When the box arrived two days later, Leo was skeptical. He wasn't exactly "handy," but the fiberglass poles snapped together like a tent in under ninety seconds. It stood seven feet tall—a massive, yawning mouth of heavy-duty hex netting ready to swallow every line drive he could throw at it.

“I’m done spending more time hiking for balls than actually hitting them,” Leo muttered, pulling up his phone. He didn’t need a permanent iron cage that would kill the grass; he needed something that could disappear when dinner was ready.

He’d spent the last hour chasing stray baseballs out of his neighbor’s prize-winning rose bushes and narrowly avoiding a showdown with a basement window. His backyard was big enough for a swing, but way too small for the flight of a well-hit ball.