The New Ball Game - Overview 1

A passionate fan of minor-league baseball explores the impact of a team on the life and personality of several North American towns. Along the way, he meets a giant taco, a pig that takes baseballs to home plate and a base-running toilet.

This bittersweet story looks at a threat to a slice of small-town Americana that's fast going the way of soda fountains and drive-in movies. It includes comments from baseball greats Paul Molitor and Dave Stewart and announcer Bob Uecker.

As much as sports pervades a community's life, how much do we know about what it means to have a team? How do we tie our identities as individuals and as communities to its fortunes? What does it contribute to the economy? To our image? To our self-image?

Four Midwestern states, along with Texas and northern Mexico, figure strongly in this one-hour documentary, a co-production of Steve Holmes Productions and Iowa Public Television. National broadcasts began in August 2002.

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The significance of our story goes well beyond baseball. Towns and fans are fighting to keep teams that have been a strong part of their identity — for more than a hundred years in some cases. The entire population of Burlington, Iowa, the smallest market to have a full-season pro team, would fit into Yankee Stadium — twice. Yet major leaguers like Greg Maddux, Paul Molitor and Billy Williams learned their trade on Burlington's Community Field. But the "brain drain" and farm troubles that have shaken towns like Burlington have sapped the resources needed to support future teams.

Our first-person story unfolds through the eyes of an ardent, bush-league baseball fan — Steve Holmes, the project's producer — on a road trip to ballparks in the region.

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On a humid summer evening, the dusk hangs forever in the Iowa sky. From the

ballpark in Waterloo, a left-field home run lands on the Illinois Central railroad tracks. Between games of a double-header, a young boy passes the time on the bench next to a Waterloo player not much older than he.

The minors feel purer than the big leagues, a throwback to what we can imagine the major leagues once were. More innocent. Less formal. Only in the minors could a club owner plan an event called Vasectomy Night. Only in the "bushes" would a player be traded for ten pounds of catfish — and then pitch a perfect game for his new team.

Scenes from the show: In a modest apartment, three young hopefuls watch Mark McGwire's historic 61st home run... At a slow point in one game, bullpen pitchers set a fire to ward off mosquitoes... A pitcher, whose career is threatened by injuries, lives with his wife in a fan's spare bedroom; to save money, the young couple clip grocery coupons and chow down on macaroni and cheese and canned chili...

These players would rather be somewhere else. They're paid only $850 per month. Most of them must find other jobs during the off-season. Of all the hopefuls who sign a pro contract, only a handful ever put on big-league uniforms — even for one game.

Off the diamond, competition for the right to field a team has turned just as fierce.

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