Another exciting week of the NFL offseason is in the books! We have no shortage of riveting CHIEFS news to cover. The last seven days alone tell us that:
The first reaction: thank God someone is tackling that next season schedule thing. Let’s take a look at the Mel Kiper Big Board as we prepare for the KC edition of the draft. The perfect fit for the CHIEFS is going to be…all right! I can’t do this.
Nothing happened. There I said it. The team came together with no injuries. That is great but hardly qualifies as news. Chris Porter from Shawnee, KS, is a comedy favorite of mine. Fair warning, he is fairly blue, but one of my favorite bits starts at the ’50-sec mark of this clip. I am not going to make up news and will instead talk about my 4th of July.
My typical Independence Day weekend includes these key ingredients:
Summerfest was my planned topic, but I could not attend Saturday as planned. I made it Thursday for a 2Chainz rap show, but Saturday was my full experience day. However, thanks to an awesome employee’s effort, I was filming a wedding instead. It turns out that I saved the day. My plan is to Fest hard tonight and get into it next week.
The rest of my list didn’t hit either. Rain scuttled the majority of fireworks and grilling, and Covid broke the roof deck and lake routine. This 4th featured oven-grilled meat and extra movie viewing, which was perfect for a weekend full of hard pivots. I am flexible, if nothing else. We have fantastic alley neighbors with kids that line up in age with mine, so we invited them over. After the party dispersed, we hit the movies. Misty and I finished up ID4, and then we put on another true classic: “The Sandlot.”
My kids rarely watch movies from start to finish or entirely focus on anything for 90+ minutes. Louis CK (yes, fully aware of controversy) is another comic I enjoy. His 2009 release special, Hilarious, is my favorite of his material. He has a section where he talks about keeping his kids off of TV due to the sensory overload that kills their focus. I think there is something accurate, but I do not keep my kids off screens. They are great students in school, spend a ton of time running around outside, and screen policing is hard. Misty and I are busy people, happy with their emotional and intellectual development, and screens occupy them best when we need silence.
My actual theory of why my kids don’t watch movies is based on them being 9 and 6. I don’t recall my focus level at that point, but I cannot imagine it being very high. The majority of my memories include running all over the farm after my grandmother threw me out of the house for being loud, which only happened every day. I recall watching ‘The Sandlot’ in the theater and watching the whole thing.
It had the same effect on my kids. My son is 6, so I count him making it 3/4 of the way through as complete. My 9-year-old daughter took it all in.
‘The Sandlot’ was released on April 7, 1993, which made me almost 12 when I saw it in the theater. Next year makes 30 years, and I will do a whole column about my thoughts, feelings, and lasting cultural effects. For now, I am having fun thinking about this recent viewing. My daughter is 9 and in the perfect head space for The Sandlot. Misty and I spent the entire moving trading glances while watching her enjoy every minute. My daughter did a few things I do not recall doing when I first saw it. The main thing was how much she constantly dissected the plot. She questioned the character’s decision-making on multiple occasions. My absolute favorite was the Babe Ruth decoy ball.
Spoiler alert for a 29-year-old movie. The lead-up to the scene is Scotty Smalls taking his stepdad’s Babe Ruth signed ball to the Sandlot to play. On the first pitch, he hits it into the beast’s lair. The boys’ tactic to buy time is to buy a new ball and sign it themselves, as that will pacify Smalls’ mom.
My daughter caught on immediately and said something to this effect:
Are they seriously going to sign a new ball and expect to get away with it?
The other great quote from her was during the big final chase scene when the beast got loose and chased Benny The Jet Rodriguez all over town. At one point, the chase went through the pool, and her comment:
What is he doing? He’s banned from the pool for life.
The last thing that jumped out was her immediate empathy for the dog actor when the fence fell. Her only concern: was that the actor was OK. The Sandlot was a magical experience for her. Her parents too.
I will get deeper on this next year, but I cannot leave the topic without some extra fun. Here are my CHIEFS comparisons to the cast!!
Benny the Jet!! He is the talent, the steak, and the sizzle. He is not the narrator, but he is the story. There is one obvious choice here, and that is Patrick Mahomes. I can even picture him lacing up the PF Flyers.
This is the main character and narrator. It is his story about his favorite summer. He is also the new guy that comes in raw but gets exceptionally good. Here’s looking at you, Skyy Moore. Rookie mistakes will happen, but the Skyy’s the limit.
Ham is the swagger for the team and the antagonistic catcher that will rattle opponents. He started and ended the fight with the organized baseball team. This one is Creed Humphrey for me.
I believe we are at the cusp of seeing a vocal lineman. He recently signed a deal with Boulevard, so we will be hearing from him. This will be fun!!
This guy is bold, loud, and a major contributor to the story. He puts the move on Wendy AND lived to talk about it. This is Travis Kelce.
He is the pitcher in the movie. His loads of talent take over parts of the film as he hurls his signature heater.
This is Chris Jones, and we need him to take over more than ever this coming season.
This guy is the risk taker. He is the one bold enough to lower into the beast’s lair and, according to the end sequence, the inventor of bungee jumping. L’Jarius Sneed gets the nod here. We need him to be the leader and risk taker on D. I’m talking selling out to jump routes en route to pick sixes. That is what we have been missing at cornerback since Peters, and we need it back. Be bold!!
This is the older of the two brothers, who becomes an engineer. The movie does not immediately portray him as smart but gives him “the moment.” He is the one who ups the intelligence in the ball retrieval methods. Andy Reid all day engineering the O.
The token little brother is always emulating his big brother. He grows up to become an architect and work with his brother. Here is looking at you, Spags. It is time to grow up and become the architect of a top-flight defense.
The peer pressure of the group. He is the guy responsible for the grossest and possibly best scene of the movie. I hate puke, but that carnival ride scene when they chew tobacco and vomit everywhere is hysterical. My daughter’s comment: stupid boys. This one just feels like Frank Clark for some reason.
Art LeFleur kills it as the ghost of Babe Ruth in Benny’s dream. His famous line tells us that heroes get remembered, but legends never die. I will tie this back to the team “news” and go with Hank Stram! That guy is an NFL and CHIEFS legend and will never die.
The film ends with meeting this character. James Earl Jones returns with the baseball magic that made Field of Dreams and ties up the story.
He offers the boys pragmatic advice: just knock on the door if you want the ball back. That move ends the movie at minute 30, so it was never happening. However, the message of simplicity is clear: sometimes, it is best to take the apparent action. Clark Hunt and his pocketbook gave this advice two offseason in a row. The CHIEFS lost Super Bowl LV along the O line, and the 2021 season was hectic due to the Defenses ineffectiveness. Clark’s message after each season: get players and rebuild.
Misty and I make an effort to watch this movie every year on or around July 4. I consider this an all-time great action movie for a few reasons. First, the special effects still hold up today. This movie came from the era of models for sets. The producers effectively create and destroy cities with models in an awe-inspiring fashion. The next thing is the story. It was and remains a great take on the aliens invading story and layers around the message of humanity. We are all people, all over the world, and we are more the same than different. It is a great reminder that grows in importance daily. Finally, the cast is impeccable. There is not a bad role or casting in the movie.
ID4 was the beginning of Will Smith’s dominance of all things entertainment, and he crushes the role of Air Force pilot, Captain Hiller. Bill Pulman was everyone’s president in 1996 as Thomas Whitmore. Jeff Goldblum as a cable repair man, David Levinson, plays the brains and the plan. The ancillary cast delivers as well. Randy Quaid as Russell Casse steals the final sequence as a crop duster turned fighter pilot who saves the day. A personal favorite is Brent Spiner. He plays Data in Star Trek but steals scenes in Area 51 as Dr. Okun. Spiner went on a mini run with Star Trek “First Contact” also released in ’96. In 1997 he played Gil Godwin, cruise director, in Out to Sea with Matthau and Lemmon. This movie is essentially Grumpy Old Men 3. The story is dumb, but the film is hilarious—the perfect guilty pleasure flick.
Baseball is another thing synonymous with my Independence Day. The Brewers and Cubs delivered the drama in the 4th with extra innings. My Brew Crew prevailed in the 10th in walk-off fashion. This was the first 4th of July walk-off win for the Brewers. Victor Caratini struck out four times before coming to the plate with two on in the 10th inning. Naturally, he hit a 3-run homer to wrap up the win. I love watching baseball on-field reporters. Sophia Minnaert for the Brewers is top tier. She immediately found Caratini and began a bilingual interview. My favorite moment was when teammates came with the cooler to soak Victor once again. Minnaert saw it coming, turned to protect the mic, stepped away, and never stopped the interview. A true pro.
Happy belated Independence Day to everyone at Arrowhead One and all readers.
Josh Kingsley – ArrowheadOne
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