The Benchwarmers


The Benchwarmers is a 2006 American sports-comedy film directed by Dennis Dugan and starring Rob Schneider, David Spade, and Jon Heder. It is produced by Revolution Studios and Happy Madison Productions and is distributed by Columbia Pictures. It has developed a cult following over the years since its release, especially amongst baseball fans.

Plot

Gus Matthews, Richie Goodman, and Clark Reedy are three adult "nerds" who spent much of their childhoods longing to play sports, especially baseball, but never got the chance. Clark and Richie were unpopular children who were constantly bullied by the jocks and were never able to play baseball or other sports because of their lack of athletic ability. Gus Matthews, who does not talk much about his past, is surprisingly good at baseball even though he also lacks an athletic record. When a nerdy, unathletic boy named Nelson Carmichael and his friends are ruthlessly bullied and kicked off a nearby baseball diamond by a team of bullies who belong to a local little league team, Gus and Clark chase the bullies away. When Gus and Clark come with Richie to the field to play and get back their feel for the game, the bullies return and demand that they leave. Gus challenges the bullies to play them for the field, and the three friends, despite Clark and Richie's poor abilities, win the game due to Gus's superior skill. Days later, a man named Brad, who was one of Clark and Richie's bullies, challenges them to another baseball game with his team, but the three friends win again.
Later, Nelson's billionaire father, Mel, tells the trio that he is impressed with their wins, and explains his plan to hold a round-robin with all the mean-spirited little league teams in the state, plus their team. The winners will be given access to a new multimillion-dollar baseball park that he is building. Wanting to capture the spirit and fun in baseball which they never had when they were kids, as well as seeing this as an opportunity to teach children everywhere that bullying is wrong and that all children, regardless of ability, should be given equal opportunities in sports, the three name themselves the Benchwarmers and join the tournament. They play against every cruel little league team in the tournament, despite the fact that they are three adults squaring off against a team of nine kids. The Benchwarmers win every single game, with Clark and Richie's abilities gradually improving, and the team becomes popular among many nerds, children with poor athletic abilities, and the general public. Their success causes increasing frustration and bitterness amongst the mean-spirited teams of jocks, who start meeting to think of plans to defeat the Benchwarmers.
At the semi-final game, the competing team's coach Wayne meets Jerry who has an idea to bribe the umpire by entering a 30-year-old Dominican man named Carlos into the league claiming him to be 12 years old. Wayne is confident in his team and at first says he doesn't need Carlos but changes his mind after runs are scored by the Benchwarmers while his team remained scoreless. Carlos proves to be a professional, purposely stepping on Gus' hand at one point to injure it too much for him to pitch. But the Benchwarmers eventually manage to defeat Carlos by making him too drunk to actually pitch properly and they manage to win when Richie's agoraphobic and heliophobic brother Howie is hit by the pitch but forces the winning run.
After multiple unsuccessful attempts to derail the trio and halt their winning streak, the Benchwarmers' adversaries finally find a weakness that they can exploit. They find evidence that Gus was a bully himself as a child, known for using name calling over physical force and had bullied one boy named Marcus so intensely that he had to be sent to a mental institution. Seizing this opportunity, the bully teams expose Gus' secret to the public, shaming Gus into resigning from the team. However, on his wife Liz's advice, Gus sincerely apologizes to Marcus just before the final game. In return, Marcus forgives Gus in an incredibly moving speech in front of everyone right on the field at the beginning of the final game. Gus re-joins the team, announcing that Marcus is the Benchwarmers' new third-base coach.
In the final game, Gus, Clark and Richie do not play; rather, they let a team consisting of Nelson and other non-athletic children play, to give them a chance to compete. The final is played against a team with their heartless coach, Jerry, who is the leader of all the mean bully jocks on the local little league teams, and was Richie and Clark's main bully when they were children. In the final inning, the Benchwarmers are losing, but Jerry's team sees that the Benchwarmers are having fun playing the game anyway despite losing. Seeing how heartless and uncaring Jerry is and realizing the true spirit of the game, they decide to let Nelson hit the ball, and let him score a run, saying that Jerry is "the loser". The Benchwarmers storm the field, celebrating the fact that they were not shut out, and they give an enraged Jerry a taste of his own medicine, giving him a wedgie. Later, the entire Benchwarmers team, along with the kids from Jerry's team, Number 7, Marcus and with an additional crowd, even Carlos and Wayne celebrate at Pizza Hut where Richie and Clark manage to get girlfriends, and Gus ecstatically announces that he is going to become a father.

Cast

Darth Vader
The Benchwarmers was shot at various locations in California, mostly in Agoura Hills, in Chumash Park and at a Pizza Hut. Other locations were Chino Hills; Chino; Culver City; Glendale; Watson Drug Store Chapman Avenue, Orange; Simi Valley; Westwood, Los Angeles and on Mulholland Hwy, Malibu.

Reception

The film received negative reviews. It scored 11% on Rotten Tomatoes, with the consensus reading, "A gross-out comedy that is more sophomoric than funny, The Benchwarmers goes down swinging."

Box office

The film was a box office success. In its opening weekend, it grossed $19.6 million, ranking second at the North American box office. The film finished with $59,843,754 domestically and $5,113,537 in foreign markets, totaling $64,957,291 worldwide.

Award nominations

2006 Stinkers Bad Movie Awards:
2007 Razzie Awards:
2010 Razzie Awards:
In July 2018, Revolution Studios and Universal 1440 announced a direct-to-DVD sequel, titled Benchwarmers 2: Breaking Balls. The film was released on January 29, 2019, with Jon Lovitz reprising his role as Mel Carmichael. The rest of the cast consists of Chris Klein, Chelsey Reist, Lochlyn Munro, and Garfield Wilson.