BOSTON - JUNE 25: Pedro Martinez and Manny Ramirez point to each other after Manny's catch to end the seventh inning. (Photo by Barry Chin/The Boston Globe via Getty Images)
In recent years, MLB has encouraged teams to loosen up in an effort to liven the sport up a bit. Some teams have responded in ways we may have never expected.
Considering that MLB players are on average 27.6 years old, millennials have officially taken over the sport. Guys like Bryce Harper, who some consider the face of baseball, has even made it his priority to “Make Baseball Fun Again,” a take on Trump’s MAGA campaign slogan.
In a sport where sometimes old school rules take too much precedent, fans get a kick out of players being themselves. The best example of this came in 2004, when the self-proclaimed “idiots,” the Boston Red Sox, ended an 86-year World Series drought by simply – or seemingly – not caring.
Teams are taking the “loosen up” message to a whole new level now, and the sport is better for it. In fact, according to Maury Brown of Forbes, while attendance at big league stadiums was down in 2018, “all told, MLB saw ratings increase by 2%.” Some teams even saw ratings go up by up to 41%.
Sure, increase in viewership can’t all be attributed to teams loosening the reigns a bit. The fact that the teams that saw the biggest ratings boost had winning seasons indicates that winning plays a role in viewership as well.
A little comedy never hurt anybody, though, and in honor of “making baseball fun again,” I have compiled a brief list of ballplayers being funny.
Hope you enjoy!
“The Sandlot” by the Brew Crew, 2018
“The Sandlot” is a classic 90’s movie and one of the best baseball films of all time. the Beauty of this reenactment is just how good the Brewer players actually are at redoing the whole thing. It’s almost scary how much Christian Yelich resembles Benny “The Jet” Rodriguez, and Steve Vogt’s take on Hamilton “Ham” Porter is perfect!
SPOILER ALERT: This scene is one the pivotal scenes in the movie. It’s the what sets up the inciting incident that keeps the story moving forward. The rest of the movie relies on this group of friends finding creative ways to retrieve another baseball that flies over the fence.
“The Sandlot” by the Yankees, 2015
This reenactment came as a big surprise to Yankees fans when it came out in 2015. Aside from surprise appearances on “SNL” and “Seinfeld” by players like Derek Jeter, Bernie Williams, David Wells, and others in the late 90’s, the most buttoned up organization in MLB almost seemed robotic. This reenactment gave fans a different look at the Yankees.
SPOILER ALERT:This reenactment shows the most important scene in “The Sandlot”. After losing a baseball to a Benny Rodriguez home run, “Smalls” claims that he has a replacement. What the group of friends didn’t know is that the ball was “signed” by Babe Ruth.
“Dumb & Dumber” by the Brew Crew, 2018
This reenactment was so good, it earned praise by one of the stars of the original movie. In a twitter post soon after the video was released, Jim Carrey stated that the tribute “tickled” him stupid. He then praised Brent Suter by saying, “you got some comedy chops or a severe behavioral disorder. The difference is negligible”.
Jim Carrey is right, this is probably the best display of players being funny we’ve ever seen, and Suter’s performance is perfect.
SPOILER ALERT: This is the part of the movie leads to the inciting incident which sets up the rest of the film. Josh Hader plays a hitman that will eventually meet an unexpected fate.
“Ballpark Alone” by the Atlanta Braves
This reenactment is more of a spoof trailer of the classic Christmas movie, “Home Alone.” Titled “Ballpark Alone,” the plot of the trailer is that after mistakenly being left alone, Kevin Gausman has to defend Suntrust Park from a couple of burglars. Armed with endless amounts of tools within the ballpark, Gausman gives them hell.
“Bull Duhram” by the D’Backs
20 years after the Arizona Diamondbacks entered MLB as an expansion team, some of the franchise greats recreated a classic scene from the film “Bull Durham” on its 30th anniversary.
This reenactment depicts the classic mound visit scene which features talk of jammed eye lids, cutting the head off of a rooster to remove a hex from a glove, and Christmas gifts for relatives of all things.
Especially in today’s game, where mound visits (MV) are tracked on screens at home and on the scoreboard at stadiums, this single MV might have exhausted a teams entire limit. It also feels like something players might actually talk about in a game.
In 2014, Mark Teixeira showed a softer side of himself when he, in partnership with the YESnetwork, released a series of video’s depicting Teixeria as a sideline reporter of sorts called “Foul Territory”.
In this series, which lasted 12 episodes – each episode never exceeding more than 4-minutes – Teixeira interviews members of the New York Yankees. Players like Derek Jeter (interview above), Brett Gardner and Masahiro Tanaka to name a few.
The genius comes in Teixeira’s performance, a clueless jock who thinks he has a future in broadcasting after retiring from the MLB. It also comes in the commitment Tex has to staying in character. While many players are in on the joke, some players it seems don’t know what to expect from the “Foul Territory” host.
Ironically, Teixeira has proven that he is actually good at reporting on baseball. After retiring from the Yankees in 2016, Tex has established himself as one of the best analysts on ESPN.
Joe Kelly is “Jim Buchanan”
Similar to “Foul Territory,” Jim Buchanan from JWK, Punta Gorda features a clueless reporter interviewing big league players. The genius of this original series is that Joe Kelly, who played Jim Buchanan while with the Red Sox, took on an entirely different character and actually fooled players and legends into uncomfortable interviews.
It will be interesting to see if Jim Buchanan makes an appearance in Los Angeles now that Joe Kelly signed a free agent deal with the Dodgers. One thing’s for sure, the Red Sox and their fans will miss Joe Kelly and his down to earth personality.
Kelly is another great examples of players loosening up a touch. He frequents the “Section 10” podcasts and speaks directly to the fans.
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Finally, if MLB wants to see continued success in their ratings, they have to continue with this approach. Take it from us fans, we’re tired of the buttoned up nature and antiquated unwritten rules of the past. We like bat flips and home plate celebrations, but most importantly we want to see players be allowed to be more themselves.
