UA baseball player Sawyer Gieseke hits a home run with 'Major League' spoof

Arizona senior infielder Sawyer Gieseke didn’t play in Friday’s season opener at Hi Corbett Field. He had just 11 at-bats last year.

But the film and television major from the Bay Area already went deep last week. His 3 minute 10 second promotional video/spoof of the 1980s movie “Major League” was exceptional. Or maybe better than that. (See the video below).

“Sawyer is a special talent,” said UA coach Jay Johnson. “The video caught more attention than anyone could’ve anticipated, in a good way.”

By Friday, more than 400,000 views of Gieseke’s work had been linked on social media, and hundreds of thousands more on ESPN and other cable TV platforms.

Gieseke’s video, the brainchild of former Star football beat writer Daniel Berk, now a UA media relations official, was shot in about two hours. Gieseke did all the casting and filming.

Some of the 1989 movie, starring Charlie Sheen and Wesley Snipes, was filmed at Hi Corbett Field. Gieseke got all of it right, including Jay Johnson’s crusty deep-voice as Cleveland manager Lou Brown, played in the movie by James Gammon.

About the only thing Gieseke missed was having a part for former Arizona outfielder Mike Thorell, who was among the ballplayers cast during Hi Corbett Field filming sessions 29 years ago.

Thorell, who remains a strong UA baseball follower, is now president/CEO of Pinnacle Bank in the greater Phoenix area.