It’s hard to imagine a baseball card is worth a couple of million dollars. But that’s what one collector paid for the most valuable and most recognizable card ever produced: the 1909 T-206 Honus Wagner. Based on a children’s novel by Dan Gutman and directed by John Kent Harrison, The Winning Season gives a fantasy spin to the origins of the card and slaps some warm feelings on for good measure. The result is a fluffy moral piece with a strong sense of time and a strong performance by Matthew Modine. But unlike the card that continues to dominate discussions of vintage baseball collectors, The Winning Season is a film that’s forgettable in almost every way.
In 1985, young Joe Soshack (Shawn Hatosay) and his family are having financial issues. While cleaning up an elderly neighbor’s attic for a little extra cash, Joe finds a valuable Wagner card (then worth only tens of thousands) that could be the ticket his family needs to financial stability. If only he didn’t take the card without implicit permission. With a twist of fantasy, Joe finds himself some 80 years back in time to learn the story behind the famous card. Joe befriends a famous Wagner (Modine) and discovers that the Pirates shortstop didn’t want his name and image associated with the tobacco with which his card would be distributed with.
With Wagner and his Pirates caught up in a fierce World Series battle with the nefarious Ty Cobb (William Lee Scott) and his Detroit Tigers, the baseball action is intense. And as excited as Joe is to find himself making like Marty McFly, even he’s questioning why he’s in the particular time and place that he is. The smart cookie that he is, he understands that he’s got some sort of lesson to learn before he heads back to the present. This is where the film gets all corny and obvious.
The Winning Season is held together by Modine, who does a good job at being the seemingly squeaky-clean Wagner. His performance is one of quiet confidence, like he knows what he’s doing and where he is. This may seem like a basic rule for acting, but there seems to be a lot of loss amongst others in the cast. They’re not horrible, but they’re also not believable in their period roles either.
The Winning Season offers a nice fantasy spin on the traditional baseball film. Although not horrible, it’s also a bit of a moral mess at times that is far too predictable, even when you look at it as a relatively harmless family film.
The Winning Season Gallery
