The true story of Star Trek’s most famous baseball game

According to Chris Snellgrove
| Published 32 seconds ago

Star Trek has often been strangely fixated on baseball. Deep Space Ninefor example, it shows that Captain Sisko has a fierce passion for the old sport and keeps a baseball in his office as a prize. The spinoff even gave us a hilarious baseball game pitting the DS9 crew against the cocky Vulcans, and fans still love to cosplay by wearing the same Niners baseball jerseys as in the “Take Me Out To the Holosuite” episode. However, Star Trek most the famous baseball game was probably the one in which the reference was made A new generation episode “Evolution”, which refers to the 1951 National League tiebreaker between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants.

The Star Trek writer loves baseball

If you’re one of the many Star Trek fans who don’t watch much actual baseball, the main plot of “Evolution” might have been confusing. This episode features an eccentric scientist with a passion for baseball, and instead of recreating classic games in a simulator, he recreates them in his mind as a sort of reward for himself. He demonstrates his skills by reciting “Lockman on first, Dark on second, Thomson at the plate, Branca on the mound”, a direct reference to the aforementioned game between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants, although the makeup has some crucial significance. errors.

Star Trek: The new generation showrunner Michael Piller wrote “Evolution” and is a huge baseball fan (more on that later) and chose this game because it’s so special. This clash of baseball titans led to the so-called “Shot Heard ‘Round the World. That’s the affectionate nickname for New York Giants outfielder Bobby Thomson, who walked home in the ninth inning to help his team win the National League pennant. That’s what made this 1951 game memorable for sports fans, but the baseball superfan at the heart of “Evolution,” Dr. Paul Stubbs, in fact, got things wrong in crucial details when narrating the play.

Despite Star Trek guru Michael Piller’s great love for baseball, he got a few details wrong when he wrote to Stubbs: “Lockman on first, Dark on second, Thomson at the plate, Branca on the mound.” Because Giants shortstop Clint Hartung was out, the lineup was a little different . To be completely accurate, former prodigy Stubbs should have said, “Lockman at second, Hartung at third, Thomson at the plate, Branca on the mound.”

While he may have gotten a few details wrong, we doubt the late great Piller lost any sleep over this mistake…after all, it was the Star Trek script and his baseball references that helped land him the showrunner job. A new generation. Before Piller, Michael Wagner was briefly the showrunner, but he soon left the production and the “Evolution” script helped Piller land executive producer Rick Berman. Piller later said that Berman “shared my love of baseball” and that Stubbs’ speech “hit him right between the eyes,” leading to a “partnership” in which Piller became showrunner of the insanely popular. science fiction spinoff.

There you have it folks: if Star Trek: The Next Generation episode “Evolution” wasn’t so concerned about baseball, Michael Piller might not have gotten the showrunner job and LPG could have continued to be something of a hot mess instead of “evolving” into one of the biggest shows in television history. And if it weren’t for Berman and Piller’s mutual love of America’s greatest pastime, we might not have gotten Captain Sisko’s own baseball obsession, let alone “Take Me Out To the Holosuite,” a near-perfect episode of DS9.

Star Trek fans as a franchise owe a lot to the creators’ passionate love of baseball, so we’re here to ask an important question: when will Trek baseball legend Buck Bokai finally get his own Picard– stylish solo series?