Half-Empty: What Are Your Choices For Worst Baseball Movie? [Archive]

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Mark West

10-03-2005, 03:10 PM

I really enjoyed the thread on favorite baseball movies.

I thought it might be a good mental exercise, and opinion-getter to have you guys to list your least favorite baseball flicks?

Care to opine?

hellborn

10-03-2005, 03:44 PM

That Babe Ruth movie with John Goodman...what a huge waste, and an insult to the Babe and all fans.

The Real McCoy

10-03-2005, 04:35 PM

Steve Jeltz

10-04-2005, 02:26 AM

julusnc

10-04-2005, 11:20 AM

There was a movie made about 25 years ago about a woman who makes the big leagues with the Braves. She ends up becoming romantically involved with a teammate and the relationship somehow helps the Braves win in the movie, I think. I forget the name of this awful film.

She doesnt play baseball but her boyfriend does and he breaks Roger Maris's homerun record with 62 homeruns.

The movie was called The Sluggers Wife and yes it sucked.

ElCaminoSS

10-04-2005, 04:45 PM

Paulmcall

10-04-2005, 05:20 PM

Yea, William Bendix really looked bad trying to swing a bat and Goodman's portrayal was equally poor. I thought Goodman was going to have a heart attack rounding the bases in one scene.
It would be nice to see a good movie about the Babe but it hasn't been done yet. Maybe the guy is still too reverred to be accurately shown.

Brian McKenna

10-05-2005, 08:31 AM

The Babe movie with John Goodman and Cobb with Tommy Lee Jones were both jokes. I hate true stories that are so butchered you leave wondering what was true of not. Now society as a whole believes a load of crap about the two greatest baseball players in history.

Hollywood and TV perpetuate the sterotypes that underlie much of society's thinking. Now, to many, Ruth was a fat slob since birth and Cobb never had a rational thought. What a joke, few people realize that both, in their profession, were geniuses. The talent may have come to Ruth easier than Cobb but they are both so far ahead of the pack that we can never give them their due.

Joltin' Joe

10-05-2005, 08:56 AM

Field of Dreams. Joe Jackson threw lefty and hit righty in the movie. This inexcusable reversal error bothered me so much that it made the movie virtually unwatchable.

ElCaminoSS

10-06-2005, 05:29 PM

well being that he came in late in the movie and that wasnt the
point.... it was a very good movie

Big Dirty Sox

10-09-2005, 06:03 PM

Major League 3 is pretty bad, but unnecessary sequels made just to milk one more dollar out of a respectable movie always make me angry.

Big Dirty Sox

10-09-2005, 06:07 PM

Ubiquitous

10-09-2005, 06:39 PM

The worst baseball movie I saw featured Keanu Reeves as a failed gambler who has to manage a little league team in the hood. I believe it was called Hard Ball and it was hard to watch. Oh and Costner's last baseball movie was pretty bad.

ElCaminoSS

10-09-2005, 08:02 PM

Ubiquitous

10-09-2005, 08:52 PM

Well that part and pretty much every single other part as well.

Chabone

10-10-2005, 05:43 AM

I'm uncertain whether "BASEketball" qualifies as a baseball movie or even as a movie (it may have been created as some unspeakable torture technique), but it certainly falls into the unwatchable category (it would have to improve two-fold to reach the "straight to video" classification).

Not surprisingly it included Jenny McCarthy in a featured role. Shockingly, Bob Costas also appeared (I'd be willling to bet he changed agents shortly thereafter).

In the "Worst Baseball Movie" race, "BASEketball" is Secretariat at the ' 73 Belmont.
I wouldn't consider BASEketball a baseball movie. It's basically a satire on professional sports anyway. Apparently you have a major beef with it, for some reason. I love the movie, I find it hilarious.

The movie with Freddie Prinze Jr, and Jessica Biel, that one was pretty bad.

ElCaminoSS

10-10-2005, 05:37 PM

ya it can no way be considered a baseball movie

64Cards

10-14-2005, 10:53 AM

The Babe Ruth Story made in 1948 is not only the worst baseball movie ever made but possibly the worst movie ever made period. It stars William Bendex who sorta resembles the Babe but the guy is the biggest stiff that ever lived. A cardboard cut-out could have done a better job of acting. The way they portrayed the Babe was rediculous, they made him seem like some kind of saint/super hero. Kind of a cross between Superman with a bat meets Jesus Christ. As we all know the Babe was no saint and this ham fisted portrayel of his life is so corny that I doubt anyone who isn't farting dust could sit through it. Thumbs down!

All good points. Supposedly, the Babe went to the premiere and left about halway through it. Was no doubt thinking, "Gehrig gets Gary Cooper to portray him and I get stuck with frigging Bill Bendix."

But I go with with the John Goodman version as the worst, because least they had seen how bad the first Ruth movie was and incredibly, came up with one that was arguably as bad, if not worse.
:laugh

westsidegrounds

10-14-2005, 03:35 PM

All good points. Supposedly, the Babe went to the premiere and left about halway through it. Was no doubt thinking, "Gehrig gets Gary Cooper to portray him and I get stuck with frigging Bill Bendix."

<...>

Yeah .... but when you look like Babe Ruth, ya know? If they'd gone with Clark Gable, people would've said "Hey wait a minute .... "

Wonder if Charles Laughton was available. That would have been something to see ...

Edit: Hey, he was. And you know what, he looked kinda like the Babe.

Yankeebiscuitfan

10-15-2005, 02:17 PM

That Babe Ruth movie with John Goodman...what a huge waste, and an insult to the Babe and all fans.

I totally agree with you.

Bad acting, bad settings. Many times when a scene was filmed in a baseball stadium, you could easily see that it was cardboard.

Yankeebiscuitfan

10-15-2005, 02:20 PM

Field of Dreams. Joe Jackson threw lefty and hit righty in the movie. This inexcusable reversal error bothered me so much that it made the movie virtually unwatchable.

I never noticed. I will check the next time I'll watch that movie.

rainout

10-17-2005, 01:30 PM

Oh yeah, and I completely forgot about The Scout, which contains the most ludicrous baseball performance ever. He makes his major league debut in the World Series and pitches a perfect game, striking out every batter with 3 fastballs, and also hits 4 homeruns. I mean come on, nobody even made contact on him.

Not only that but there was this whole plot about some emotional turmoil relating to his parents that was brought up and then completely forgotten. This truly terrible movie would be my choice too.

ElCaminoSS

10-20-2005, 08:37 PM

I still like the scout

Ex-Expo fan

10-20-2005, 10:38 PM

Even if it is a delicate subject, the worst baseball movie I have seen so far is the Jackie Robinson story, with Jackie playing himself. I think we can all agree that athletes are not the best actors. The subject is deified, and the script is pretty simple. But at least my expectations were not high when I bought the movie (I like collecting baseball movies). I am ashamed to say I bought fever pitch thinking that at least I would get to see some baseball and get that rising feeling (like when I see Roy Hobbs hit that homerun or see the Indians win the pennant in the movie Major League) when I would see the Red Sox win the series and have some laughs at least while relating myself to a baseball fan. But the movie dissapointed me in how exagerated everything was, the baseball fan came out as a freakin idiot and I don't think the actors were all that good. And the overexposing of the Red Sox by the medias crushed my support for them so I had nothing left to enjoy on that piece of crap.

efin98

10-22-2005, 12:46 PM

I still like the scout

Only the biggest snobs won't suspend disbelief to enjoy a funny movie- one that is intentionally funny. I liked the movie.

I liked Hardball.

I loved Major League 3. Can't get enough of it.

I though The Babe was pretty stupid, but it looked more like a satire of his life than an actual biography.

runningshoes

10-22-2005, 12:50 PM

The Babe.

I can still smell the stench.

steveox

10-23-2005, 01:55 AM

Captain Cold Nose

10-27-2005, 05:57 AM

My pick would be "Bang the drum slowly" Robert DeNiro played a catcher with Hodgkin's disease and would soon die. That film was depressing and it made me cry.Why not make a movie positive about the game not negitive about the game.
Because that was what happened in the book, written by Mark Harris. It was depressing, wasn't it?
The Babe was bad. As was The Babe Ruth Story from 1948. They even made him a martyr.
The second and third Bad News Bears movie paled in comparison to the first one, especially Bad News Bears in Japan.
Considering how enjoyable The Sandlot was, the direct to video Sandlot 2 was a major disappointment. As inspired as Airplane 2.

85cards

10-31-2005, 12:07 PM

Field of Dreams. Joe Jackson threw lefty and hit righty in the movie. This inexcusable reversal error bothered me so much that it made the movie virtually unwatchable.

Director Phil Robinson was interviewed on a "Baseball Movie" theme show once and he said something to the effect that people always point out to him that Ray Liotta bats righty as Jackson in the movie and how that is inaccurate.

He responds that there is another glaring inaccuracy that those people rarely notice. Shoeless Joe is dead and in the movie they show him walking around. Its a movie, he said, get over it.

skeletor

11-10-2005, 05:49 PM

The Babe.

I can still smell the stench.

I concur..it was STANKING !
:eek:

Could have been a great film..but failed and badly..

worst film..from 1962..'safe at home' with Mickey Mantle, Roger Maris..
and the rest of the bronx bombers..story about some lying dork who
promises mantle and maris and his little league banquet..man, it blows
chunks..too bad Mickey didn't take a louieville slugger to that kid..

heh heh heh...it's so bad, it's fantastic..:rolleyes:

ElCaminoSS

11-10-2005, 06:09 PM

Shoeless Joe is dead and in the movie they show him walking around. Its a movie, he said, get over it.
:laugh :laugh :laugh Haha:laugh :laugh :laugh

ElCaminoSS

11-10-2005, 06:11 PM

My pick would be "Bang the drum slowly" Robert DeNiro played a catcher with Hodgkin's disease and would soon die. That film was depressing and it made me cry.Why not make a movie positive about the game not negitive about the game.
Its supposed to be sad, that movie wouldnt be what it is without that, its basically the point of the whole movie. Theres plenty of happy baseball movies out there

Yankee Legend

11-10-2005, 06:35 PM

on word...BASEKETBAL!!!!

What was that about???

juan pierre

11-10-2005, 06:50 PM

I hate that movie of "BASEketball" and the babe ruth story in 1948:crazy it was a joke dude

juan pierre

11-10-2005, 06:51 PM

on word...BASEKETBAL!!!!

What was that about???
Hey dude chill with the yankees THE BOSOX rule the world!!!!!:evil

ElCaminoSS

11-12-2005, 01:13 AM

What happened to the tons of posts I read that you said your a diehard marlins fan???

petrel

11-13-2005, 04:17 PM

My two choices for worst baseball movie are:

"Major League III: Back to the Minors" and "Bleacher Bums".

The "bad" movies have something good about them. You can watch William Bendix's Babe Ruth biopic with jaw-dropping amazement -- am I really watching a movie this bad? You can watch "The Bad News Bears Go to Japan" and ask "what the hell were they thinking?"

But "Major League III" and "Bleacher Bums" are just bad. There's no amazement, just sheer boredom. I couldn't get past the first 20 minutes of MLIII without emptying the DVD from the player. As for "Bleacher Bums", the crappy movie took all the charm out of an amazing play.

--Pet

ElCaminoSS

11-13-2005, 04:25 PM

Whats bleacher bums about?

petrel

11-19-2005, 08:35 AM

"Bleacher Bums" is a movie based on a play that's not widely known. It's only been seen on television, and I was lucky enough to see both versions of it.

The first version was shown on PBS in 1979. It isn't much different from what you would have seen if you saw the play on stage. Minimal sets, and the actors have to carry the play. The 2002 version is the Showtime version, filmed at an actual ballpark.

The movie is about the lives of several Chicago Cubs fans in the cheap seats during one day of the baseball season. (Showtime punks out by letting you know it's a Chicago team, but never saying "Cubs".) These are the regulars -- people who have been meeting in these seats for years. They aren't necessarily friends, but they know each other.

The best explanation of the movie is
http://www.badmovieplanet.com/3btheater/b/bleacherbums.html. It's on DVD, if you want to waste the money.

The PBS production reached its hairy mitt out of the set and grabbed you by the throat. The Showtime production was just boring.

--Pet

RedSox2004

11-19-2005, 10:11 AM

As bad as the orginal Babe Ruth Story in 1948 was, this is by far the worst baseball movie of all time.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076424/combined

Murder at the World Series (1977)

Plot Outline: A disturbed young man, who had tried out for the Houston Astros baseball team and been rejected, plots to take his revenge by a series of kidnappings.

RedSox2004

11-19-2005, 10:19 AM

A footnote to this. Babe Ruth attended the premier of the movie in NY about 2 weeks before he died in 1948. He left before the movie ended and was never seen in public again. See attached story from the New York Times from July 1948

The Babe Ruth Story made in 1948 is not only the worst baseball movie ever made but possibly the worst movie ever made period. It stars William Bendex who sorta resembles the Babe but the guy is the biggest stiff that ever lived. A cardboard cut-out could have done a better job of acting. The way they portrayed the Babe was rediculous, they made him seem like some kind of saint/super hero. Kind of a cross between Superman with a bat meets Jesus Christ. As we all know the Babe was no saint and this ham fisted portrayel of his life is so corny that I doubt anyone who isn't farting dust could sit through it. Thumbs down!

petrel

11-19-2005, 02:27 PM

I decided to solve this conundrum by going to the ultimate movie ranking source: the United States Internet Movie Database at http://us.imdb.com and looking for the ratings of every movie listed with the keyword "baseball".

I put a few restrictions on my search.

a) A movie had to have baseball in some way central to the plot or the theme, and
b) It had to have gathered more than 100 votes.

First, the 10 worst baseball films of all time, from #10 (tenth worst) to #1 (the worst)

10. The Scout (5.1/10, 1224 votese) A hard-charging baseball scout finds himself in charge of a player who is even more messed up than he is. Got a 7% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

9. The Winning Team (5.1/10, 147 votes). The standard biopic of Grover Cleveland Alexander, with Ronald Reagan in the starring role. The movie plays loose with the facts regarding Alexander's life -- the word "epilepsy" is not mentioned due to restrictions by Warner Brothers. I suspect the voters hate it because they hate Reagan -- I hate Reagan as a politician, but this film showed he could clearly act.

8. The Bad News Bears in Breaking Training (4.9/10, 632 votes). The second movie suffered a lot as Walter Matthau and Tatum O'Neil wisely turned this one down. A lot of crude, and not funny, humor.

7. Major League II (4.8/10, 3,829 votes). Suffered from a case of sequelitis -- there are a lot of plot threads that don't add up to a whole movie. Furthermore, the plot threads weren't that funny. Cerrano becoming a buddhist? A crazy Japanese baseball player? Yeah, yeah.

6. Night Game (4.7/10, 110 votes). A serial killer strikes only when the Houston Astros play at night. I've seen a lot of Astros games that made me wanna kill someone, too.

5. Summer Catch (4.5/10, 2,596 votes). Poor boy falls in love with rich girl. Poor boy in minor leagues wants to play pro baseball. Poor boy is Freddie Prinze. Poor boy takes shirt off. Skip this movie if you're not wearing a training bra.

4. The Slugger's Wife (4.2/10, 300 votes). Baseball player marries rock singer. They get the baseball wrong, and the love story strikes out, too.

3. Major League: Back to the Minors (4.1/10, 1278 votes). The amazing thing is they found over 1,000 people who admitted to watching it.

2. The Sandlot 2 (3.8/10, 405 votes). Straight to video. More of a remake than a sequel.

And the number one worst baseball movie....

1. The Bad News Bears Go to Japan (3.5/10, 563 votes). And they can stay there. Not enough baseball, not funny, and by now the Bears were old enough to shave.

--Pet

Aa3rt

11-27-2005, 06:55 PM

There was a thread a few months ago: "Movies we so did not need remakes of" http://www.baseball-fever.com/showthread.php?t=31508 where many of these same movies were discussed.

My vote for "Worst of the Worst" goes to the atrocious piece of schlock, the remake of "The Kid From Left Field" with Gary Coleman, Robert Guillame and Ed McMahon. This one was truly lame.

And while everyone here has been panning Major League-Back to the Minors, I liked that one-yeah, it was bad, but I'll still watch it if it's on. There were some amusing scenes.

steveox

11-27-2005, 08:57 PM

T
My vote for "Worst of the Worst" goes to the atrocious piece of schlock, the remake of "The Kid From Left Field" with Gary Coleman, Robert Guillame and Ed McMahon. This one was truly lame.

Hey i liked that movie!

runningshoes

11-27-2005, 09:04 PM

My pick would be "Bang the drum slowly" Robert DeNiro played a catcher with Hodgkin's disease and would soon die. That film was depressing and it made me cry.Why not make a movie positive about the game not negative about the game.

Because that wouldn't be realistic and the most respected movies tend to be realistic.

Funny, but that's considered one of the best baseball movies.

brewcrew82

01-16-2007, 08:44 PM

Oh and Costner's last baseball movie was pretty bad.

"For love of the game" was the movie...It was a stinker and the first movie that came into my mind when I saw the title of the thread. ATROCIOUS!

W_Marone

01-16-2007, 10:39 PM

Major League two and threee.....wesly snipes wasnt even in the second one but his character was, I hate when that happens.

Dalkowski110

01-17-2007, 05:23 AM

I nominate "Death on the Diamond." HORRIBLE piece of dreck. When you try and mix a film noir murder mystery with baseball, the results are rather poor...

riverhawk

01-17-2007, 02:50 PM

Chasing Dreams. I rented it about 5 years ago because like everyone else here, I'm a baseball movie junkie. It has Kevin Costner on the front, and since I liked FOD, Bull Durham, and For Love of the Game, I decided to give it a try. It was Costner's first role according to IMDB and he was only in the movie for 5 minutes as the big brother going off to Med School. The rest of the movie centers around a guy who has spent his whole life working on the farm. I don't recal how he started playing ball, but do remember that he couldn't hit until swung the bat like it was an ax, at which point he tore the cover off the ball. It was terrible. IMDB gave it a 3.3/10, but I think it was worse than that.

rkoch

01-27-2007, 06:20 PM

The Winning Team was awfully bad. Reagan playing Pete Alexander was pathetic. They really went into fantasy land for the baseball facts. Last inning of the 7th inning of the 26 world series they have Alexander striking out the last batter. One of the memorable facts of that series was Alexander walking Ruth and the "babe" making the last out trying to steal second.
Eight Men Out played things fast and loose when they had Dickie Kerr pitching right handed.
Bill Bendix as Babe Ruth had to be the worst bb movie I can remember.
"Bang the Drum Slowly" was excellent. di Nero looked like Willard Hershberger.

ironman

01-27-2007, 07:25 PM

i liked the scout and hardball. The whole point of the scout is that he is perfect obviously its not based on probability. And hardball was pretty good exept the part where G-Baby gets shot. poooooor gbaby :(

I cannot stand the scout its just so stupid and not real. There is even a lefthanded catcher in spring training

SamtheBravesFan

01-28-2007, 08:54 AM

Has anyone even SEEN The Slugger's Wife? :eek: I have. :waving

I found it at Big Lots, bought it for kicks for $3.00. Basically, it was worth that. I would guess the love story strikes out because there's no closure. She thinks Darryl Palmer is suffocating her so she leaves him and he starts to tank again. So she just leaves him.

I wouldn't say they got the baseball "wrong", per se. They tried. They got details wrong and weird of course. In the first scene that there was a shot of Palmer playing against the Reds and then they switch to Astros, when he probably should have had that shot all along. Duplicate shots at same angles, just different results, were there. Also, there was the obvious fact that the only place that they were allowed to shoot was Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium. No Carolina blue Braves road unis for this movie :p

The fact they had the Braves team of broadcasters was a plus. Made that much more easier to swallow. Skip Caray saying "And once again, the Braves have trouble scoring runs," in one scene just rang so true. ;)

I had to double take twice when I realized that Mark Fidrych and Al Hrabosky (whose name is butchered in the credits: HRBOSKY or something like that) were pitching for the Astros. This is 1984! Fidrych had been retired for 4 years and Hrabosky had just retired a couple of seasons ago! :laugh

And if I was the ump, I would have tossed Palmer for coming up to bat with the Walkman, not just confiscated it. At least he got his 62 home runs at the end of the season. Top that, Chipper and Andruw Jones! :laugh

I can tell why "Oh, Jimmy!", which is in the opening credits, was nominated for a Golden Raspberry for Worst "Original" Song: it was just the same words over and over, like four or five times. Bleh.

*shrugs* I expected it to be a hokey 80s movie, that's what I got. But it was somewhat enjoyable.