HardballMovies like Hardball
- Key Features:
- Little League, Redemption, Underdog story, Urban setting, Gambling debt, Character development, Mentorship, Second chance, Teamwork, Friendship, Personal growth, Overcoming adversity, Responsibility, Sports, Coming-of-age
- Tone:
- serious, humorous, earnest
- Target Audience:
- Sports movie fans, Drama viewers, Inspirational stories, Character-driven narratives
- Emotional Arc:
- Apathy → Connection → Grief → Hope
Hardball

An aimless young man who is scalping tickets, gambling and drinking, agrees to coach a Little League team from the Cabrini Green housing project in Chicago as a condition of getting a loan from a friend.
Hardball
An aging, down-on-his-luck ex-minor leaguer coaches a team of misfits in an ultra-competitive California little league.

A pro ball player with a substance abuse problem is forced into rehab in his hometown, finding new hope when he gets honest about his checkered past, and takes on coaching duties for a misfit Little League team

When Rachel Phelps inherits the Cleveland Indians from her deceased husband, she's determined to move the team to a warmer climate—but only a losing season will make that possible, which should be easy given the misfits she's hired. Rachel is sure her dream will come true, but she underestimates their will to succeed.

Under the leadership of their counselor, teenagers at a juvenile detention center gain self-esteem by playing football together. Based on a true story.

A trio of guys try and make up for missed opportunities in childhood by forming a three-player baseball team to compete against standard little league squads.

An acclaimed college hoops coach is demoted to a junior varsity team after a public meltdown.

A comedy centered on a has-been coach who is given a shot at redemption when he's asked to run his local high school's girls basketball team

The story of Oakland Athletics general manager Billy Beane's successful attempt to put together a baseball team on a budget, by employing computer-generated analysis to draft his players.

When the owner of the Minnesota Twins passes away, he bequeaths the team to his preteen grandson. The newly minted head honcho quickly appoints himself manager, causing unrest in an organization that struggles to take orders from a 12-year-old.

When megalomaniacal White Goodman, the owner of a trendy, high-end fitness center, makes a move to take over the struggling local gym run by happy-go-lucky Pete La Fleur, there's only one way for La Fleur to fight back: dodgeball. Aided by a dodgeball guru and Goodman's attorney, La Fleur and his rag-tag team of underdogs launch a knock-down, drag-out battle in which the winner takes all.

After reckless young lawyer Gordon Bombay gets arrested for drunk driving, he must coach a kids hockey team for his community service. Gordon has experience on the ice, but isn't eager to return to hockey, a point hit home by his tense dealings with his own former coach, Jack Reilly. The reluctant Gordon eventually grows to appreciate his team, which includes promising young Charlie Conway, and leads them to take on Reilly's tough players.

An unemployed slacker inspires his softball teammates to improve their game to avoid getting kicked out of the local league.

Veteran catcher Crash Davis is brought to the minor league Durham Bulls to help their up and coming pitching prospect, "Nuke" Laloosh. Their relationship gets off to a rocky start and is further complicated when baseball groupie Annie Savoy sets her sights on the two men.

A stranger mentors a young Reno gambler who weds a hooker and befriends a vulgar casino regular.

A former basketball all-star, who has lost his wife and family foundation in a struggle with addiction, attempts to regain his soul and salvation by becoming the coach of a disparate ethnically mixed high school basketball team at his alma mater.

After losing in the ALCS the year before, the Cleveland Indians are determined to make it into the World Series this time! However, they first have to contend with Rachel Phelps again when she buys back the team.

After discovering a once-in-a-lifetime player with a rocky past abroad, a down on his luck basketball scout takes it upon himself to bring the phenom to the States without his team's approval. Against the odds, they have one final shot to prove they have what it takes to make it in the NBA.

A young girl and her coach overcome adversity to make their way into the National Australian Gymnastics Squad.

Jim Morris never made it out of the minor leagues before a shoulder injury ended his pitching career twelve years ago. Now a married-with-children high-school chemistry teacher and baseball coach in Texas, Jim's team makes a deal with him: if they win the district championship, Jim will try out with a major-league organization. The bet proves incentive enough for the team, and they go from worst to first, making it to state for the first time in the history of the school. Jim, forced to live up to his end of the deal, is nearly laughed off the try-out field--until he gets onto the mound, where he confounds the scouts (and himself) by clocking successive 98 mph fastballs, good enough for a minor-league contract with the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. Jim's still got a lot of pitches to throw before he makes it to The Show, but with his big-league dreams revived, there's no telling where he could go.

In search of a lifeline for his struggling off road racing team, a man takes on a young car thief looking for a second chance, but as their worlds collide, they must struggle to forge a successful alliance.

Morris Buttermaker is a burned-out minor league baseball player who loves to drink and can't keep his hands to himself. His long-suffering lawyer arranges for him to manage a local Little League team, and Buttermaker soon finds himself the head of a rag-tag group of misfit players. Through unconventional team-building exercises and his offbeat coaching style, Buttermaker helps his hapless Bears prepare to meet their rivals, the Yankees.

Two years after a Super Bowl win when NFL head coach Sean Payton is suspended, he goes back to his hometown and finds himself reconnecting with his 12-year-old son by coaching his Pop Warner football team.

An unknown middle-aged batter named Roy Hobbs with a mysterious past appears out of nowhere to take a losing 1930s baseball team to the top of the league.

High school track coach Molly McGrath knows just as much about football as anyone else on the planet. When a football coach's position becomes vacant, she applies for the job, despite snickers from fellow staff members and her former husband.

A stubborn and hotheaded minor league basketball coach is forced to train a Special Olympics team when he is sentenced to community service.

Based on a true story, a group of boys from Monterrey, Mexico who become the first non-U.S. team to win the Little League World Series.

Jaycen 'Two Js' Jennings is a washed-up former pro football star who has hit rock bottom. When sentenced to community service coaching the Underdoggs, an unruly pee-wee football team in his hometown, he sees it mostly as an opportunity to rebuild his public image. But in the process, he may just turn his life around and rediscover his love of the game.

Out-of-luck coach Lambeau Fields takes a rag-tag bunch of college misfits and drives them towards the football championships. In the process, this life-long loser discovers that he is a winner after all by redeeming himself, saving his relationship with his family and friends, and finding that there is indeed, no "I" in "team"!

Failed college coach Norman Dale gets a chance at redemption when he is hired to coach a high school basketball team in a tiny Indiana town. After a teacher persuades star player Jimmy Chitwood to quit and focus on his long-neglected studies, Dale struggles to develop a winning team in the face of community criticism for his temper and his unconventional choice of assistant coach: Shooter, a notorious alcoholic.

When Danny O'Shea's daughter is cut from the Peewee football team just for being a girl, he decides to form his own team, composed of other ragtag players who were also cut. Can his team really learn enough to beat the elite team, coached by his brother, a former pro player?

Roger is a foster child whose irresponsible father promises to get his act together when Roger's favourite baseball team, the California Angels, wins the pennant. The problem is that the Angels are in last place, so Roger prays for help to turn the team around. Sure enough, his prayers are answered in the form of angel Al.

A track coach in a small California town transforms a team of athletes into championship contenders.

Two losers from Milwaukee, Coop and Remer, invent a new game combining basketball with the rules of baseball. When the game becomes a huge success, they, along with a billionaire's help, form the Professional Baseketball League where everyone gets the same pay and no team can change cities. When a rival owner wants to institute major rule changes, Coop and Remer's team is the only one standing in the way.

Contemporary Russia. After he flubs a penalty kick, a humiliated national soccer player quits the game. He flees to a small town, where he decides to coach their local team.

12-year-old Henry Rowengartner, whose late father was a minor league baseball player, grew up dreaming of playing baseball, despite his physical shortcomings. After Henry's arm is broken while trying to catch a baseball at school, the tendon in that arm heals too tightly, allowing Henry to throw pitches that are as fast as 103 mph. Henry is spotted at nearby Wrigley Field by Larry "Fish" Fisher, the general manager of the struggling Chicago Cubs, after Henry throws an opponent's home-run ball all the way from the outfield bleachers back to the catcher, and it seems that Henry may be the pitcher that team owner Bob Carson has been praying for.

A baseball legend almost finished with his distinguished career at the age of forty has one last chance to prove who he is, what he is capable of, and win the heart of the woman he has loved for the past four years.

The story of Rickey Hill, who overcomes his physical disability and repairs his relationship with his father in a quest to become a major league baseball (MLB) player.

Outsider and new kid Matthew desperately wants to join his high school's boxing team, but resident bully and boxing champion Hector stands in his way. Facing constant torment, Matthew finds an unlikely ally in Dan, the school's janitor and one-time amateur boxer. Together, they train for the biggest boxing match of Matthew's life and discover what it truly means to be a winner.

Slowed by age and failing eyesight, crack baseball scout Gus Lobel takes his grown daughter along as he checks out the final prospect of his career. Along the way, the two renew their bond, and she catches the eye of a young player-turned-scout.

A once-great basketball coach is on a journey back to victory by reuniting his former high school championship basketball team, but this time, he’s challenging them to play like girls.

Racing legend Sonny Hayes is coaxed out of retirement to lead a struggling Formula 1 team—and mentor a young hotshot driver—while chasing one more chance at glory.

Maverick old-guard coach Jimmy McGinty is hired in the wake of a players' strike to help the Washington Sentinels advance to the playoffs. But that impossible dream hinges on whether his replacements can hunker down and do the job. So, McGinty dusts off his secret dossier of ex-players who never got a chance (or screwed up the one they were given) and knits together a bad-dream team of guys who just may give the Sentinels their title shot.

A former college athlete joins forces with a sports consultant to handicap football games for high-rolling gamblers.

As an ex-gambler teaches a hot-shot college kid some things about playing cards, he finds himself pulled into the world series of poker, where his protégé is his toughest competition.

A basketball player's father must try to convince him to go to a college so he can get a shorter prison sentence.

Bomber is an unemployed boat captain. One day he meets Jerry, a manager of boxers who are struck by the force of his fists. That is when they see the chance to win big money.

After failing to make it on Broadway, April returns to her hometown and reluctantly begins training a misfit group of young dancers for a competition.

In the 1980s, a drummer is abandoned by his band just before they become rock superstars. Twenty years later, the drummer sees his second chance at stardom arise when he is asked to perform with his teenage nephew's high school rock band.

At the behest of Roger Dorn -- the Minnesota Twins' silver-tongued new owner -- washed-up minor league hurler Gus Cantrell steps up to the plate to take over as skipper of the club's hapless farm team. But little does he know that Dorn has an ulterior motive to generate publicity with a grudge match between the big leaguers and their ragtag Triple A affiliate.

A successful professional baseball player gets his ego in check when he travels back in time to his boyhood sandlot ball-playing days.

A small, turbulent town in Texas obsesses over their high school football team to an unhealthy degree. When the star tailback, Boobie Miles, is seriously injured during the first game of the season, all hope is lost, and the town's dormant social problems begin to flare up. It is left to the inspiring abilities of new coach Gary Gaines to instill in the other team members -- and, by proxy, the town itself -- a sense of self-respect and honor.

Jack Cooper could be a world-class baseball pitcher if he didn't keep buckling under the pressure. He tries to keep his spirits up after he's traded to a minor league team but loses all hope when he discovers that Ed, one of his teammates, is a chimp. Ed used to be the team mascot, but was promoted to third base when the owners realized he had a talent for baseball. As Jack struggles to get used to his new surroundings, Ed helps him regain his confidence on and off the field.

A former footballer living in Brittany enlists his old teammates to help the local fisherman to win some games in order to raise money and save jobs.

During a summer of friendship and adventure, one boy becomes a part of the gang, nine boys become a team and their leader becomes a legend by confronting the terrifying mystery beyond the right field wall.

A high-school gym teacher has big plans for the summer, but is forced to cancel them to teach a "bonehead" English class for misfit goof-off students. Fortunately, his unconventional brand of teaching fun field trips begins to connect with them, and even inspires ardor in some.

Based on a true story from 1998, five Latino and Black teenagers from the toughest underserved ghetto in Miami fight their way into the National Chess Championship under the guidance of their unconventional but inspirational teacher.

Doug Glatt, a slacker who discovers he has a talent for brawling, is approached by a minor league hockey coach and invited to join the team as the "muscle." Despite the fact that Glatt can't skate, his best friend, Pat, convinces him to give it a shot, and Glatt becomes a hero to the team and their fans, until the league's reigning goon becomes threatened by Glatt's success and decides to even the score.

Aging baseball star who goes by the nickname, Mr. 3000, finds out many years after retirement that he didn't quite reach 3,000 hits. Now at age 47 he's back to try and reach that goal.

Haunted by his mysterious past, a devoted high school football coach leads a scrawny team of orphans to the state championship during the Great Depression and inspires a broken nation along the way.

A former high-school football star loses his shot at a college scholarship due to a devastating gridiron injury, but gets a second chance at living his dream.

As Maddy takes on coaching a team of young twelve-year-old gymnasts, she faces up to intense city versus country rivalry, racism, cyberbullying and her own self-doubt but eventually takes the challenge head on.

Blackball follows the fortunes of Cliff Starkey, a working-class fine of lawn bowls with an exceptional talent. Wanting to take on the Aussies he manages to become regional champion, only to get banned. Sports agent Rich Schwartz picks him up and makes him so popular the Bowls Committee deem to lift the ban. Now the question is whether he can regain his form and his friends to beat the Aussies.

After bowler Roy Munson swindles the wrong crowd and is left with a hook for a hand, he settles into impoverished obscurity. That is, until he uncovers the next big thing: an Amish kid named Ishmael. So, the corrupt and the hopelessly naive hit the circuit intent on settling an old score with Big Ern.

Disgraced ex-England football captain, Danny 'Mean Machine' Meehan, is thrown in jail for assaulting two police officers. He keeps his head down and has the opportunity to forget everything and change the lives of the prisoners. When these prisoners have the chance to put one over the evil guards during a prison football match, Danny takes the lead.

A gambling addict faces a conflict when entrusted with keeping a bunch of money that isn't his.

Ray Kinsella is an Iowa farmer who hears a mysterious voice telling him to turn his cornfield into a baseball diamond. He does, but the voice's directions don't stop -- even after the spirits of deceased ballplayers turn up to play.

Tripper is the head counselor at a budget summer camp called Camp Northstar. In truth, he's young at heart and only marginally more mature than the campers themselves. Tripper befriends Rudy, a loner camper who has trouble fitting in. As Tripper inspires his young charges to defeat rival Camp Mohawk in the annual Olympiad competition, Rudy plays matchmaker between Tripper and Roxanne, a female counselor at Northstar.

Eric, a highly-gifted golfer but radically-undisciplined college undergrad, finds his world drastically altered after losing a golf bet to a pair of sadistic plastic surgeons. Eric's bad-boy attitude lifestyle comes to a screeching halt as he loses his money, his girlfriend, his dignity and his golf swing. Eric and his best friend Tyler decide to take on the doctors, in a final golf match of "Best-Ball" to get his life back and become the man he should have been all along.

A losing coach with an underdog football team faces their giants of fear and failure on and off the field to surprising results.

Michael Chapman, a former child TV star, runs a struggling talent agency specilizing in child acts. When a young girl off the street puts on a real performance after he catches her picking his pocket, he may have just found the next big thing.

After Gordon Bombay's hockey comeback is cut short he is named coach of Team USA Hockey for the Junior Goodwill Games. Bombay reunites the Mighty Ducks and introduces a few new players, however, he finds himself distracted by his newfound fame and must regather if the Ducks are to defeat tournament favourites Iceland.

Approaching forty, Ferro is unsatisfied with his life as a construction worker and part-time boxing instructor in Los Angeles, CA. After a successful bout with a young pro boxer, Ferro decides to don the gloves one last time. The movie recounts his unlikely quest for Olympic gold.

The dramatic comedy is based on the true story of writer and pinball wizard Roger Sharpe, chronicling his journey to overturn New York City’s 35-year ban on pinball.

Alex Pearson has a lot to learn about teamwork. As the star of the Lemon Oaks hockey team, Alex almost always has his way on and off the ice. That is until he pulls a stunt so outrageous not even his own coach can give him a pass. His punishment? Suspension from the team, a never-ending list of chores and a job watching his little sister Emily after school.

The true story of Jasmine Plummer who, at the age of eleven, became the first female to play in Pop Warner football tournament in its 56-year history.

After ex-con Joe Braxton violates his probation, he is given a second chance. All he has to do is drive a group of special kids across the country.

A boy begins a grand journey to return Babe Ruth's baseball bat before the deciding game of the 1932 World Series comes to a close.

Three converging story lines involving bootleggers, a serial killer and drug dealers are followed. A former drug dealer tries to go straight, but comes across a stash of stolen drugs. Meanwhile, a middle-aged suburban housewife hides a sadistic and vicious streak.

After reluctantly agreeing to coach cross-country, high school basketball Coach John Harrison helps the least likely runner attempt the impossible in the biggest race of the year.

A high school basketball player’s life turns upside down after free-falling into the harrowing world of drug addiction.

With hard work and dedication on lock, a group of homeless men trains to compete in a global tournament — despite a cranky coach.

A retired pool hustler is forced to pick up the stick again when his brother starts a game he can't finish.

Sadoun is France’s best soccer player whose extra-curriculum pleasures are damaging his play and new contract negotiations. Dispatched by his scheming agent to his home village, he ends up reconciling with his father, relating to his fatherless niece, who dotes on him, and training his local children’s team, whom he takes to championship glory.

A down-on-his-luck coach is hired to prepare a team of the best American dancers for an international tournament that attracts all the best crews from around the world, but the Americans haven't won in fifteen years.

Charlie Kenton is a washed-up fighter who retired from the ring when robots took over the sport. After his robot is trashed, he reluctantly teams up with his estranged son to rebuild and train an unlikely contender.

Based on a true story, in which Richmond High School head basketball coach Ken Carter made headlines in 1999 for benching his undefeated team due to poor academic results.

A disgraced basketball coach is given the chance to coach Los Amigos, a team of players who are intellectually disabled, and soon realizes they just might have what it takes to make it to the national championships.

Max Chêne is a life coach who helps to motivate everybody from professional athletes to government ministers to business executives. After his gambling debts get out of control and his wife throws him out, he is approached to take on a unique client.

Hotshot real estate salesman Daryl has a bad cocaine habit. After embezzling his company's money, he wakes up next to a girl who overdosed. To hide from the police, he checks into a rehabilitation program guaranteeing anonymity. Under the mentorship of counselor Craig, Daryl accepts that he has a substance abuse problem. As he falls in love with fellow patient Charlie, Daryl begins committing to a newly sober life.

Andy, at the urging of his former mentor and Magic Camp owner Roy Preston, returns to the camp of his youth hoping to reignite his career. Instead, he finds inspiration in his ragtag bunch of rookie magicians.

At the NFL Draft, general manager Sonny Weaver has the opportunity to rebuild his team when he trades for the number one pick. He must decide what he's willing to sacrifice on a life-changing day for a few hundred young men with NFL dreams.

Mick O'Brien is a young Chicago street thug torn between a life of petty crime and the love of his girlfriend. But when the heist of a local drug dealer goes tragically wrong Mick is sentenced to a brutal juvenile prison where violence is a rite of passage and respect is measured in vengeance.

After 12 years in prison, former high school football star Eddie Palmer returns home to put his life back together—and forms an unlikely bond with Sam, an outcast boy from a troubled home. But Eddie's past threatens to ruin his new life and family.

The former World Heavyweight Champion Rocky Balboa serves as a trainer and mentor to Adonis Johnson, the son of his late friend and former rival Apollo Creed.

Two salesmen trash a company truck on an energy drink-fueled bender. Upon their arrest, the court gives them a choice: do hard time or spend 150 service hours with a mentorship program. After one day with the kids, however, jail doesn't look half bad.

After thirty years teaching in London, Mark Thackeray retires and returns to Chicago. There, however, the challenge of teaching kids in an inner city school proves to be too much to resist.

A former sports star who's fallen on hard times starts coaching his son's soccer team in an attempt to get his life together.

Since 1912, baseball has been a game obsessed with statistics and speed. Thrown at upwards of 100 miles per hour, a fastball moves too quickly for human cognition and accelerates into the realm of intuition. Fastball is a look at how the game at its highest levels of achievement transcends logic and even skill, becoming the primal struggle for man to control the uncontrollable.

Buck Weaver and Hap Felsch are young idealistic players on the Chicago White Sox, a pennant-winning team owned by Charles Comiskey - a penny-pinching, hands-on manager who underpays his players and treats them with disdain. And when gamblers and hustlers discover that Comiskey's demoralized players are ripe for a money-making scheme, one by one the team members agree to throw the World Series. But when the White Sox are defeated, a couple of sports writers smell a fix and a national scandal explodes, ripping the cover off America's favorite pastime.
