Top 10 Major League Characters

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October 23, 2014 | Posted by Jason Chamberlain

Growing up near Toronto, I went to a lot of Blue Jays games with my dad during their glory years in the early 90's. Back then, baseball was my undisputed favorite sport.

Baseball translates very well to the silver screen, and there have been a lot of great baseball movies over the years, from Eight Men Out to The Natural to Moneyball, and lots more.

But my favorite has always been Major League, 1989's comedic look at the long-suffering Cleveland Indians, and the ragtag group of has-beens and never-weres that make them an unlikely contender.

They made a couple sequels, neither of which reached the heights of the first (I've never seen the third, Back To The Minors, which only features a couple of the original characters).

With the Kansas City Royals and San Francisco Giants battling it out in the World Series, it's a good time to look at my favorite baseball movie of all time and highlight some of the characters that make the film so memorable.

10) Margaret Whitton as Rachel Phelps

Rachel Phelps is the scheming new owner of the Indians (having inherited the team from her late husband) and a send-up of those disinterested, 'profit-first everything else last' owners you often see in pro sports. Whitton is fantastic in the role, chewing the scenery in every scene while establishing herself as the team's off-the-field antagonist.

Phelps has no interest in running a baseball team and even less in doing so in Cleveland. She assembles a team of losers with the hope they will be bad enough to create such poor attendance that the Indians can break their lease and head to beautiful Miami. As the team defies expectations throughout the season and climbs the standings, Phelps becomes more and more desperate and unhinged in her quest to see them fail, taking away all luxuries and forcing them to travel in a rickety death trap of a plane.

The original ending has Phelps revealing herself to be a true fan of the team, having faked her Miami plot to give the team something to rally against. But she was just too much fun to hate, so the story was changed to maintain her villainy.


9) Peter Vuckovich as Clu Haywood

Phelps is a villain in the boardroom, but Clu Haywood and his powerhouse New York Yankees are the main on-field antagonists for the Indians in the movie.

Early in the movie/season, the Yankees trounce the Indians at every turn, usually led by a home run or two by Haywood, who is particularly good at knocking Rick Vaughn's fastballs out of the park. He's also your prototypical old school baseball slob, spitting tobacco everywhere and slamming opponents with crude jokes and taunts.

Haywood is one of a handful of characters in the movie played by a genuine ball player, in this case Vuckovich, a former big league pitcher, making it ironic that he plays a slugger in the movie.


8) Chelcie Ross as Eddie Harris

Every team needs a savvy veteran or two, the guy who knows all the ins and outs of the game and can take advantage of every loophole in the book. For the Indians that's pitcher Eddie Harris, who famously slathers parts of his body with different substances he can rub on the ball to make his curve ball that much better. And if all else fails, he uses snot!

Harris, a devout Christian, also engages in a memorable locker-room war with voodoo practitioner Pedro Cerrano, which doesn't turn out very well for him.

As Harris, Ross does a great job portraying an athlete in the twilight of his career that is using every ounce of his knowledge and experience to stay competitive in a young man's game, while also doing the Lord's work and defending Jesus Christ's ability to hit the curve ball!


7) Corbin Bernsen as Roger Dorn

One of the great things about Major League is how it represents pretty much every archetype you're likely to find on a pro team, from the wily veteran to the cocky young rookie. Then there's the "overpaid, overconfident, not nearly as good as he used to be but still acting like he is" player. Corbin Bernsen plays that role to perfection as Roger Dorn, the lone big-money talent on a team full of nobodies. Sadly for the Indians, he's earning that big money for his past accomplishments, not his present ones, and is more interested in investments and golf clubs than baseball at this point.

A highlight of the movie is the conflict between Dorn and Rick Vaughn, which starts as mutual animosity and eventually becomes respect. Bernsen also does a good job playing Dorn's rediscovery of his competitive edge and passion for the game as the season goes along, and he's a key contributor by the time the Indians go for the pennant.



6) Dennis Haysbert as Pedro Cerrano

Until his presidential role in 24 (and those Allstate commercials) Haysbert was arguably best known for his role as the hard-hitting voodoo practitioner. He must like making baseball movies as he would do another (Mr. Baseball) with Tom Selleck a few years after this one, and he appeared in both Major League sequels as well.

Aside from his powerhouse swing, Cerrano is notable for his voodoo beliefs and his nearly unshakeable faith in a doll named Jobu, whom he plies with cigars and rum in exchange for help hitting the curve ball. He also performs elaborate rituals in front of his spring training locker to ward off the dreaded red tag.

Cerrano is a prime example of an athlete who takes superstition to a whole new level. Whether or not Jobu helps him or not is up for debate (though the doll does certainly get revenge on Harris for stealing his booze). After struggling with breaking balls all year, Cerrano finally tells Jobu to shove it and immediately cranks a game-breaking homerun out of the park. So believe in yourselves, kids!


5) Wesley Snipes as Willie Mays Hayes

He plays like Mays, and he runs like Hayes. And he was recast as Omar Epps in the sequel, but we're going to ignore that. This was a breakthrough role for Wesley Snipes, who is nearly unrecognizable here as the slender, cheerful Hayes when compared to his later work in movies like Demolition Man and Blade.

Hayes is a speed demon who crashes the Indians camp without an invitation and promptly gets thrown out, only to prove his worth in a foot race. Indians manager Lou Brown immediately identifies him as a prototypical leadoff hitter due to his speed, but Hayes has dreams of hitting the long ball, which he is comically incapable of doing. When he does get on base though, he's an ever-present threat, and his base running abilities combine with Jake Taylor's fake-out home run call/bunt for an unforgettable play that wins the Indians the pennant.

One of my favorite moments in the movie is Willy's 'restrained in the dressing room/exuberant in the parking lot' celebration upon making the team. "Yes yes yes..."


4) James Gammon as Lou Brown

This movie really does nail the sports archetypes. In all the baseball movies I've seen I can't point to a better example of a classic baseball manager than Lou Brown. Old and crotchety but warm and supportive, the late James Gammon is note perfect in the role of the manager who guides the team to their unlikely success.

Brown almost steals the entire movie in his very first scene, when the Indians GM calls to offer him a big league post and he is completely unimpressed. "I've got a guy on the other line about some whitewalls, I'll talk to ya later!"

Then he arrives at spring training and shows just how smooth he is, doling out pushups to Hayes every time he hits a ball in the air, seeing right through the veteran Taylor's assurances of his good health, and my absolute favorite; tossing Roger Dorn's contract on the ground, pissing on it, zipping up and walking away, all with a straight face.

When he learns the full extent of Rachel's plans for the team, he comes up with an ingenious solution to motivate his club into the best performance of their lives. "Every time we win, we peel a section." Classic!


3) Charlie Sheen as Rick Vaughn

Before Charlie Sheen was Charlie Sheen (tiger blood, Vatican assassin, warlock, etc.) he was one of the hottest young actors in Hollywood with scene stealing roles in movies like Platoon and Wall Street. With a lifelong passion for baseball as well as a well-earned bad-boy reputation in Hollywood, Sheen was perfect for the role of the rebellious "Wild Thing".

Discovered in the California Penal League, Vaughn has a blistering fastball that he can't control to save his life; hence his nickname. One of the funniest scenes in the movie is his Major League debut, when he walks the bases loaded in 12 pitches with unbelievably bad aim.

Eventually found to have poor eyesight, Vaughn is fitted with a pair of glasses and starts to get his control in check. By the time he is brought in to close out the pennant-winning game against the Yankees (naturally to the tune of "Wild Thing" as covered by the punk band X) , he is in full control of his 100-mph fastball, which he uses to strike out Haywood in three high-speed pitches.


2) Tom Berenger as Jake Taylor

Arguably the movie's lead character, Jake Taylor is a classic example of the veteran who has seen and done it all in the game and is desperately trying to hang on for just one more season.

Taking on the role of team leader, Taylor takes Vaughn and Hayes under his wing to teach them about life in the big leagues, all while trying to keep his own waning career together and reignite his relationship with the beautiful Lynn (Rene Russo in her first movie).

Taylor's pursuit of Lynn is the only place where the movie really departs from the world of baseball, but thankfully those instances are few and far between, and Berenger and Russo have great chemistry together.

But Taylor is at his best in the locker room and on the field doling out sage advice and coming through in the clutch with his play.


1) Bob Uecker as Harry Doyle
"Juuuuuuust a bit outside, he tried the corner and missed!"

"The post-game show is brought to you by...... Christ, I can't find it. The hell with it."

"Low, and he walks the bases loaded on 12 straight pitches. How can these guys lay off pitches that close?"

It's a testament to the greatness of broadcasting legend Bob Uecker that he can walk into a movie filled with experienced actors and steal the whole thing. Sure, he was working off a funny script, but the delivery with which Uecker provides his withering play-by-play is genius and couldn't have been matched by anybody else.

Uecker utilized his experience as a play-by-play man for the Milwaukee Brewers as well as his own career as a pro ball player to bring his character to life.

Without the broadcasting of Uecker's Harry Doyle, Major League would still be a solid baseball movie, but it would definitely be missing something. Doyle takes what's happening on the field and elevates it to a whole new level.