Whether you like baseball or not, and especially if you do, this is such a tribute to the sport, to players who play for the love of the game and for one guy who simply wanted to make it happen. "The Battered Bastards of Baseball" is on Netflix and is 80 minutes of pure joy.
Portland, Oregon lost its Class B baseball team in the early 1970's. Bing Russell, a working actor in small roles, wanted to get guys together to play ball, and to that end he started an independent baseball team, put an ad in the local newspaper for tryouts and hundreds of men came to play. A team, the Mavericks, was created. There were not many independent baseball teams, none on the West Coast in 1973 except the Mavericks. While they were totally independent, the Mavericks played against Class A minor league teams who were affiliated with major league teams like the San Diego Padres and many others. The Mavericks kicked ass for more than 4 years.
This is a film not just about baseball but about the love of the underdog, the love of the game, about playing against the establishment and playing for the joy of the win. As Bing's son, Kurt Russell said, when he played on this team he had a thousand brothers.
Watch this on Netflix. You will get a little teary and you will be very, very happy. And for some of us, the chance to see Kurt Russell talk about his Dad is simply a great bonus.
All thumbs up for this one.
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