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There’s exactly one amusing in-joke movie reference in this painfully sluggish attempt at mixing rag-tag sports comedy with slobs-vs.-institution campus comedy: Kate Vernon, daughter of John “Dean Wormer” Vernon, playing the antagonistic president of fictional Orem A&M University, who’s trying to shut down the once proud but now pathetic baseball program. But the smiles end right about there, as director/co-writer David Rountree sends smirking, wasting-his-talent catcher Frank Bender (Ryan Carlberg) and his fellow misfits—including a pitcher with cerebral palsy (Josh Blue)—against the Powers That Be in a movie that can’t even work up the energy to be raunchy. Instead, it’s just a parade of touchstones from other movies and TV shows—e.g. Larry “Soup Nazi” Thomas as an assistant coach, inspiring a “no soup for you” punch line—that somehow thinks it’s still a good idea to accompany the hijinks surrounding a Vietnamese recruit (Dat Phan) with the sound of a gong. Carlberg’s frat-boy insouciance offers some minor charms, but for a movie trying so hard to mate Animal House with Major League, it’s not fit to carry either of those movies’ jock strap.
Director: David Rountree
Producer: Jake Katofsky, David Rountree, J.P. Pierce and Jeff Katofsky
Cast: Josh Blue, Dat Phan, Erin Cahill, Larry Thomas, Bruce Davison, Kate Vernon, Ryan Carlberg, Roger Clemens, Allen Maldonado and Chris Moir
Producer: Jake Katofsky, David Rountree, J.P. Pierce and Jeff Katofsky
Cast: Josh Blue, Dat Phan, Erin Cahill, Larry Thomas, Bruce Davison, Kate Vernon, Ryan Carlberg, Roger Clemens, Allen Maldonado and Chris Moir
