The Guardians playoff game against the Yankees that was scheduled for tonight has been rained out, so I am going to get my baseball fix by watching a guilty pleasure baseball movie: Major League. The fact that the fictional Indians beat the Yankees to make the playoffs is just icing on the cake.
It’s a dream movie for Cleveland sports fans, of course, but it also is one of the best movies about baseball ever made. You can argue about whether it’s the finest baseball movie ever, but can anyone dispute that it’s in the top five?
If you want to watch it, incldentally, it’s on Paramount+
Everyone has movies they feel compelled to just sit and watch. For me, Major League is one of those movies. I’ve seen it dozens, if not hundreds, of times, yet still the silly story about the misfit gang of Cleveland Indians who improbably find success makes me laugh. I think it is because I well remember the dark days of the ’70s and ’80s when awful Tribe teams played in decaying, cavernous Municipal Stadium before tiny crowds, and therefore the movie’s plot line about an evil owner who tried to lose in order to have an excuse to move the team to another city has always seemed plausible. When the movie came out, long-suffering Indians fans like me loved it, because it was the visualization of what was then a distant, unlikely dream.
Webner House 