Angels in the Outfield commentary, part 3: ‘You don’t even *lose* as a team!’

Now, let’s get to some personalities on the Angels team. We’re in the clubhouse postgame, watching players’ hands lightly touch a pillar in the room as they walk by. Pitcher Gates has a front-row seat to this as he’s icing his neck following the scuffle with his manager.

“Why do you idiots do that after we’ve lost?”

“It’s for good luck, man,” an Angels teammate responds, acting like Gates is a moron for asking.

Then Adrien Brody walks by, saying that after 15-straight losses (remember the continuity from the boom box in part one?) they should find something else to rub. Another player says they should do it before they lose; he doesn’t seem too bright.

From meats to meeting one of the movie’s stars
Next, there’s the usual bustle of activity in a postgame clubhouse. Players are at a snack table taking in that postgame spread. Win or lose, everybody’s gotta eat. The catcher picks up a piece of lunch meat and is not pleased: “Aw, not again. They got the wrong kind of salami!” he exclaims to the room. This catcher, Messmer, is very tall and a bit portly. So, it looks like we’re establishing him as the stereotypical fat-joke/food-joke character for the movie. He and Doris Murphy should get together.

Tony Danza is introduced in a hot tub working his right arm. He’s also the third actor in the first 20 minutes of the movie to puff on a cigarette. I didn’t realize how much smoking was still an everyday thing even in the 90s. Then again, I remember when we had “smoking or non” sections in restaurants.

A couple of teammates ask Danza about his arm and tell him he’ll be pitching no-hitters any day now. Alright, so this guy is an injured pitcher. Got it.

Still on Danza, the audio cuts to some kind of musical rap starting. Here begins one of my favorite, funniest scenes in the movie. Back in the clubhouse, a random player is making up a rap on the fly as he walks around his teammates and starts to take off his jersey.

Rap it out
“Boys of summer
and it’s a big bummer
No matter who we play
We give the game away
Cuz we can’t win
That would be a sin
We even lose the games before we begi---”

This guy, Mapel, is abruptly cut off when Knox enters the room from behind and shouts “Save it, Mapel!” Something I recently noticed, is that when Knox startles Mapel, the player gets turned around and bangs his head on the “good-luck” pole.

The room falls silent at the Knox bark. Again with a purpose, Knox strolls across the room and uses both hands to turn over the table of cold cuts and postgame goodies. Avid Twitter users have probably seen this moment in GIF form as a sign of some frustration. For good measure, a random lunch meat rolls over to Messmer. He stops it with his foot and offers a “bummer.” Yes, the big guy is disappointed about the food. Shocker.

Manager tears into his team
And here we go. This is the rant where Knox is pissed. Again, it’s very PG without the profanity, but it’s still very good. Knox goes all out with his anger, straining his face/neck muscles, almost challenging a vein to pop, and he screams at his team for their terrible performance. We never do learn the final score of the game they just lost, but it really doesn’t matter.

Here’s the Knox rant, which I didn’t even need to check the film for because I have it memorized.

“One more loss! One more loss which could have been a win!” Knox looks around at his team as the players stand around sheepishly.

“You call yourselves professionals!” I love the way Knox moves his head around in sarcasm mode right here.

“I have never, ever seen a worse group of 25 players!” On this line, Danza shows up in the back of the room, shirtless with a towel around his waist.

“You don’t think as a team! You don’t play as a team! You don’t even lose as a team!” Quick exit stage right for Danza. He doesn’t need this.

“You all got your heads, so far up your butts – you can’t even see the light of day!” Again, the delivery here is so good and full of rage that you forget there’s no profanity.

“One more loss (as he looks to the sky, imploring), and I’ll, and I’ll do this!” He grabs a chair by a locker and tosses it at a rack of bats, causing them to go flying in the direction of players.

“… To each and every one of you!”

“I want you here, in uniform at 9 (a.m.) tomorrow! We’re going back to work on fundamentals!”

Fundamentals?!
Another player quickly jumps in, asking why fundamentals, in the middle of the season, which establishes where we are time-wise. Probably June or July. For a team that’s lost 15 games in a row, and had two outfielders collide with each other on a play, do the players really think they have a right to question why their manager wants to send them back to basics?

Then the not-so-bright guy says he thought the game started at 1. “It does start at 1! And you’re a jackass!” Hey, a swear, haha.

I think we’ve established that this guy will be the stupid character of the movie. He responds by very seriously saying he’s a pitcher, not a jackass. Another teammate informs him that he can be both; it’s very common. The scene ends with the pitcher passing out backward into his locker, which makes sense since one of the flying bats nailed him right in the face. 

Angels in the Outfield commentary, part 1: 'I'd say when the Angels win the pennant'

Angels in the Outfield commentary, part 2: 'Boy, they're bad'