A Baseball Movie - Starring Vince Vaughn as Mike Redmond and Justin Timberlake as Giancarlo Stanton

A MLB Film Productions movie
in association with Deathly Squirrel Productions
A film by Keisuke Hoashi

Title: "THE ARMCHAIR MANAGER"

FADE IN

INT. VISITING LOCKER ROOM, CITI FIELD

30 minutes after the Mets' walk-off, 4-3 win against the Marlins, April 7, 2013.

A JANITOR (extra #1) sweeps up in the foreground; two MARLINS PLAYERS (extras #2 and #3), now in their street clothes, give subdued "good byes" to the MANAGER (Mike Redmond, played by Vince Vaughn, VV) as they exit the clubhouse. Marlins slugger Giancarlo Stanton (played by Justin Timberlake, JT) hides in the trainer's room, wearing nothing but a towel.

JT: (whispering) You can do this, you can do this ...

The Janitor exits the room and shuts off the lights, leaving the manager's office the only bubble of light in the room. Giancarlo steels himself and enters the office just before Redmond leaves.

JT: Hey skip, got a minute?
VV: Giancarlo. I'm just about to leave. Got dinner plans.
JT: Why did you play the infield in?
VV: What?
JT:With one out, runners on second and third, bottom of the ninth with a one-run lead, why did you play the infield in?
VV: We had to cut off the run at the plate. Now if you'll excuse me ...
JT: (blocking the door) The percentages don't add up, skip.
VV: Don't tell me how to do my job, kid.
JT: The percentage play is to walk the bases loaded to set up a force at every base, and to play for the ground ball double play. Cutting the run off at the plate doesn't make any sense in that situation! What you did didn't even play for a tie game, trading a run for an out, and a chance to go into extra innings! What gives, skip? What gives?

(REDMOND doesn't say anything. GIANCARLO's eyes widen in sudden realization.)

JT (con't): Oh my god. You were playing to LOSE, weren't you? You were playing to LOSE! My god! Why, skip? Why?
VV: You've got your whole career in front of you, kid. Hell, you've got your whole life. Me? All I've got is this. And to keep it, I always do as I'm told. Okay? What I'm told.

(REDMOND shoves past GIANCARLO. Intense music begins. Camera cuts to REDMOND's back walking through the dark locker room. Cut to GIANCARLO's face as he intently considers the implications of what his manager has both told him, and NOT told him. )

JT: Oh my God.

COMING TO A THEATRE NEAR YOU HOPEFULLY NEVER.

And that's a cut!

Voting the Oscars with My Heart - Unsafe, Unstandard, and Politically Incorrect

Here is my totally cynical prediction of the films that will win Oscars this year.  This has nothing to do with what I personally feel about any of the categories, but they are all the safe, standard, politically correct predictions that are entirely based on the past behavior of The Academy as the guardian of all that is safe, standard, and politically correct:

• Best Picture: Lincoln (yawn)
• Best Actor: Daniel Day Lewis (pretty good)
• Best Actress: Jessica Chastain (she’s pretty good too)
• Best Supporting Actor: Robert Deniro (was he acting?)
• Best Supporting Actress: Sally Field (can i take out my earplugs yet?)
• Best Animated Film: Brave (because Disney would otherwise kill everyone)
Best Director: Ang Lee (everyone loves animals)

Here now is the list of films and people that, in my opinion, actually deserve to win. Please note that they include films and actors that have been totally ignored by the Academy in favor of making safe, standard, politically correct choices.

This is based entirely on my unimportant, uninfluential, totally biased, cynical, naive positions.

Because these actors, actresses, and films made me FEEL things, to fall in love with the characters, the stories, the situations, even the locations.

They triggered my love of film, moviemaking, entertainment, even the nerd within me who know exactly how every special effect was rendered, how every shot was lit, how every cinematographer composed every frame.

I feel awards belong to those who truly earned the honors, and as my former acting teacher Drew taught me, I love seeing some kind of *truth* emerge on the screen, a truth that makes me gloriously happy to be alive and to be watching that film.

And the real Oscar goes to:

• Best Picture: Pitch Perfect
• Best Actor: Dwight Henry, Beasts of the Southern Wild
• Best Actress: Quvenzhane Wallis, Beasts of the Southern Wild
• Best Supporting Actor: Christoph Waltz, Django
• Best Supporting Actress: Maggie Smith, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
• Best Animated Film: No award this year. It was that bad.
• Best Director: Benh Zeitlin, Beasts of the Southern Wild

And here are the nominations that are great … “for me to poop on.” (Thanks for everything, Triumph the Insult Comic Dog!)

• Argo, Best Picture. Are you kidding me? The story is wonderful, the film, geez, more dramatic stuff happens in an episode of “Star Trek: Enterprise.”
• Django Unchained, Best Picture. Comic books qualify for best picture? Someone call up Frank Miller.
• Bradley Cooper, Best Actor. WAAAHAHAHAHA. The last time I saw someone sleepwalk so sleepily through a role, it was in a galaxy far far away. Episode 1, 2, and 3.

Nationwide Boycott of Miami Marlins to Begin in 2013

MIAMI, FL -- The unofficial boycott of the Miami Marlins baseball club has become official. 

A new nonprofit group, the "Get those Goddamned Marlins the Hell Outta Florida Already Super Baseball Action Committee," has announced a worldwide campaign not only to have every home game in Marlins Stadium totally empty, but every game they play on the road as well.

This is viewed as a natural extension of the regular baseball boycott that has been going on in the Marlins home city of Miami ever since their inaugural season in 1993.

Precedent for this complete boycott of a ballteam was set by the Montreal Expos during their final seasons in Olympic Stadium. Despite having a capacity of 80,000 within its tomb-like confines, the team's attendance shrank every year until the team's management struck on the idea of counting the stadium's rat population in their official tallies. 

In addition, the 1979 New York Mets also experienced a near-total boycott, despite the mostly unsuccessful attempts at on-field heroics by Lee Mazzilli, the defacto team leader with a batting average of .021 and on base percentage of .019.

The Marlins management, led by Jeffrey Loria, has already announced measures to aid the efforts of the GTGMTHOFASBAC.  In a press release, Loria announced he will follow the lead of the CEOs of Papa John's Pizza and Applebee's restaurants, who earlier this week pretended that the imminent implementation of Obamacare will "force them to execute up to 98% of current employees in creative and gruesome ways."

"The Miami Marlins only require one ticket taker for the entire season," read the Loria/Marlins press release. "Additionally, all concession stands will be shut down, as we have determined that a single pushcart selling hot dogs and hot dog water will be sufficient for our fan's needs. Our fan's name is Fred."

Jason Bay Wins MLB LVP FTW

NOWHERE, NY, USA -- The Legion of Doom today presented their award for Least Valuable Player to former Mets left fielder Jason Bay.

Lex Luthor, Solomon Grundy, and the chick in some kind of skin-tight feline kiddie pajama costume presented the award to Bay in the muck-filled swamp just north of the former Shea Stadium. 

The sulphurous-smelling area conveniently is also where the League of Doom regularly sinks their vaguely Darth Vader-looking headquarters building, the Hall of Doom.

The ceremony was interrupted when Superman burst through the domed roof, ruining their new crown molding job, followed by Wonder Woman, the Green Lantern, Hawkman, and Zan (sans Jana and Gleek The Space Monkey, who were doing a mall opening in Secaucus). 

Bay attempted to defend the swiftly scattering Legion members by swinging his baseball bat, but was unable to hit even Wonder Woman's enormous ... bracelets.

"That's why he won the award, nyehhhhh heh heh heh heh heh," cackled Scarecrow before Zan accidentally set fire to his hat.

Mets Trade All Their Good Players

SIBERIA, NEW YORK -- Proving the absolute power of social media and online punditry, the New York Mets have announced they have traded all of their good players. 

"We finally bought into all the 'ya gotta trade 'em at the peak of their value' talk on the Internet," said Mets GM Sandy Alderson.  "Everybody with a Twitter account that watches Major League Baseball says the best time to trade a player is when they have had a career year.  We have accepted their collective wisdom and have discarded our old-fashioned thinking, which is, develop a player until they are good, keep them as long as you can, and build a team around those best players.

"So thank you, all you armchair GMs," continued Alderson as inspirational music swelled underneath. "Thank you, every talk radio freak. Thank you, you princes of fielders, you kings of queens, for your excellent advice on how to build and manage a ball club."

Reminiscent of the 1977 "Midnight Massacre" in which future Hall of Famer Tom Seaver was traded to Cincinnati for four slightly-warm minor league corpses, the following trades were completed this weekend:

• David Wright, third baseman and leader in every offensive category in Mets history, was traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers for the ghost of Wilbur Huckle, former teammate of Seaver on the Alaska Goldpanners in 1963.
• R.A. Dickey, starting pitcher and odds-on favorite for the 2012 Cy Young Award, was traded to the NY Yankees for cash considerations and bragging rights.
• Ike Davis, slugging first baseman who despite hitting .111 the first two months of 2012 recovered to lead the Mets in home runs, as well as continuing his reputation as a future Gold Glover, was traded to the Boston Red Sox for Bobby Valentine.  Valentine had been fired by the Red Sox earlier this offseason, but the Mets didn't remember this until after the trade had been finalized.

"Holy motherF&*^%%&(&*(&*^&^&&*(^ sh*()&*^&*^%$%$^&*," said Mets manager Terry Collins when he learned of the deals made.

Mets Announce New Lumberjack Draft Strategy

The New York Mets have officially announced their future draft strategy.

"From this day forward," said GM Sandy Alderson, "the Mets will only draft players who look like lumberjacks. I am not talking about the evil backwoodsmen who play banjos and are proud of having only two teeth, of which one is almost completely rotted out. No. Unless you are a high school or college ballplayer with the size and physique of Thor the Norse God of Thunder, or of Jack Reacher (made famous by author Lee Child), or have been known by your schoolmates by the nickname 'Paul Bunyan" or "Andre the Giant' since grade school, the Mets will take a pass on you."

The new strategy has been informally in place for two or three years. This season, with the emergence of right fielder Lucas Duda, who is roughly 6 feet 19 inches tall; Ike Davis, first baseman, appx 6 feet 14 inches; and now Kirk Neuhenwies, centerfield, coming in at 6 feet 18 inches, the Mets have shown their dedication to putting Giant Metahumans in their starting lineup.
"It's no disrespect to normal-sizers like David Wright or Greg Luzinski," said Mets manager Terry Collins, himself a diminutive 5 feet 8 inches, putting him in the category of Elfin Woodland Ballplayer in the new Mets depth chart. "But the big guys make the ground shake when they run. It makes the game more fun."
The National Association for Natural Humans has filed a lawsuit against the Mets for size discrimination, as has the American Association of Unaugmented Homo Sapiens. The ACLU considered joining the lawsuit but withdrew when a group of Titans appeared at their headquarters and threatened to stamp out "every puny human vermin."
"Now if you will excuse me," said Alderson, "I need to find appropriate sacrifices for the Old Ones located beneath the former Shea Stadium."

Jason Bay to be Publicly Humiliated by Mets

Mets left fielder Jason Bay was moved from his accustomed number 5 spot in the Mets lineup all the way down to the number 9 position in today's game against the Braves. Bay is now the most expensive position player in history to hit last in a professional major league lineup.

"I figured, what the hell," said Mets manager Terry Collins. "We tried being nice, we tried being mean, we tried psychology, tried threats, tried bribes with ice cream milkshakes from the Shake Shack, everything. But we hadn't tried openly humiliating him as a professional."

Collins went on to detail the progressive plan to shame Bay into shaking himself out of his now three-year batting funk.

1) Move Bay to the number-9 hole, behind the pitcher and even behind catcher and career .117 hitter Mike Nickeas
2) Require Bay to wear the pink Dora the Explorer backpack (normally assigned to the low man in the bullpen) for each at-bat
3) Have bat boy Billy Jones kick Bay in the rear end every time he makes an out
4) Post faked naked photographs of Bay performing inappropriate acts upon underage bunny rabbits on the official Mets Twitter feed
5) Require Bay to bat in only his spikes and underwear.

"We will give Jason every chance to feel really terrible about himself," said Sandy Alderson, Mets GM. "He's already irritated the heck out of the entire Mets fan base. I mean, yesterday I saw Jason with a fan who wanted an autograph. Jason took the shirt off his back, autographed it, called over David Wright with an autographed baseball, and then pulled out his wallet and gave all of that to the fan -- and the fan spit in his face. I mean, wow."

Fans are encouraged to submit additional humiliations via a special suggestion form that will be posted on the Mets official website.

"It sucks to have a player who sucks so hard," said Collins. "We're beyond 'tough love.' It's time for 'tough hatred.'"

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