Talent For The Game

TALENT FOR THE GAME is a pleasant but empty vessel, not in the same league as recent high-scorers BULL DURHAM and FIELD OF DREAMS. The plot moves forward with the unadorned quality of a fable, but there's no moral at the end to put the whole thing in perspective.

Virgil Sweet (Edward James Olmos) lives for baseball. An ex-player sidelined by an injury, Sweet serves as a talent scout for the California Angels, combing the farms and small towns of America for a "phenom"--that player who "rises out of the perfect earth"--who will also get the Angels out of a slump. When callow young advertising whiz Gil Lawrence (Terry Kinney) buys the team, however, Sweet's job i...