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Padres Editorial: Friars On Base Ranks Their Favorite Baseball Movies Part II

By Billy Brost

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Mandatory Credit: punchdrunksports.com

And Keegan Tatum has our #1 ranked favorite baseball movie of all-time…Major League!

Almost every baseball fan knows the words: “Juuust a bit outside!” It comes from the next movie on the countdown.

Major League, for those that don’t know, centers around the hapless Cleveland Indians. The owner wants to finish in dead last so that attendance records can suffer to the point where she can relocate the team to Miami. The film revolves around Jake Taylor (Tom Berenger), Rich Vaughn (Charlie Sheen), and Roger Dorn (Corbin Bernsen) on a motley mix of cast-offs and raw amateurs. One player is into voodoo; another played in the California penal leagues. When the team finds out what the owner is up to, they go all out to ruin her plans.

As both a film and a baseball film, Major League succeeds. It is a great comedy even for people who don’t pay much attention to the game. Bob Uecker’s ad-libbing is a source of constant entertainment as well as the numerous bits of funny scenes. Watch any scene that includes both Pedro Cerrano and Eddie Harris and you’ll know what I mean. In the world of Michael Bay movies, it’s also refreshing to watch a film in which all of the major protagonists have a character arch. And all of those protagonists are likable. You root for them – something really important in any movie, but when I watch Major League I actually feel like I’m rooting on the Indians.

The film also has what all films need – an emotional core to the story. While also trying to stay in the majors for one last year and hang onto his career, Jake Taylor tries to win back his wife, who is set to marry some rich attorney. Unlike so many other sports films, the love story feels organic and fits in with the rest of the plot.

As a baseball movie, director David Ward and whoever helped cast this movie and whoever worked with the actors did a wonderful job. These people are actors. They aren’t typically the most graceful or coordinated bunch. But other than perhaps Wesley Snipes everyone looks like a ballplayer. Special props should go to Charlie Sheen who had a great pitching motion.

It is a worst to first movie that I highly recommend.

And there you have it! Now that the winter is over, and our staff has taken some time to share our favorites with you, our readers, what wasn’t on the list that should’ve been? Do you agree with the final rankings? Sound off in the comments below, and again, thanks for sticking with us throughout the winter, and within a few weeks, the real fun begins…San Diego Padres baseball 2015!

Next: Padres Favorites To Land Hector Olivera?

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