In belated honor of Memorial Day (sorry Canadians!) . . .
Chad Harbach wrote a “Great American Novel” about America’s pastime. Or, at least he wrote “a big American novel of the old school” that has been very well-received. Now, The Art of Fielding is going to be made into an HBO series.
That fact, to me, begs the question: Who will play the parts of the main characters?
While a couple of my previous posts have addressed which actors would play which players in the not-yet-for-real MLB: The Movie, I thought it might be more interesting this time around to consider which players are best suited to play the characters in the novel.
Mike Schwartz: Schwartzy is a bulky catcher who grows a beard. He’s intensely motivational, more the coach of the Westish Harpooners than the actual coach. He’s not the best player, but he pulls his weight, and he makes other players on the team reach their potential, and keeps them motivated. He’s also addicted to painkillers.
Because I cannot go a day without googling Mike Napoli, he’s the first one that sprung to mind here. But while Nap-Dogg is a good body comp for Schwartzy (bulky, bearded catcher), he doesn’t match up with the character’s character: that of a motivational manager-in-waiting. Then, after googling “most selfless player baseball,” I kicked myself, because the first player to pop up (after an ironic reference to Alex Rodriguez) was Jason Varitek (also a bearded catcher), of whom Curt Schilling said, “In my 23 years of professional baseball I never played with or against a more selfless and prepared player….” That’s Schwartzy in a nutshell.
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