guy was off the charts, but at the last minute, he decided to play French Horn instead.
Two weeks later, the prank was revealed. It was simply a brilliant stunt and quite a few people bought in.