PITCH Recap “The Interim”

By Ruby Campos

Gin-Sanity

After last week’s remarkable introduction into the show, Pitch delivers another solid episode as Ginny Baker faces more difficulties in fitting in with the team and keeping up with a good public image.

After a brief montage of news coverage on Ginny, the Padres, and more Ginny, the team members are seen hanging out at a bar, and Ginny seems to be fitting in, teasing and joking around with her teammates, one of the guys, as she had been hoping. However, the atmosphere changes since it’s hard not to notice that every channel on the bar’s TV features Ginny. One of the players cannot handle it and actually leaves the bar.

Something else going on behind the scenes? Frank, the owner of the Padres, isn’t all too happy with how the team has been playing lately. Furthermore, he wants the team’s general manager, Oscar, to do something about it, meaning manager Al needs out and a new manager needs in.

Things go from bad to worse as a clip of the manager from 2 years ago surfaces. In it, Al is asked about Minor Leagues player, Ginny Baker. All he has to say about her? She’s easy on the eyes and he’d love to have her on the team. Yikes.

Later, Al does apologize to Ginny for the comment. He also tells her that his daughter is a doctor, and she’s beautiful, but being beautiful is not the most important thing about her. He feels awkward and tells her that he doesn’t know whether or not he’s saying the right things, but Ginny gets the message.

But literally immediately after he apologizes to her in private, Al releases an apology to the press and moves past it a little too quickly. When the reporters start asking about the team’s recent subpar playing, Al tries to steer the questions back onto Ginny and “how pretty she is”. Well, that lasted about 2 seconds.

As the episode gets closer to the end, Ginny is about to interview with Jimmy Kimmel. Her agent, Amelia has been warning her throughout the episode to keep things light, and not to release a statement in support of Al, and to just stick with the fun skit about “Ginny’s Clubhouse Decorating Tips.”

Ginny starts out the interview casual and light, but stops the decorating tips skit before it happens. Things get serious, she needs to address the current buzz around her and the Padres. She says that yes, her manager’s comment about her was stupid, but he also says a lot of stupid things, and that particular stupid comment was made over a year ago. There are more important things to worry about. And although she previously refused to talk about it after being approached by a reporter (who we find out in the episode is Mike’s ex-wife), Ginny also takes this moment to address the sexual assault in a track and field locker room that has been in the headlines. She makes a simple yet powerful statement. Girls shouldn’t be sexually assaulted because they stepped into the wrong locker room. She also asserts that it is not a girl’s fault for being sexually assaulted and boys need to know that rape is wrong.

Ginny’s interview is spliced with Mike’s angry lecture to the team. In short, Al’s probably going to get fired and most of the guys can’t get over themselves long enough to play well because there’s a girl on the team. He’s sick of them acting like spoiled kids instead of baseball players, he doesn’t want to spend his last years as a player with a losing team that is doing nothing to improve their playing and attitudes.

After these two reality checks given to the Padres and the world, the episode ends a bit like how it started. The team is out again and Ginny seems much more content, and invites the guys to come dance with her, however, Mike looks anything but content and sullenly leaves the team to have their fun.

More Flashbacks: Agent Amelia

Like last week’s episode, we get a fair amount of flashbacks to Ginny’s past. This week’s subject? We’re taken back to how Amelia came to be Ginny’s agent.

Set some time after her father’s death but before she’s a Major Leagues player, we see Ginny and her brother/agent, Will, after a game where they run into Amelia, who has come all the way to Texas because she’s interested in taking on Ginny.

Amelia takes the siblings out for some drinks and tries persuading them to let her be Ginny’s new agent. While she compliments Will on a few of his tactics to get Ginny’s name out there and his obvious love for his sister, Amelia tells him that he’s in over his head and that under with her skills she could get Ginny to the Majors way faster than he could. The two refuse, but at the next game the stands are packed with people and signs, all Amelia’s doing. Will quickly changes his mind and urges Ginny to hire the Hollywood agent, he knows that he could never even begin to figure out how to get the right people to see his sister play.

Back to the present, after the Jimmy Kimmel interview, Ginny asks why Amelia ever came all the way to Texas to represent a ballplayer. We then get one last flashback for the episode, except this time the scene takes place in a doctor’s office. Amelia and her husband are having difficulties having children and her spouse swiftly calls off the marriage, leaving Amelia shaken, although she won’t let him have the benefit of seeing her cry. She’s sitting in her office with her coworkers and sees footage of Ginny playing on a TV in the other room and subsequently quits. Brought back to the present, Amelia tells Ginny that she just knew the ballplayer needed her.

An Aging Ball Player

Episode 2 gave us a lot more background on Mike’s character as well. Last week, it was mentioned that he was oldest member of the team, but this week we learn he has been feeling the effects of aging. There is a scene early on where he’s sitting in a tub icing his knees, and later another where he and Ginny are at the gym doing extra workouts, Ginny has to work harder because she’s a woman, Mike does because he’s a 36-year-old catcher with bad knees.

In this episode Mike has to go to his ex’s house to go through his things. About halfway through when he does go, he tells Rachel that he knows baseball always came first in their marriage, and that is what drove her to cheat on him. But he is 36 and his knees aren’t doing so great, he’ll be retired in a few years. He tells her he wants to give their marriage another try, but she tells him she’s engaged.

Mike’s story for the episode closes after he lectures his team members for having to babysit them, but they’re the only people he’s got. While Ginny and the other players are out dancing, Mike goes to sit with the solitary Amelia and it fades to black.

Other Notes

• I still love Blip, and his relationship with his wife, Evelyn. Since the episode featured Mike’s and Amelia’s failed marriages, it was great seeing the couple in such a loving relationship like Blip and Evelyn. The side storyline about Blip’s lucky shirt was fun to watch.
• I love the musical backdrop of the show, it’s very fitting to the tone and appropriately adds to the energy and emotion of the show.
• I really enjoyed how they balanced out Ginny’s storyline this week while we got to know Amelia and Mike better, sometimes shows don’t do so well balancing their characters, so this was nice to watch.
• I LOVED that the show made that statement about sexual assault so concise and just totally to the point; rape is wrong, it’s not the victim’s fault.

Catch Pitch next Thursday at 9/8c on Fox.