If you could choose any player in the history of the game to make a movie about his life, who would you choose and why?

1. Honus Wagner, just because he was so naturally great, coming out of his mining family, and naturally colorful on the field giving it his all, and such a modestly good dude. Edit: Considering that in baseball's history shortstop is considered the most {important X challenging} field position to fill, he gets my vote for major league baseball's All-Time MVP.

2. Billy Sunday, because he gave it up for God's better choice for him, personally (and my Grammie accepted Jesus in one of his meetings). And because he was a cut-up."Going to church doesn't make you a Christian any more than going to a garage makes you an automobile."

Arlen - I really like your choice of Honus Wagner. He was an interesting person and a heck f a player in the early days of baseball. There is a movie called The Winning Season starring Matthew Modine that is a fictionalized account of a romance Honus had...it's kind of a time travel movie...I really liked it. I think it was a made for TV movie...not sure if you could rent it on Netflix or some other such service. Good post.

Wow, thanks CW. I'll have to look that up. Could even be online.

Also, I'm confident there are plenty of war hero (and other hero) baseballers (and props to the Jackie Robinson dramas)....

I'd be interested in a film about Big Ed Delahanty...who died of mysterious circumstances while he was still a player. He got kicked off of a train and fell off a bridge that went over the Niagara Falls RIver. Supposedly there was also a robbery and a mysterious person that may have been related to the incident. Or perhaps he was just drunk and suicidal. I think it would make for an interesting mystery.

Here's a copy of the obituary written by the NY Times, posted on baseball almanac:

http://www.baseball-almanac.com/deaths/ed_delahanty_obituary.shtml

Somebody with a good sense of mystery could write an interesting book using this as the basis for the story.

With all the stories I've read and heard of Rube Waddell, that would be a very entertaining movie...

Denny McLain

hey shut it, 1968 was my best year ever

moe berg..satchell paige...hank geenberg.....billy milligan..

Posted by ArlenWilliam on 6/2/2015 9:19:00 PM (view original):
1. Honus Wagner, just because he was so naturally great, coming out of his mining family, and naturally colorful on the field giving it his all, and such a modestly good dude. Edit: Considering that in baseball's history shortstop is considered the most {important X challenging} field position to fill, he gets my vote for major league baseball's All-Time MVP.

2. Billy Sunday, because he gave it up for God's better choice for him, personally (and my Grammie accepted Jesus in one of his meetings). And because he was a cut-up."Going to church doesn't make you a Christian any more than going to a garage makes you an automobile."

Regarding your edited addition re: Wagner, I'd opine that since pitcher is the most difficult position period, Babe Ruth still wins any debate of All-Time MVP.

Hal Chase -- Read Bill James' section on him in the Historical Abstract.  Directed by Martin Scorsese.  

John McGraw -- From player to manager, lots of great stories.  Clint Eastwood?

Hugh Casey -- Beat up Ernest Hemingway in Cuba (read Billy Herman's wonderful account in "Baseball When the Grass was Real") and then beat Hemingway to the suicide-by-shotgun punch by 10 years.  Coen brothers.

Jose Canseco -- We'll let the Farrelly brothers direct this one.

I posted this in the league forum where you asked the same question, but I will repost here:

Larry Doby (no one talks about him, and yet really, didn't he face all the same pressures that Jackie did?)
Josh Gibson (no one talks about him, and when you do hear about him it's a bunch of unsupported stats and myths...he was obviously great...would love to see a factual portrayal of his story)
Sandy Koufax (the dominance, the era, the high-profile nature of his religion (famously not pitching G1 of the 1965 World Series because it fell on Yom Kippur, Roger Angell referring to him as the WMEJB), the early retirement)
Christy Mathewson (a brilliant man playing at a time when he must have felt a little out of his element, the relationship between him and McGraw would make for a fascinating story)
Rube Waddell (hat tip to juice for suggesting this above... Waddell would never make it to the major leagues today because of all of his issues)
Pete Gray (duh)
Ted Williams (the dominance, the crazy upbringing, the contentious relationship with fans/press, the famous feats, the war heroism, the fishing, being re-embraced by everyone in his later years, the scene of the players mobbing him in the 1999 All Star Game still brings me chills...in the hands of the right actor and director that could be brilliant)

Plus, Ted Williams had better movie star looks than most movie stars, like a cross between what... Keanu Reeves, James Garner, and John Wayne, or so. Who would play him? Reeves is getting more mature; he or Jon Hamm could do mature Ted.

Carl Yastrzemski - Greek Tragedy. 

Pete Rose - c'mon, you know you want to see it - "Wolf of Wall Street" meets "Indiana Jones".  Another Greek Tragedy.

The dark side of Stan Musial, directed by Stephen Spielberg - Okay, just kidding.

Grover Cleveland Alexander - a remake. Don't ask me why. 

Joe Pepitone, based on his excellent autobiography "Ya coulda made us proud"- "Wolf of Wall Street" meets "Wiseguys".


George Steinbrenner - for real. (I know, not a player).

And so far there is no movie about Joe Dimaggio, but c'mon, most famous person in the country on the cusp of WWII, marries Marilyn Monroe, becomes an old crank that is suspicious of everyone. 

This one could be a cross between "Indiana Jones" meets "Wiseguys" and turns into "What ever happened to Baby Jane?"  or even "All about Eve".