7 Best Baseball Movies on Netflix, Max, Peacock, etc.

7 Best Baseball Movies on Netflix, Max, Peacock, etc.

As summer turns to fall, the baseball season enters the homestretch for the playoffs and the World Series. The NFL may have replaced the NFL when it comes to American entertainment, but in the world of sports movies, baseball movies are highly regarded.

For your information, we've also compiled a list of the best football movies for you sports junkies. However, the films on that list are all great, and it's hard to find a film that I can recommend more than my own pick of the best baseball films, which is no surprise since I chose them myself. Somehow, baseball movies are simply better made, and frankly, there are some great films that I had to leave off this list.

So, whether you like to go to baseball games or simply enjoy watching great sports movies, here is a list of baseball movies you can watch right now.

You may not cry over baseball, but you will shed tears of laughter after watching A League of Their Own. The film tells the (mostly) true story of the National Women's Professional Baseball League, which was founded during World War II. In particular, it focuses on Rockford Peach, one of the league's founding members. Although the National Women's Professional Baseball League was short-lived, the film lives on as one of the greatest sports films of all time. A stellar cast of actresses play members of the Peaches, including Geena Davis as [Dorothy "Dottie"] Hinson, Madonna as "All the Way" Mae Moldavito, Lori Petty as Kit Keller, and Rosie O'Donnell as Doris Murphy. Also excellent is Tom Hanks as director Jimmy Dugan. The film also inspired a short-lived but well-received Amazon Prime Video television show, which unfortunately went off the air too soon.

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Prior to Field of Dreams, Costner played Lawrence "Crash" Davis in Bull Durham. In "Bull Durham," Davis, a career pitcher, is sent to the Durham Bulls, a minor league baseball team, to fix the pitching of rookie Ebby Calvin "Nook" LaRouche (Tim Robbins).

But while "Bull Durham" is a fun baseball movie that does a good job of portraying the sport, it is also much more than that. The love triangle between Crash, Nuke, and "baseball groupie" Annie Savoy, played by Susan Sarandon, is what makes "Bull Durham" special. In addition, young Kevin Costner shows in full what made him such a box-office star.

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No list of the best baseball movies would be complete without "Field of Dreams. If "Bull Durham" is arguably more of a romantic comedy than a baseball movie, "Field of Dreams" has no such caveats. What the film does have, however, are some memorable scenes and quotes, including the iconic "If you build it, he will come."

Unlike "Bull Durham," Kevin Costner does not play a professional in "Field of Dreams." Instead, he plays Ray Kinsella, an Iowa farmer who regrets that his relationship with his baseball-loving father did not work out. One night he hears the now-famous words "If you build it, he will come" in his head, and from there the film turns into a sentimental fantasy about the glory and importance of baseball. Field of Dreams is not as scrappy as the other baseball films on this list and is much more serious than Bull Durham, but it is one of the quintessential baseball films, with a great performance by Costner.

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"Major League" is essentially based on the same premise as "Ted Roth." The film focuses on the beleaguered Cleveland Indians (now the Cleveland Guardians) and their new owner, Rachel Phelps (Margaret Whittington), who tries to get the team to move to Miami. To do so, she assembles a team of losers, delinquents, and in the case of pitcher Ricky Vaughn (Charlie Sheen), actual ex-cons.

But unlike Rebecca Welton, played by Hannah Wadham, who comes to heart and ultimately believe in Ted, Phelps does not warm to the gang of losers. Instead, despite her efforts, they are forced to do everything in their power to win. In addition to Whittington and Sheen, "Major League" also stars Tom Berenger as catcher Jake Taylor and Wesley Snipes as middle infielder Willie Mays Hayes, and is a laugh riot from start to finish. If you're looking for extended laughs, this is the film for you.

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For Oakland A's fans, Moneyball is a bittersweet reminder of when the team succeeded despite poor ownership. But for the rest of us, it is the story of how one team changed the game of baseball. Based on Michael Lewis' book of the same name, Moneyball is the story of how A's general manager Billy Beane (Brad Pitt) transformed the A's from a team that no one believed could afford a competitive roster to a team that changed the way all major league teams evaluate talent The film dramatically describes how the team was transformed into a team.

"Moneyball" may occasionally get things wrong. It specifically omits the "Big Three" of Tim Hudson, Mark Mulder, and Barry Zito standing on the mound alongside other all-star caliber players such as Eric Chavez and Miguel Tejada. But once you start watching, even the most orthodox baseball fan will put that to the side. Pitt's performance as Beane is excellent, and Jonah Hill's Peter Brand is partially modeled after Beane's actual assistant, Paul DePodesta. Both Pitt and Hill were nominated for Academy Awards and were also nominated for Best Picture.

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Unlike Moneyball, The Natural is essentially a complete fiction. Roy Hobbs, played by Robert Redford, may claim in the film that he could be the greatest baseball player of all time, but in reality there was no Hobbs. Like "Moneyball," however, "The Natural" received critical acclaim and an Academy Award when it debuted in 1984. [The film features an all-star acting cast, including Robert Duvall, Glenn Close, and Kim Basinger, but it is the sets and score that define the film. Even if you've never seen "The Natural," you've probably seen the climactic scene or a reference to Hob's bat "Wonder Boy" somewhere in pop culture. But I urge you to see the real thing.

See it on Starz

Go to any major league ballpark in America and you will see the number 42. That is because Jackie Robinson was so important not only to the history of baseball, but to the history of the United States that his number has been retired by every team in the league. The only time we will see a baseball player with the number 42 now is on April 15, when the league will honor Robinson's historic achievement of becoming the first black baseball player in Major League Baseball.

But "42" is not about Robinson's lasting legacy; it is the story of how he came to reach such a pivotal moment. And the late Chadwick Boseman is perfectly cast as Robinson, along with Harrison Ford as Brooklyn Dodgers general manager Branch Rickey. "42" is worth watching for its historical significance alone, but Boseman's and Ford's performances, It will go down on the list of the greatest baseball films of all time.

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