The Baseball Bunch: Difference between revisions
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| show_name = The Baseball Bunch |
| show_name = The Baseball Bunch |
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Revision as of 19:30, 23 April 2009
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| The Baseball Bunch | |
|---|---|
| Created by | Major League Baseball |
| Starring | Johnny Bench Tommy Lasorda The San Diego Chicken |
| Country of origin |  United States |
| No. of seasons | 3 |
| Production | |
| Running time | 30 minutes |
| Original release | |
| Network | Syndicated |
| Release | March 211982 – January 11985 |
The Baseball Bunch was a syndicated television show hosted by Johnny Bench that ran from March 21, 1982 until January 1, 1985. The Baseball Bunch was shown nationally on WTBS at 7 a.m. Eastern time on Saturday mornings.
Format
The show ran thirty minutes and featured children chosen from the Tucson, Arizona Little League. Each show was divided into two halves. The first half featured a current or former major league player demonstrating a baseball fundamental to the children as well as their sometimes humorous attempts to imitate the star. The second half featured a skit called "The Dugout Wizard" (played by Tommy Lasorda) who taught a second baseball fundamental (for example, use two hands to catch a fly ball). This second instructional unit was usually accompanied by a music video (then a genre in its embryonic stage) that showed players either performing the act or failing at it. Another star of the show was The San Diego Chicken.
Notable guest stars
Numerous major leaguers made appearance on The Baseball Bunch, including Bucky Dent, Tug McGraw, Bruce Sutter, Keith Hernandez, Jim Rice, Frank Robinson, Mike Schmidt, Pete Rose (who appeared twice), Andre Dawson, Cal Ripken, Jr., Ted Williams, Ken Singleton, Dan Quisenberry , Graig Nettles, Rick Dempsey, Tom Seaver, Joe Morgan and Ozzie Smith.
Supporting cast
The following persons were featured the first two seasons of The Baseball Bunch.
- Stacy Blythe as Michelle
- Linda Coslett as Kate
- Lance Crawford as Ozzie
- Hurst Dornan as Harold
- Jared Holland as Sam. According to the Jump the Shark website, Jared Holland attended Kansas State University and was a good debater. The same article claims Holland later committed suicide.
- Erik Lee as Rick
- Danny Santacruz as Louie
- Eddy Tonai as Freddie
- Tom McCabe as Andy
In later seasons, other appearances were made by:
- Tom Cribe as Billy
- John Fordney as Sherman (who replaced Hurst Dornan)
Lou Piniella's Injury
- Yankees outfielder Lou Piniella's playing career was ended in 1984 when he injured his rotator cuff on the show while being pitched to by The San Diego Chicken. However, Ted Giannoulas, the man inside the Chicken suit, in a 2007 podcast interview said the Piniella story was a "really big fable": "I read that on something called Wikipedia and I couldn't believe it. I laughed out loud. Lou Piniella was never injured in the making of The Baseball Bunch."