In Honor Of James Van Der Beek, These Are The 5 Best Sports Movies Of All Time
Spoiler alert: Varsity Blues is ABSOLUTELY on this list.
The news of actor James Van Der Beek's passing has continued to ripple through the online community even 24 hours later.
Tributes have poured in from former costars and fans alike, showing how impactful his roles were to children of the 90s.
While many knew Van Der Beek from his role as the titular Dawson Leery on Dawson's Creek, sports junkies will always remember him as the gunslinging West Texas high school quarterback Jon Moxon in Varsity Blues.
In that vein, to honor the memory of Van Der Beek, I will be sharing my five favorite sports movies of all time, and, yes, Varsity Blues is absolutely one of them.
They may not be your favorites, so make sure you email me and let me know what you think is the greatest sports movie ever made.
Alright, enough of the small talk, let's get the ball rolling!
5. Moneyball (2011)
I've had a sort of love-hate relationship with this movie, and it's not for reasons you might think.
The baseball scenes and the front office stuff is near perfection for a big-budget, Hollywood drama, but the family subplot interspersed between the Oakland A's legendary 2002 win streak always gives me mood whiplash.
With all that being said, I LOVE this movie.
Brad Pitt absolutely crushes it as Billy Beane, a man ahead of his time with the idea of piecing together a championship roster while strapped for cash, and the chemistry between he and Jonah Hill really puts this one over the top for me.
Yeah, I know, Moneyball conveniently omits the fact that the A's had that year's MVP, Miguel Tejada, as well as three All-Star pitchers in Barry Zito, Mark Mulder, and Tim Hudson.
It's not perfect, but it's a great story and a fantastic movie with some of the best baseball content you could ever ask for in a blockbuster film.
4. Remember The Titans (2000)
Back when Disney made incredible sports movies like Miracle instead of farting out another superhero flop, we were gifted with what is perhaps the greatest football movie of all time.
Remember The Titans stars Denzel Washington as Herman Boone, a real-life high school football coach whose team helped ease racial tensions in Alexandria, Virginia, in the early 70s.
Washington delivers a powerhouse performance and the story is a beautiful tale about putting differences aside and coming together to achieve something greater than yourself.
It's a super quotable film, and it delivers equal parts humor, drama, and football that even the most cynical pigskin fans will find enjoyable.
I still get goosebumps every time Boone delivers his speech of unity at Gettysburg.
For a Disney movie in the early 2000s, Remember The Titans is way better than it has any right to be, and it's a classic that I still revisit quite often.
3. Major League (1989)
While the first two entries on this list are semi-historically accurate dramas, Major League is a straight-up comedy, but don't let that stop you from enjoying this one if you're a serious seam-head.
Baseball fans will absolutely love this movie and if you see it at least once, you'll be quoting it until your lungs give out.
The cast of characters in this Major League is legendary. Many fans of this film remember Charlie Sheen's Ricky "Wild Thing" Vaughn as the standout, but guys like down-on-his-luck catcher Jake Taylor (Corbin Bernsen) and speedy airhead Willie Mays Hayes (Wesley Snipes) absolutely steal the show.
Even the secondary characters like Cerrano and Dorn will elicit laughs and have their own memorable moments, so give this one a watch towards the end of spring training when your need for baseball reaches a fever pitch.
2. Varsity Blues (1999)
The reason for the article!
Maybe it's because I lived in Texas for six years and covered the sport as part of my job, but this movie is a perfect representation of just how seriously they take their high school football in the Lone Star State
When it comes to teen movies and sports films, the perfect intersection is Varsity Blues.
James Van Der Beek plays Jonathan "Mox" Moxon, a backup quarterback who gets reluctantly thrust into action after star signal caller, Lance Harbor (Paul Walker), goes down with a season-ending injury.
From playing a game hungover after a night at a strip club, to rallying around each other to spite their grade-A jerkoff of a head coach, Bud Kilmer (Jon Voight), Mox and his teammates go on a journey of personal growth and we are all just happy to be along for the ride.
It's got humor, it's got drama, it's got feel-good moments.
You'll laugh. You'll cry. You'll feel like you're living in West Texas the way you're cheering for a high school football team full of misfits like the Coyotes.
1. The Sandlot (1993)
With respect to every other movie on this list and sports movies in general, I don't think they make them any more perfect than The Sandlot.
It's a perfect coming of age tale with a perfect backdrop of baseball in the 1960s to help tell the story of Scotty Smalls, a 12-year-old who moves to California and struggles to make friends until neighborhood legend, Benny "The Jet" Rodriguez, invites him to play baseball at the local sandlot.
The cast of characters is incredibly iconic, and the movie has some of the most quotable scenes in cinema history.
The soundtrack adds to the nostalgic vibe, delivering late 50s and early 60s hits that will almost fool you into thinking you grew up right alongside these kids.
And that's the true magic of The Sandlot. Anyone watching this movie will be magically transported back to when they were 12 years old, spending their summer vacations riding bikes and playing baseball until the streetlights came on.
Nostalgia is a powerful drug, and The Sandlot practically hooks you up to an IV machine and drip feeds it into your veins.
If you're over the age of 25, put this movie on one summer night and try not to reminisce about the days of carefree games of baseball at the park or campouts in someone's backyard.
The Sandlot might be as close to a perfect movie as we will ever get, and it's my runaway number 1 on this list of all-time sports movies as a result.