There are legitimate reasons to worry about Pitch, a new drama about the first female major league baseball player. It’s one of the best pilots in quite some time but tells a story that’s an undeniably hard sell for some (especially on Fox, which has been struggling of late) and there’s a question mark over whether its deserved audience will tune in. The other concern is that it will struggle to sustain its premise and the excellence of the first episode will turn into an eventual strike out. Remember Smash? Other than its exceptional opener, few do.
Pitch grabs the audience from the get-go with 23-year-old Ginny Baker (Kylie Bunbury) in the middle of a media maelstrom as she’s about to start in her first game for the San Diego Padres. After five years in the minors, she’s ready to capitalize on her success and so are plenty of others, like her hard-charging manager Amelia (Ali Larter) and the team’s billionaire owner (Bob Balaban), who is not only selling more tickets thanks to her but also trying to crack some glass ceilings.
But can Ginny cope with the pressure and expectation and still be a success? We learn from a series of well-deployed flashbacks that her father (Michael Beach), a failed minor league pitcher who would slap his son in the face to force his daughter to throw strikes, was the driving force behind her aspirations. Though grateful for her opportunity, she’s also resentful that he made her “a robot wearing cleats” and also of everyone who wants her to be an inspiration when all she wants to do is play ball.
Reaction on the team is mixed, with her old team-mate Blip (Mo McRae) protecting her and ageing star catcher Mike (Mark-Paul Gosselaar) skeptical that she’s anything more than a gimmick to sell tickets. Manager Al Luongo (Dan Lauria) is willing to give her a shot, but comes to blows with the owner over Ginny’s inclusion.
This just adds to the realism that director Paris Barclay and creators Dan Fogelman and Rick Singer have infused into the story. They’ve considered every aspect of what the world would look like if there were more X-chromosomes in the clubhouse and watching Ginny play, the press and the fan’s reactions to her, and the stupid sports bro backlash feels so authentically realized that it’s almost like watching this thing play out in real life.
Pitch also acquired a license from Major League Baseball, which allows them to show actual uniforms, baseball stadiums and the other trappings of the sport. The way Ginny’s big game is filmed, and how it is shown on screen, is like watching a game on television, except – sorry, baseball fans – without all the boring parts.
The action is propulsive and the emotions are big, as they probably would be in a similar real-world scenario and they’re coupled with the adrenaline-inducing big-game sequence that makes the show addictive. The great cast helps as well, with Bunbury as a major revelation and a cast of actors like Larter, Lauria and Mark Consuelos (as a front office suit) who have been kicking around TV for years and finally awarded decent roles that will hopefully continue to utilize their considerable talents. Gosselaar, darker and heftier than in his Zack Morris days, is absolutely perfect as a faded hero and gets to display more nuance than he ever could on CSI or Franklin & Bash.
All of this quality is what makes the show’s fate so perilous. What the series will look like down the line is the biggest question about whether or not viewers should root, root, root for the home team. While Ginny’s debut is a fitting subject for a great hour of television, what will Pitch look like in the future? Is she going to be embroiled in the treachery of clubhouse politics? Will she fall for one of her team-mates? Is there going to be a sex tape scandal? Will one of her rival pitchers wind up dead and Ginny become the main suspect in a murder investigation? Only the pilot was made available for review, so it’s hard to gauge the direction.
Pitch could go so many different ways and almost all of them threaten to abandon the realism and honesty that the pilot promises and is integral to its success. The strike zone for this show is very, very small and will be hard to hit and, let’s face it, it’s not like network executives are known for their stellar batting averages. Right now all we have is an excellent debut, and many major league careers have been built on less.
