Daily Times

Henry Rowengartner wasn’t good at Little League baseball. Yet, after the 12-year-old broke his right arm by slipping on a baseball, Rowengartner turned into the best pitcher in America in the summer of 1993.

See, when a doctor removed Rowengartner’s cast, the two quickly discovered that the Little Leaguer’s tendons healed “a little too tight.” This led to Rowengartner being able to throw a baseball really, really fast.

And that’s the premise of “Rookie of the Year” – a comedy film starring Thomas Ian Nicholas, Gary Busey and John Candy.

When Rowengartner had his cast removed in the summer of ’93, his mother bought him and his two best friends tickets to a Chicago Cubs game. The trio went to Wrigley Field, and after a Montreal Expos player hit a home run, Rowengartner – as has long been tradition at Wrigley – threw the opposing team’s home-run ball back onto the field.

Rowengartner’s toss, however, went over 400 feet from the outfield bleachers back to home plate. So the Cubs, a losing franchise at the time, recruited the 12-year-old to play for them.

When the Cubs manager asked Rowengartner if he wanted to play for the MLB team, he said: “Great! But I gotta ask my mom first.”

Long story short, Rowengartner, who threw his fastball over 100 miles per hour, led the Cubs to a World Series championship while also helping his mother find a boyfriend: insert “The Rocket” or as you know him of screen, Gary Busey.

If Rowengartner isn’t your favourite character while watching this, then you have no soul. So throwing out the obvious pick here, my favourite personality came from one of the bad guys from the “Home Alone” movie series.

Daniel Stern, who plays Marv in “Home Alone” and Phil Brickma in this flick, is the uncanny pitching coach of the Cubs. He gives unique pieces of advice to Rowengartner and often finds himself trapped or locked in unpleasant situations.

So I’ll give the edge to Brickma over Chet “The Rocket” Steadman and Rowengartner.

Even to this day, I find myself quoting this not-so-believable sports movie.

There are too many quotes to name here like “Pitcher’s got a big butt” and “I ain’t seen the floater pitch since Scuffy McGee!”

But my favourite scene is when the New York Mets power hitter known as “Heddo” hits a monster fly ball during the final game of the regular season.

The towering shot goes down the left-field line as fans and announcers alike say “go foul” while Heddo yells “stay fair.” At the end, the umpire yells “foul ball!”

Sometimes the best quotes are just two words long.

This movie didn’t win an Oscar. And that’s fine. Some movies are just made to entertain, and that’s what this did. There are a few mistakes throughout the film that you’ll notice if you’ve watched it as many times as I have.

Rowengartner’s mom, Mary, who is played by the actress Amy Morton, apparently didn’t have a long relationship with Rowengartner’s father.

At one point during the film, Mary sits Henry down and tells him that she only knew his father when she was a teenager.

The problem with that is Henry is 12 years old and Mary, who in real life was 35 at the time, didn’t look a day younger than 30. So the story line didn’t stick of her being pregnant with Henry when she was a teenager.

One other “blunder” of the film that always stuck out to me was that the Cubs wore full game uniforms on practice days. Not sure if that was a thing for MLB teams in the 90s but I’m pretty sure everyone had their own practice attire.

There are plenty of great baseball movies out there. Heck, Kevin Costner plays an actor in like 10 of them.

But this film was a favourite of mine growing up and I can still watch it nowadays, albeit with a few more chuckles. From slow-motion effects to the same feel-good tune in the background throughout the movie, it’s a bit cheesy.

It’s not a star-studded cast but there are a few faces and names you’ll even see nowadays – 27 years later – on TV.

It’s short, funny and subtly pulls at a few different heartstrings.

So “Rookie of the Year” gets a 7.2 out of 10 rating from this sports writer.