In the movie "Penalty Shootouts become Gold", we see the magic that data brings to modern baseball. However, old-school fans are still carrying on the glory of baseball's past. The video we are going to share today is how a traditional stubborn old scout and his daughter work together to solve the "curve problem" in their lives.
Atlanta Warriors' veteran scout Gus (Played by Clint Eastwood) has been with the club for many years, and her daughter Mickey (Amy Adams) is an excellent lawyer who is expected to become a partner in a law firm and has reached the peak of her career.
His wife died early, leaving Gus alone to raise his daughter. However, Gus, who concentrated on scouting, needed a lot of time to scout players across the country, resulting in the lack of father role in Mickey's growth. It also created a deep estrangement between the father and daughter, and baseball became the only topic between them.
Near the draft day, the team sent Ges to carolina to visit Jane Deli, a potential high school student who attracted national attention. The team's data department highly recommends the player, and the team's general manager is also very optimistic, and the purpose of the team's Paiges is actually to take the player before other teams.
Elderly Gus also has a big problem with his eyes, and the uneasy boss and friend Pete finds Mickey, hoping that she can temporarily put aside her busy green work and accompany Gus to the Carolinas to take care of her father's life.
Hesitant, Mickey still decides to go to the competition to take care of her father, and the stubborn and uncommunicable Gus refuses to be cared for by her daughter, hoping that she will return to Atlanta to do a good job as a lawyer. Mickey, who has a strong and independent personality, also inherits her father's stubborn personality and resolutely stays behind to help Gus.
The father and daughter came to the baseball field to inspect the players, where they met Johnny (played by Justin Timberlake), a player that Gus had signed, who could once throw a hundred speedballs, retired early due to an arm injury and became a Scout for the Red Sox.
During the day to accompany Gus on the court to observe the players, at night back to the hotel to busy with the lawyer work Mickey, every day is full load, the pressure of work and the conflict with her father, so that Mickey physically and mentally exhausted. Johnny's appearance to some extent to alleviate this pressure, since childhood to work with her father Mickey is also a veteran baseball fan, and Johnny naturally have a common topic, the two gradually developed a mutual love for each other.
As the high school league game progressed, Gus's star player Jandry on this trip also played better and better, with a lot of physique than his peers, wielding a baseball full of strength, killing all sides on the court, and even blasting a goodbye home run in the final to win the championship for the team.
However, Gus saw Janedley's fatal flaw, and when Janedley swung the stick in the face of a curved ball, Gus asked Mickey in the stands to go to the third base to observe his swing, and Mickey found that Janedley's blows were almost perfect, but his hands were slightly displaced during the swing of the ball when facing the changing ball.
Even though the home run in the final was a curved ball, Gus still judged that the player was unstable, relying on a more advanced physique than his peers to carry out the home run with brute force, and the unstable grip of the stick would make the player unable to adapt to the professional-level pitch. Gus told Johnny of his observations and told him not to pick the player in the first pick, and his team would not choose him.
On league draft day, the Red Sox, who had a pick, followed Johnny's advice and did not select Jane Deli. At this time, Atlanta was full of cheers, and under the repeated insistence of the data department, the general manager decided to abandon Gus's suggestion, believed in the magic of data, and chose Jane Deli.
An enraged Johnny drives to the hotel where his father and daughter are staying, berating Gus for his betrayal and risking his hard-won job. Despite Mickey's attempts to explain, Johnny couldn't believe them, and Mickey, who had struggled to feel affection for others, could only watch from a distance as he drove away angrily.
Extremely disappointed in the team, Gus left the hotel alone the next morning, ready to return to the team to finish his job. Meanwhile, Mickey's colleagues took advantage of her absence to snatch the case Mickey was working on from her partner. The sudden departure of her father, the misunderstanding of her boyfriend, and the unhappiness of her job make Mickey, who remains in the hotel, feel sad alone. She never liked to be a lawyer, and her happiest time was wandering the country with her father to scout players at baseball stadiums, eat junk food, and stay in cheap motels.
Just as she was walking near the hotel, she suddenly saw Sanchez, the son of the lady of the innkeeper, practicing pitching on the grass. Sanchez was a classmate of Jandry's, and due to his mother's objections, he did not join the team and had to practice secretly on his own. Sanchez's four-slit straight ball was full of energy, and the trajectory of the curved ball was very tricky, and Mickey took the initiative to ask herself to act as a catcher and feel Sanchez's pitch. The feel and sound of baseball thrown into her gloves reinforced her conviction that Sanchez was a talented pitcher with great potential.
As the saying goes, "There's nowhere to go, it takes no effort at all," the potential pitcher that my father desires is standing in front of Mickey, who decides to take Sanchez back to the team with her.
At this time, the team was holding its first training session and Jane Deli was practicing blows on the pitch. Mickey calls her father to the court with the team to have Sanchez and Jandry do a shooting exercise to try to prove his father's judgment of Jandley.
Sure enough, Jandry not only could not hit Sanchez's fast ball, but also could not touch Sanchez's curved ball when he knew the opponent's ball, and the problem of the strike form was exposed and ugly.
There is no doubt that father and daughter have won both. The results of personal observation with eyes and ears defeated data analysis, Gus regained the trust of her boss, and Mickey's excellent vision allowed her to get her father's affirmation and invitation to the ball. At this time, Johnny, who had calmed his anger, also found Mickey to apologize to her, and the two embraced and kissed each other, regaining their trust.
The film ends here, but the power of baseball is still given to every baseball fan off-screen. We will encounter such "curve problems" in life to a greater or lesser extent, but baseball can reunite family ties with each other, and it can also be passed down as the best family totem. Baseball is not only a great sport, but also a place of mutual affection.
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