MLB’s Field of Dreams game is absolutely perfect.

Rarely in life are idea and execution both perfect. Rare in movies, rare in music, (not so) rare in small market blogs, rare in sports. But if you watched any of last night’s Field of Dreams game that the MLB put together, you saw something perfect. The setting, the sunset, the pictures and camera shots, the walk-off home run with fireworks in centerfield, it was absolutely perfect.

Now I know there are some jaded baseball/movie fans that will tell you that Field of Dreams is VERY high on the ‘cheesy’ factor. That may be so, but let me tell you this: If you roll your eyes at that movie, and can’t appreciate the romanticism of the sport of baseball and fathers and sons, then you have a big ol’ dump in your pants. Because it is one of the best baseball movies every created. It might be THE best.

Granted, I may be a little biased with that take. Because Field of Dreams is one of ‘those’ movies from my childhood. Maybe this is only relatable to people my age or older, but WAY back in the day, when movies were on TV, if you liked that movie and wanted to watch it again and again and again, you got out a VHS tape and recorded it as it was airing. And if you REALLY loved the movie, you would break off the little plastic nub on the top of the tape so no one would every be able to tape over it. Then you labeled it, and threw it in a movie drawer for the rest of eternity.

Field of Dreams was one of those movies for me. Hyper local reference: My parents taped the movie when it was the Saturday Night Movie of the Week on Channel 18. And as I got a little older, probably 7 or 8 years old, and started to REALLY get into sports, I started watching that movie over and over and over again. To the point where I knew EXACTLY when the commercials were coming, and I could probably even tell you what the commercials were about even as I was fast forwarding through them. I think there was one summer where I legitimately watched Field of Dreams almost every day.

So yes, maybe my opinion on that particular film is a little rose colored. But I don’t think I’ve seen any ‘best baseball movie’ list that doesn’t have it at least top 5.

But because of the love affair that a LOT of people have with that movie, there was genuine excitement at the beginning of 2020 when Major League Baseball announced they were going to attempt a real life, regular season game on the movie site. That location in Dyersville, Iowa has been a tourist destination since the movie blew up, and they’ve been holding Sunday ‘Field of Dreams’ games with ‘actors’ on the field for decades. But a full scale MLB game??  On paper it sounded really, really cool. But how would it actually play out? How would it look? Would the weather cooperate? Would there be a global pandemic that would cancel it until 2021?

The answers in order are: Perfectly, beautiful, yes, and, unfortunately, yes. This one was worth the wait, though. I can’t imagine that MLB won’t try to do one game a year on that site. It’s too beautiful not to. Just a perfect scene for the grand old game.

PS: Especially if you’ve got kids, and kids that are into sports, the trip to Dyersville is WELL worth the drive (which is only about 4 hours from Sheboygan). When I was calling games for the Wisconsin Woodchucks, they played a team in Waterloo, Iowa. That was maybe an hour from the Field of Dreams site. So before a game that night, our coach loaded everyone up on the team bus, and took us over there for a tour. It was SO cool. I don’t know if it still is, but when we went in 2006, the owner was still the owner who was there when they filmed the movie. He actually lived in the house you see in the movie, and went about his day while people would drive up and walk around the field, and walk into the corn. I wouldn’t say you need to spend any more than a day or two there, but it’s worth it for a long weekend trip.

Double PS: ^Related: The Woodchucks were about 20 games under .500 at that point, and it was a HOT day in August. I think our coach was low-key hoping the entire team would actually disappear into the corn. He kept yelling ‘KEEP GOING! KEEP GOING!’ as we wandered that direction.