For the Love of the Dame

Matt Bruce

Adam Sandler needs to make a baseball movie, just to show Kevin Costner how it's done. Mind you, Sandler's baseball movie would not have such a lofty premise as For the Love of the Game. That just means that it could not be nearly so disappointing. For the Love of the Game left me bitter, if not angry, for falling so far short of its potential.

The in-flight magazine, which gave away a crucial plot element, is partly to blame for my letdown. Unlike that magazine, I will not ruin any of the ending for you. However, this column contains so much detail that you might want to stop reading if you don't want spoilers.

Choose wisely. If you think you want to see the movie without having it ruined, you should instead go buy some Strikethree.com merchandise with the money you'd have spent at the theater and thank me later when For the Love of the Game makes its cable TV run. Otherwise, read on.

Billy Chapel, the pitcher played by Costner, is a cross between Cal Ripken and Kirk Gibson. As an ace starter, he obviously never had a consecutive games streak. Still, like Ripken, he makes a big deal about playing the game as it's supposed to be played. Also like Ripken, he peddles an image of blue-collar humility despite taking himself deadly seriously and enjoying special hotel privileges.

Chapel, who has spent his whole career with the Detroit Tigers, was supposedly the hero of the 1984 World Series. In real life, Gibson was the Tigers' heart and soul that season. He inspired the Dodgers to a championship four years later, though he also threw a temper tantrum when his new teammates played a practical joke on him in spring training. That outburst was supposed to convince people to treat Gibson with respect; it was exactly the reaction I'd expect from any of Costner's baseball characters.

The team's new corporate ownership would like to trade Chapel in the offseason. The old owner encourages him to retire instead, an idea that brands him as a total fool. In real life, Chapel would have been gone by July 31. The sentimental value of his last few starts as a Tiger (including maybe five home games in August and September) is nothing compared to the real value the franchise would get from a package of young prospects. We learn at the start of the game that Chapel is 8-11, despite a 3.35 ERA. Kevin Appier, call your office: those numbers scream out a lack of run support and suggest that Chapel would be of great value to a playoff contender.

If he really wants to win, then Chapel himself might like to take another team to a championship. A player with a girlfriend in New York should welcome a chance to become a Yankee. As for his hometown faithful, I think it would have been more fitting for him to finish with a bang as a visitor to his old ballpark than to do it in his old uniform but in front of those rotten Yankee fans.

As the game unfolds, we see several batters retired in convincing action scenes. Vin Scully imitates his own marvelous broadcast style perfectly, right down to the choice of words - at one point, Scully wonders whether Chapel has enough "petrol" left in him. Steve "Psycho" Lyons gives painfully vapid color commentary, though this too is exactly like real life. Even the Detroit manager is convincing and endearing.

With all of the flashbacks inside Chapel's head, though, several of his actual outs are lost on the cutting room floor. Given the way the movie was promoted, this is just maddening. It's bad enough when ESPN Classic cuts out whole innings of great games to make room for the digressions of Al Trautwig. I've felt near-homicidal rage towards Trautwig, whose smug foreshadowing is even worse than John Tesh lending drama to a pre-recorded Olympic gym meet. But even Trautwig, unlike director Sam Raimi, would never think of pre-empting an out if the whole point of the broadcast were one pitcher's quest for perfection.

The problem I have with this movie is that the game itself is not the dominant plot element. Maybe things are different in the Michael Shaara novel, which I have not read, but the movie is actually built around Chapel's romance with a freelance writer named Jane Aubrey. Kelly Preston, who in real life is married to John Travolta, portrays Aubrey with overacting that would do her husband proud.

Aubrey is self-absorbed, yet destructively self-critical. On her first date with Chapel, she describes her theory that everyone who flirts ought to wear a descriptive sign. When asked what her own sign would read, she pulls out a sheet of paper and writes the word "yes." Within seconds, our happy couple is making out on an elevator, then waking up together in bed the next morning. So far, so good, but don't expect me to buy Aubrey's subsequent angst that she "doesn't do things like that." Years after living with Charlie Sheen and dating George Clooney, Kelly Preston now plays a character who must repeatedly insist, "I am not a groupie."From the moment that Chapel and Aubrey begin dating, For the Love of the Game is the worst form of chick flick. She even tells him at one point, with either derision or frustration, "you are such a guy." While Kevin Costner is a paragon of masculinity compared to Matt Damon or Leonardo DiCaprio, there is still no need for this kind of generalization. Even A League of Their Own rises above the "Men Are From Mars" stereotypes -- one reason why that is my all-time favorite baseball movie.

For a far better "such a guy" character, I direct you to a scene in Happy Gilmore. Adam Sandler, as the title character, has brought the woman of his dreams to a hockey rink. He offers her a wager: If she can shoot a puck into an open net from center ice, then he will never bother her again, but if she misses, then she must kiss him. "I guess that just blew up in my face," Sandler observes when the puck sails directly on target. What follows is genuine romance compared to the "yes" scene, which a friend of mine would describe as a "fannawuck."If Costner's ballplayers are giants with tragic flaws, then Sandler's romantic leads are goofballs whose niceness and genuineness make them all the more heroic. This said, I must acknowledge that For the Love of the Game is built on the human flaws of Chapel and Aubrey. They both have secrets that are awkwardly revealed. They both grow as characters, lovers, and people, working through their various situations.

In one of these situations, Chapel badly injures his arm with a tool saw. Aubrey rushes him to aid but is told there is no room for her on the emergency helicopter. As he tells her to call his trainer, "the most important person in my life right now," the hurt she feels is one of the most profound emotions ever conveyed in a movie. Likewise, on the day of the game, Aubrey's developing reaction to Chapel's performance is at least as important to the movie as the performance itself.

After the game, Chapel and his favorite catcher go out to celebrate, after which Chapel must put his intoxicated friend to bed. I actually found this to be the second most romantic scene in the movie -- a twisted reaction, no doubt, but at least a bit justified by the opening scene. Despite Chapel's bond to his teammate, whom he had previously described as "the ugliest wife in the league," he finds that he still cannot enjoy his moment of glory if he cannot share it with Aubrey.

The moral of the movie seems to be that Chapel's life and love are more important than a silly game. To the fans, however, the silly game is all that exists in the moment that it happens. David Cone, David Wells, Kenny Rogers and Dennis Martinez are all heroes for the same accomplishment, a heroism that transcends whatever good or bad they have done with their lives outside of that game. I wanted to revere Billy Chapel the same way, but For the Love of the Game robs us of that opportunity.

about the author

Matt Bruce remembers David Cone's bullpen exploits as a Met and wonders whether Cone's perfecto allowed him to become closer to himself. Help Matt avoid similar temptations by dropping him a line at mb@strikethree.com.