There is probably nothing more embarrassing than confidently launching into a backflip on live TV and then landing on your face. This was the fate suffered by Savannah Bananas player Robert Anthony Cruz, who is going massively viral for attempting a backflip during a recent CNN appearance. Cruz is, no pun intended, taking it on the chin and able to admit that the clip is really, really funny. Let’s watch it again, and then I’ll answer all your questions.
A guest on CNN attempted to backflip. pic.twitter.com/1bo6MhkaDI
— Pop Crave (@PopCrave) July 24, 2025
Sorry, what is a Savannah Banana?
The Savannah Bananas are an exhibition baseball team sort of akin to the Harlem Globetrotters in that they’re performing more than they’re actually playing the sport. They’re dancing, they’re clowning around, and they are (usually successfully) flipping. The team has become massively popular in recent years thanks to their social-media presence, and they now tour around the country.
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Here’s Cruz just a month ago, very impressively doing a backflip and catching a fly ball at the same time.
Is Cruz okay after that flip?
As you and I both know, he was not as graceful during his CNN appearance. However, in an update posted to his Instagram, Cruz confirmed that he’s totally fine. He explained that he was running on four hours of sleep after flying directly to New York from Houston, where he had just finished running a baseball camp for 500 kids. When the producers at CNN asked him if he had any tricks he could perform, he explained, he offered up one he’s done “tens of thousands” of times: the backflip.
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“I had zero reason to doubt my abilities,” Cruz said. “Anyways, I’m standing on the stage. I get the countdown and I’m like, Okay, it’s time. I send the flip, and next thing I know, I am on the floor and I am rattled. I was pretty confused; my mic pack fell out of my pocket, my shoe flew off my foot. I don’t even know how that happened.”
Cruz explained that he felt fine when he got up, but there was a lot of blood coming from his face, which earned him a trip to a doctor in the building. He received stitches on his lip and chin and is now on the up and up.
If you’re wondering how something like this happens to a pro like Cruz, he had a theory. “In hindsight, when you do a flip, you are looking for the ground while you’re rotating,” he said. “I remember jumping back and seeing a bright light in my face, and the floor itself was very light. I kind of just lost where I was in the air and wound up under-rotating; also, my feet slipped.” That’ll do it!
Is it actually okay to be laughing at this?
Cruz promises that it is. He even posted the video from another angle with the caption, “The sound makes it 10x funnier. Yes, you have my permission to laugh. Yes, I’m all good.”
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The player noted that he had some “slightly damaged pride,” but that seems to be the worst of it. That’s for the best, because the Bananas are performing a stretch of sold-out games for the next two months, and they’re going to need their star flipper.
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