Although I usually love any kind of sports-related movie, I had serious reservations about watching The Benchwarmers. I’d read some terrible reviews about the film, and the whole premise of three grown men playing baseball against Little League teams seemed too preposterous even for a silly comedy. I wasn’t planning on watching this, but when my husband brought it home from the video store a few days ago, I decided to give it a try.
Plot summary (with possible spoilers): Gus (played by Rob Schneider), Richie (David Spade), and Clark (Jon Heder) are three friends who one day witness some kids getting picked on by a baseball team full of bullies. The not-so-cool kids were just trying to have some fun on the public baseball field, but the bullies kicked them out. Gus didn’t think that was fair, so he stepped in to help.
The bullies wouldn’t listen to him, though, so he decided to challenge them. He, Richie, and Clark would play the bullies for the right to stay on the field. One look at the obviously uncoordinated Richie and Clark was enough to get the bullies to agree to the deal.
Gus turned out to be good enough to carry the team, belting home runs over the fence every time he stepped up to the plate and striking out nearly every batter he faced. Richie and Clark were predictably terrible, but thanks to Gus they end up winning.
The billionaire father of one of the not-so-cool kids hears about what happened, and comes up with a great idea. He will hold a tournament between all the local Little League teams and Gus’ team, with the winners getting to play in a state-of-the-art baseball stadium that he’s building.
The rest of the film then deals with the tournament and its typical sports movie outcome, with a few minor subplots along the way.
My Reaction: I love baseball, so I tried my best to like The Benchwarmers but it was damn near impossible for me to do so. I don’t understand how Gus’s team won even a single game, let alone made it all the way to the tournament finals. I mean, remember how they had to let Richie’s brother play in the end when the bases were loaded? If they didn’t send a batter to the plate it would have been an automatic out or whatever. Well, why weren’t other teams doing that all along? They could have easily walked Gus, Richie, and Clark intentionally to start getting automatic outs.
Better yet, other teams could have just walked Gus intentionally, and then pitched to Richie and Clark for two automatic outs. No pitcher in his right mind (not even a 12-year-old) would continue pitching to a guy that hits home runs every single time he steps up to the plate. Hell, they do it in the Majors to Barry Bonds, so why not in these games? Oh, that’s right: because there wouldn’t be a movie if this happened.
I didn’t really like anything about this film, and thought Richie was a particularly annoying character. Does Jon Heder have any range at all as an actor? He seemed like he was playing a mentally handicapped version of Napoleon Dynamite. Can he doe anything else? Why did his character have to wear a bicycle helmet the whole time? Was he really supposed to be handicapped??
Overall, I can’t imagine how anyone over the age of 12 would find either the jokes or the plot entertaining. As a result, I give The Benchwarmers just 3.0 stars out of 10 and recommend that you skip it.