Hardball

Conor O'Neill is a small-time ticket scalper and gambler in Chicago whose losing bets leave him deeply in debt. When his friend Jimmy, now working at a bank, offers a way out, Conor reluctantly agrees to coach a Little League baseball team from the Cabrini-Green housing project. The children are short on skill and discipline, and Conor has little patience for them, but he keeps at it, encouraged by Elizabeth Wilkes, a teacher at the school the players attend. As the season goes on, the team begins to improve and Conor's own outlook shifts along with it.

Brian Robbins directed the film, the fourth in the run of features he made between Good Burger in 1997 and A Thousand Words in 2012. Keanu Reeves plays Conor, Diane Lane plays Elizabeth Wilkes, and the cast includes John Hawkes and, among the young players, Michael B. Jordan. John Gatins and Daniel Coyle wrote the screenplay.

Released in September 2001, the film runs 106 minutes. Made for a budget of 32 million dollars, it took in about 44 million worldwide. On IMDb it holds a rating of 6.4 from roughly 36,000 votes, and on TMDB 6.5 from some 581 votes. A critics' rating of 5 out of 10, drawn from 113 reviews, sits below the audience scores.