Field of Dreams
On this day in sports history 101 years ago, eight Chicago White Sox players were indicted for throwing the 1919 World Series to the Cincinnati Reds. Although they were never criminally charged, they were banned from baseball for life. The players were upset at Club owner Charlie Cominsky because near the end of the season, he ordered his manager to not play their top pitcher Eddie Chicotte, who had accumulated 29 wins and would have earned a $10,000 bonus had he won 30 games. It was said Cominsky was so cheap he seldom had the team’s uniforms washed and the accumulated dirt and sweat turned their sox more black than white. So the incident has become known as the Black Sox Scandal. Pitcher Chicotte and their best hitter, Shoeless Joe Jackson, led the uprising to throw the series.
The 1989 movie Field of Dreams was adapted from the 1982 book entitled Shoeless Joe. The story is about Iowa farmer Ray Kinsella (played by Kevin Costner), a husband and father who is tending to his cornfield when he hears a mysterious voice intone, "If you build it, he will come.” one of the most famous quotes in movie history.
The farmer turns the cornfield into a baseball field and as a result, out of the corn comes the banned White Sox players (in clean uniforms!) to play in a final game. It was thought the famous quote meant if the field of dreams was built, he, Shoeless Joe Jackson, would come, but in the final scene of the movie the real meaning of the quote becomes clear as Kinsella's estranged and deceased father shows up allowing the pair to reconcile over a game of catch.
By the way, then-teenagers Matt Damon and Ben Affleck were extras in one of the scenes!
Recently, Major League Baseball hosted a game at the actual Field of Dreams field for the very first time. The game saw the White Sox defeating the Yankees with a walk-off score of 9-8. Kevin Costner even personally made an appearance at the game and threw out the first pitch to make things even more official. Because the broadcast of the game was the most-watched regular season MLB game since 2005, it stands to reason that all of the positive attention in revisiting Field of Dreams helped to convince NBCUniversal to move forward with a TV series adaptation on the Peacock Network. May have to sign up on Peacock once that show premiers.
Keep dreaming, Fish Report readers.
~~~~~~~~
Receive a weekly email whenever there is a new blog post. Just click here to send me an email request and your name will be added to the distribution.
No comments:
Post a Comment