Backflip blunder: CNN guest goes viral

'For those of you who don’t know me, I do flips all the time-while catching a ball, mind you,' Cruz explained

By Web Desk
July 25, 2025

Backflip blunder: CNN guest goes viral

Sometimes things don't go as planned. Players don’t have an exception to it either. This time, a backflip stunt costs a baseball player a heavy price.

A baseball player from Savannah Bananas, Robert Anthony Cruz appeared on CNN Thursday morning, where he was all set to perform a backflip at the start of the segment. However, the outcome was different than expected, and Robert Anthony wouldn’t have imagined it would turn out that way.

What really went wrong?

At the start of the segment, Robert Anthony Cruz (RAC) was on screen by himself as he began preparing his backflip acts, he’s known for.

Unfortunately, the backflip attempt turned out into a disaster, shocking the anchor Kate Bolduan as she said off-screen, “Oh, Jesus.”

One second later, the Savannah Bananas star failed to get his legs completely under him to land the backflip.

Instead, he crashed face-first into the ground with a loud thud.

Then, in an attempt to hide his embarrassment, he stood up looked at the studio crew off-screen, and said, "That never happens," with a smile.

But, when the anchors went for a commercial break, Cruz didn’t return, and for good reason- he was actually hurt.

What did Cruz say about the backflip mishap?

The 26-year-old baseball player explained the real reason that led to the mess-up on the CNN morning show.

"For those of you who don’t know me, I do flips all the time-while catching a ball, mind you,” Robert Anthony Cruz (RAC) explained in a video to his Instagram grid.

But, Cruz observed, he is used to doing his acrobatics on a field-not in a TV studio.

“When you do a flip, you are looking for the ground while you’re rotating. I kind of just lost where I was in the air and wound up under-rotating. Plus, my feet slipped,” he added.

Luckily, Cruz didn’t sustain any injuries, brushing off the rumours, he concluded, “I didn’t sustain any actually serious injuries.”

Related: Chris Wallace says goodbye to CNN for more ‘action’