Red Sox the Movie

I don’t have a problem with admitting I’m wrong; perhaps because I’ve had so much practice. My long-time reader knows that I like say that movies are not like real life. Well, I was wrong (again). At least sometimes, life is like a movie. The Boston Red Sox proved that last night.

 

I’m pretty sure Red Sox management entered the 2013 season with a simple goal; to field a team the baseball fans of New England wouldn’t hate. Winning more than the paltry 69 wins in 2012 would be necessary. It’s hard to like losers. Winning the AL East? Yeah, right.

Let’s face it. The Sox were carrying a lot of baggage. The collapse of 2011. The Costa Concordia captained by Bobby Valentine that was 2012. They had jettisoned the big money stars in a mega-trade with the Dodgers and replaced them with a bunch of mid-level bottom of the order guys and overpayed them in the bargain. 3 years and $39m for Shane Victorino? Ridiculous!

Then the season started and Boston got off to an improbably hot start. It wasn’t exactly wire to wire but the Red Sox were at or near the top of the standings all season long. Fear the Beard. They started the playoffs with the best record in the American League but there was still an underdog feel to the Sox. It was a nice season the scrappy, hirsute, overachievers had put together but this was the playoffs. Those of us who know that life is not like a movie knew that the Red Sox season would be over soon enough. It was a nice ride – baseball was fun again – but it was over. It was inevitable. Victorino, Jonny Gomes, Mike Napoli, Stephen Drew and David Ross weren’t getting to the World Series, not even with the redoubtable stalwarts Jacoby Ellsbury, Dustin Pedroia and David Ortiz at the top of the order.

Tampa’s starting pitching would be too much for them.

Detroit’s starting pitching would be too much for them.

St. Louis’ starting pitching would be too much for them.

Except it wasn’t.

There was more to this season than baseball, of course.

Which brings me back to the movie and its star. The first act would end with David “Papi” Ortiz, microphone in hand, letting the punks, the thugs, the terrorists know they can never win.

“This is our fucking city!”

In that moment, the fractured bond between the Red Sox and their fans was healed.

Let me say that I’d like to cast this movie with character actors, has-beens and never-wases, not A-List actors, to provide the actors with that same sense of camaraderie and underdog sensibility. I know Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and Mark Wahlberg are going to want to be in this movie but I don’t want anybody more famous than Mark Ruffalo (who might be too famous after “The Avengers”). Maybe Affleck can direct.

I’ll also say that we’ll need guys who can give a credible performance as baseball players. Does Kevin Costner count as a has-been, yet? Oh, and they also need to be able to grow a credible beard. This is not going to be an easy movie to cast. We need a left-handed Native American to play Ellsbury (Adam Beach?), a Flyin’ Hawaiian to play Victorino (I got nothing), a Japanese actor to play Koji Uehara (Tony Leung Chiu Wai is Chinese but he was great in “The Grandmaster”) and a gigantic Dominican to play Ortiz.

Getting Big Papi right will make or break the movie. I like Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje (admittedly not Dominican) if he can hit left-handed. He’s got to handle the post-Marathon moment, the impromptu team meeting in the dugout in Game 4 and he’s got to hit .688 in the World Series.

You’ve got to do justice to Dustin Pedroia, too. Casey Affleck isn’t anywhere as famous as brother Ben but he may be a better actor. He doesn’t look like he could get anywhere close to Pedroia beard-wise and that could be a problem. Are their beard extensions? I don’t want to see any CGI beards in this flick.

I like Sam Rockwell for Jonny Gomes. Rockwell has played crazy before. This is a plum part. Let’s face it; Gomes will steal every scene he’s in. He may be a little too old but John C. Reilly could play Mike Napoli. He does have baseball movie experience. (Napoli was a catcher early in his career, too.) Josh Brolin is square-jawed enough to play manager John Farrell and for this movie I like the fact that even though Brolin has gotten some great parts in big movies recently, he just never seems to break out and become an over the title star. He’s perfect.

Hey! Somebody hire a screenwriter and a casting director! Let’s make this movie!

Oh, wait. We don’t have to, do we?