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Some Stray Thoughts, Questions, and Observations About the Phillies Field of Dreams Game
By Matt Schultz
Published:
The Phillies beat the Twins 7-1 in the 2026 Field of Dreams Game on Thursday night in Iowa. I enjoyed this game a ton. The last two Field of Dreams Games were great, and this one was made that much better by having our Phils out there for this strange/awesome event. Here’s some stuff I was kicking around while watching:
A Bunch of Stray Thoughts, Questions, and Observations I Had While Watching the Field of Dreams Game
-This whole thing is very funny.
-There are many baseball movies. MLB picking Field of Dreams as the one that gets a whole-ass special game and huge production and a fully recreated movie set is great.
-They went with the movie about time travel and ghosts.
-But I guess the other baseball movies don’t lend themselves as well to a themed-game.
–Angels in the Outfield Game would be tough.
-Have to rebuild an orphanage.
-Elle Duncan and Barry Bonds doing playful banter as lonely-seeming kids wander through the background looking hungry.
-87-year-old Christopher Lloyd swooping down in a flying harness with heavy costume wings strapped to his back.
-Trying to give an intro speech about the magic of baseball from the harness.
-Would probably die doing this.
–The Sandlot could potentially work, but MLB already milked that for all the money/attention it’s worth during the All-Star game.
-MLB loves gimmicks.
-They love playing movie scores over drone shots of empty baseball fields.
-I can’t blame them. It’s always affective.
-So don’t be surprised if the Angels in the Outfield Game happens soon.
-Netflix would buy it.
-Anyway, as far as the Field of Dreams game, the best part is always the corn walkout.
-Look how slow and weird these guys walk out from the corn:
-These are professional athletes pretending to be ghosts from a movie.
-Bryce Harper is trying so hard to seem like a ghost.
–“Hands on my hips, looking out at the baseball field with quiet wonder and awe. This is how ghosts act.”
-Also, is the movie music playing at the field too?
-I don’t think it is.
-I think the music is only playing on the broadcast.
-I think the players are slowly and dramatically walking out of the corn and onto the field in silence.
-They also left the Hall of Famers in the corn a little too long, I thought:
-Wonder how long those guys were in there.
-Lot of them were pretty old.
-Hope they had chairs in the corn.
-Speaking of corn, I was a little surprised by how corn-themed the game was.
-I know Field of Dreams is about razing the corn crop to build a baseball field, but to my memory, the characters in the film don’t actually interact with corn very much.
-They don’t wear corn clothes:
-I don’t remember them eating corn:
-Also, once the game started, I loved how there wasn’t a strike zone box on the broadcast.
-Thought it looked way cleaner. Very refreshing.
-I hadn’t really thought about it before, but I realized I’m anti-strike zone box.
-I know where the strike zone is.
-Every baseball fan who knows how baseball works knows where the strike zone is.
-Only non-ball-knowers want the strike zone box. This is my take now.
-Lastly, this jacket is sick. I would spend $2,000 to buy this jacket:
-I had a Phillies leather jacket a long time ago.
-College roommate took it when we all moved out.
-Received this photo from him recently:
-Was glad to see the jacket is still out there but was upset that I no longer had it.
-Sell the Kyle jacket, Netflix… We all deserve one…
-The one constant through all the years has been baseball fans wanting to watch ghost-themed games in multicolored leather-ish jackets…
Matt Schultz is a comedy and sports writer from Philadelphia. He’s written extensively for ClickHole, The Onion, and Conan O’Brien’s Team Coco. His work has been featured in Vulture, Deadspin, The A.V. Club, Paste Magazine, and other publications. Much of his sports journalism can be found on college basketball websites that don’t exist anymore (PhilaHoops Heads rise up…) email: M.Schultz@sportradar.com