Pitch: Pilot

This is a show that isn't true, but it has the potential to be true. Major League Baseball finally has its first female player, Ginny Baker (Kylie Bunbury, who spent months training for this role). Ginny is a pitcher and most of her teammates are not thrilled that a girl is on their team.
The cast is great: Ali Larter is the cut-throat agent, Amelia, who believes that Ginny is the best thing ever, telling the limo driver point blank that Ginny is the most important passenger he's ever driver with Dan Lauria as the team's manager, pissed at a girl disrupting the status quo and Mark-Paul Gosselaar as the team's catcher, not pleased with having to share his spotlight with a woman. Bob Balaban is the team's owner with Michael Beach as Ginny's overbearing papa, thrilled that at least one of his children loves baseball, but tough, determined to give her a secret weapon which results in the waste of perfectly good nectarines.
Ginny also has her own private locker room where she can hear what her teammates truly think through the vent, dealing with mixed comments from Mike Lawson (Gosselaar) who thinks she's talented but still isn't fond of her.
Ginny is the heroine of many little girls and has so much pressure on her. She isn't nervous, at first, but as it gets closer to her start, the nerves kick in and she's wild on the mound, disappointing in her first, brief appearance. She insists on leaving the game after just ten pitches, none of them any good. She is furious at herself and urges the little girls to find another role model, because she just can't cut it. And she's experienced, with five seasons of minor league and two seasons of winter ball under her belt. They don't send her down because they can't stomach the bad publicity it would bring. So she gets another chance, and takes it, after some great, inspiring words from the womanizing Mike.
The only problem I have with the show is that you, the audience, is lied to. That's right. Ginny's dad, unable to smile at his only daughter as she makes her major league debut, is actually dead, killed in a tragic car accident just after a major league scout selects Ginny. It's all an hallucination. I hate being lied to and I think that this could cause problems in the long run. And the fight in the locker room after her first victory sours the moment. A new coach may be found soon as he hasn't completely changed with the times.
Now, the show is very stylized, great to look at and amazing, with the life-sized stadium, all realistic. Nothing is out of place and Bunbury is up to the task of an important and difficult role and fortunately, she just like Baker does have a good support system, but unlike Ginny, she doesn't need it. I just hope this show, unlike Empire, doesn't turn into a huge mess. And the camera work is amazing. Grade: B+