Customer Reviews

These are comments and reviews from baseball fans who have purchased the Playing for Peanuts DVD set.

If you’ve seen the show, please email your comments to playingforpeanuts@gmail.com (or click here). Thanks!

*****

I picked up the Playing For Peanuts DVD, not because I’d ever heard of the team or any of its players, but because I’m a longtime baseball fan. I grew up on minor league baseball — I was a batboy for the AA Yankees team in Nashville years and years ago (Don Mattingly and Willie McGee were on the team that year) and worked in their clubhouse during college.

That said, yours is one of the very best baseball-related “documentaries” that I have ever seen … and I’ve just about seen ‘em all. I found myself invested in the fortunes of the Peanuts, and whether or not they would pull out the championship in the end. It brought back a lot of fond memories of my time in and around the sport … I remember being there when guys got the call to the “bigs,” which was huge, of course. I watched it all over again when guys from the Peanuts were picked up by big-league organizations.

Awesome. Thanks so much for your efforts on this project!

Take care,
Rick Houston
www.stockcarhistoryonline.com

*****
I purchased this DVD after seeing it recommended on Athletics Nation and part of the reason for doing so was because of my interest in professional baseball at all levels. Having worked as a photographer in the minors and reading stories about life “down on the farm,” I had some expectations going in about some of the things I’d see. After watching the ten episodes, which run in the area of four hours, those expectations were easily surpassed.

The amount of personal commentary from Producer/Director John Fitzgerald is minimal, letting the material speak for itself. There’s a brief bit in the introduction surrounding the hiring and firing of manager Wally Backman in a matter of days by Arizona in 2004 after some past personal issues came to light but the rest of the show focuses entirely on the South Georgia Peanuts and the South Coast League.

The highs and lows of not only Backman himself but the Peanuts and the initial season of the six-team league are clearly shown. Highs include Backman’s commentary and relationships with his players and staff while lows range from teams forgetting to provide towels or lacking a visitor’s clubhouse to a grounds crew being unable to cover the infield with the tarp during a downpour, on-field promotions dragging on too long, or inexperienced umpires and the arguments and ejections that followed.

One gets the sense that while the people behind the formation of the league had good intentions and tried their best to bring baseball to the areas they did, there were definitely things they got in over their heads on. They struggled financially and one of the teams ended up having no home to play at. There are also moments where it looks like the league wanted to have their cake and eat it too, trying to use Backman’s name recognition to their benefit before trying to get rid of him after a few negative incidents along with defending a couple of his players after they were suspended for failing a questionable drug test.

Backman, whose biggest success came during the 1986 season when the New York Mets won the World Series, is presented in a way that lets the viewers make up their own minds about him. He makes some mistakes and goes too far at times, highlighted by a visit to a press box to have a few strong words with a radio play-by-play man after an ejection, but one can see that there is almost always a reason behind it: backing the people who play for him. While some of the actions are questionable you can see how much he still loves the sport, how much he’s there for his players and how it’s reflected in what he does, good or bad.

As with most teams at the independent level, the Peanuts were made up of could-bes, never-will-bes, never-weres and a few has-beens with Major League experience but they’re all there for the love of the game, certainly not the money or the, ahem, living conditions (which are bad even for the minors). The goal of being picked up by a Major League affiliate is realized by a few players and it’s clear how important that is to Backman, along with helping his players improve on the field. Following the team over the course of the season as they try to win the championship becomes more interesting as we get to know some of them and watch how they come together as a team.

In addition to the ten episodes, the DVD includes short segments showing various pranks and instructional videos. My favorites included a prank with a snake and tips on taking a lead from first base followed by Backman getting into an interesting debate on a couple different techniques for it with one of his coaches.

Overall, Playing For Peanuts easily accomplishes what I believe it set out to do: show life in the minors. The amount of access Fitzgerald gets to the coaches and players is all anyone could ask for, taking the viewer into the dugout and clubhouse (when there is one) and beyond. At different times it’s funny, informative, serious and eye-opening to much of what the players and coaches go through. For any fan, especially fans of the minor leagues, it deserves to be seen. It’s more than a documentary, more than reality TV. It gets to the heart of baseball life.

James Venes
http://lastoftheninth.com
http://jamesvenes.com