Why Someone Should Make a Seattle Mariners Movie

September 28, 2012; Oakland, CA, USA; Seattle Mariners starting pitcher

(49) pitches against the Oakland Athletics during the first inning at O.co Coliseum. Mandatory Credit: Ed Szczepanski-USA TODAY Sports

There are all kinds of baseball movies (A League of Their Own, Cobb, 8 Men Out, Major League – you get the idea), but I’ve yet in all my searching to see a Seattle Mariners movie out there. Sure, there are movies and TV shows that take jabs at the Seattle team – Frasier – but wouldn’t it be great to have a movie based upon the men who call Safeco Field home?

It could be a movie based on the history of the Mariners, or it could be a fictional account. The remade Fever Pitch celebrates the Boston Red Sox’s World Series Win. Major League pokes fun at the Cleveland Indian’s perpetual losing streak. The Mariners movie could be something that celebrates the underdogs rising up and taking over – but wait, we’ve seen that.

Perhaps the Mariners movie would celebrate the steadfast mediocrity we’ve seen from the team. Maybe it could be a modern tale to go along with the trends where everyone in school gets a certificate for participating even if they were really, really bad at the sport. It could be a film that says to people “It’s okay if you don’t win. What matters is that you show up.” I’m not sure that would bring people into the movie theaters, but then again, they’re still making Fast and Furious sequels – so the theater-goers might just be hungry for such a film.

Alternatively, it could be a movie that celebrated a sports legend. We just saw Ken Griffey Jr. get inducted into the Seattle Mariners Hall of Fame. It could be a film that tracked his career. Or, it could be a movie of controversy. We could talk about the PED use and downfall of A-Rod, though as I’m sure any Mariners’ fan would agree, I don’t want to share our movie moment with those New York Yankees. Don’t they already have enough fame to last them a good little while?

What if we did a film about Dave Niehaus, who loyally served the Mariners as the play-by-play announcer from their origins in the 1977 season? Alternatively, we could dig even deeper and have a film about the Seattle Pilots’ solo season in 1969 – of course, they went on to become the Milwaukee Brewers.

We could go the way of Moneyball and have a movie about our season of glory in 2001 with 216 wins. Or we could make a movie about Ichiro Suzuki or Felix Hernandez…the possibilities really are endless.

It’s interesting that no one yet has made a feature-length film about the M’s. If you were to make a film about the team, what would you title it and what would the plot be?