I’ve loved movies about sports ever since I saw Rocky when I was a kid. So I’m naturally interested in any new sports movie coming up. But I’m not so sure about this one.
Deadline is reporting that Mad Men‘s Jon Hamm will star as real-life sports agent J.B. Bernstein, who introduced Rinku Singh and Dinesh Patel , the first Indian-born baseball players to play professionally in America. Bernstein discovered the pair on the Indian reality show The Million Dollar Arm, which Singh won and Patel was the runner-up. The two had very little knowledge of the sport and both came from modest beginnings. The project is set up at Sony and is appropriately titled Million Dollar Arm.
Here’s my issue: as unlikely of a story Rinku Singh and Dinesh Patel had — especially since they were the first Indians to ever play professional baseball in America — their lack of training was readily apparent. As of 2012, neither player has reached the majors and haven’t been top performers in the minor leagues, with Patel apparently already out of baseball entirely. While I know Rocky didn’t win at the end of his first movie and neither did Billy Bean in Moneyball, they at least had a benchmark of success to applaud. These guys… not so much. Yeah, I know it’s all about “the journey” and all that feel-good stuff.
I’m getting a “hey, let’s do another Slumdog Millionaire!” type of vibe here. I like Hamm, so hopefully this will be a lot better than I think it will be!
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