In the bottom of the 5th inning, the Angels had a runner on first. He was running on the pitch when Figgins hit a ball that bounced on the warning track and was grabbed by a fan reaching over the wall to grasp the ball cleanly, while holding a bottle of beer in his other hand. The right fielder was not close enough to play the ball before it got to the wall.
Initially, the runner stayed on 3rd, with a ground rule double. Scioscia came out and asked for a ruling that the runner would have scored on the play. I thought the announcers did a bad job of explaining the ruling, so I'll take a shot at it, based on my unprofessional understanding of the rules.
Then I'll ask JXC to rule on my explanation.
If the ball would have gone into the stands without the fan's involvement, it would have strictly a ground rule double, and since the runner was between second and third when the ball entered the stands, he would have had to stay at third base. Umpires aren't allowed to make a judgment call in that situation as to whether a runner would have scored. Is that correct, JXC?
Thus, the umpires had to first determine that fan interference was involved in the ground rule double. Once they ruled that the ball would have stayed in the field of play without the fan's grabbing the ball (which was a correct ruling, the ball was going to hit the wall on first bounce), they have a ruling of a ground rule double with fan interference. With the fan interference involved, the umpires then are expected to judge whether the runner who started on first base would have obviously (there's probably a different word in the rulebook) scored; and if so, award him home plate. Which is what they did, and once again they were correct.
I'm only going into the detailed explanation since the announcers seemed to avoid the distinction between a ground rule double and the added factor of fan interference, and I've had discussions on the rule in the past.
LAA was lucky they got the ruling, since it was a home fan that messed up the play. The announcers speculated that Figgins may have had a triple (which wasn't obvious to me, but it was possible), but the umpires can't award the hitter a triple. Figgins ended up going to third and later scored on a sacrifice fly, so it will all be forgotten as far as the outcome of the game.
But the Angels fan with the beer wasn't any smarter than Chicago's Bartman in 2003. Putting his hands on the ball was only going to hurt the home team, but he did it anyway.