Don't Pick on the Twins!

Having been sick, I have had the advantage of some "quality" television watching. In the past two days I have now seen two baseball movies that besmirch the Minnesota Twins. Yesterday, by far the worse of the two movies, I watched Major League: Back to the Minors, featuring Scott Bakula, Ted McGinley, Corbin Bernsen, who appears in the previous Major League movies, as prima donna Roger Dorn (and now owner/GM of the Twins), and a pre-24 Dennis Haysbert, also reprising his role from the earlier Major League moves, as Pedro Cerrano. The basic premise is Dorn hires an aging minor league pitcher named Gus Cantrell (Bakula) to be the manager of the Salt Lake City Buzz, the Twins AAA minor league team. Cantrell takes to his new role to get the players to act as a team and not for themselves and finds himself at odds with Leonard Huff, the snobby, arrogant manager of the twins (McGinley). A challenge is issued and the minor league Buzz take on the Twins for one game. As the Buzz hold their own against the Twins, the game ends in a tie even though Huff has the lights turned off rather than have the Buzz seem like they are doing better than his big leaguers. The Buzz continue to excel in the minors, winning a division title, when Cantrell issues another challenge to Huff and the Twins. Play the Buzz again in Buzz Stadium. If the Twins win, he will give his salary to Huff, if the Buzz wins, Cantrell gets to manage the Twins.

Today's feature was Little Big League, featuring Timothy Busfield in another great role and many others in good roles. When the owner of the Minnesota Twins dies suddenly (Jason Robards), his will bequeaths the team to his grandson Billy (Luke Edwards), a devotee of baseball who, although only 12, has devoured voluminous lore, knows the team intimately, and has shown an uncanny sixth sense of what they need to improve. So he appoints himself as manager after firing the unloved current one (Dennis Farina). But how will Billy convince a gang of proud, tough men to stick around and take orders from a kid? In an attempt to get the players effort's into the game, he dedicates the season to his Grandfather, and vows to win the Championship with the Minnesota Twins and almost pulls it off.

Watch them if you they come by the dial on a rainy day. Stop if its Little Big League, only pause if its the Buzz.