A League of Their Own — one of the greatest sports movies ever that’s also in the running for best best baseball movie of all time — was released 28 years ago Wednesday, as ESPN pointed out. Through fictional characters, the iconic film focuses on the early story of the real All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, which was created during World War II and crowned its last champion in 1954.
But nearly three decades later, the film’s fans are still contentiously debating and examining the end of the fictional World Series Game 7 to answer this question: Did Dottie purposely drop the ball?
The tumultuous relationship between catcher Dottie Hinson (played by Geena Davis) and her sister, Kit Keller (played by Lori Petty), a pitcher, is the primary conflict throughout the movie, as Kit is constantly trying to step out of Dottie’s shadow and make a name for herself. It’s particularly relatable to people who grew up being ultra-competitive with their siblings.
In the World Series, Dottie and Kit are on opposing teams, and in Game 7, Kit has the chance to be the hero at the plate in the bottom of the ninth with two outs when her team is losing. She makes contact, flies around the bases and plows into Dottie at home plate. As Kit crashes into Dottie, they both tumble to the ground. And the ball that was once in Dottie’s glove rolls out of her right hand, as Kit becomes the team’s World Series hero.
So, did Dottie drop the ball on purpose to help lift her sister up to this triumphant moment?
No, Dottie did not purposely drop the ball.
Whether it was on their Oregon farm or on the field, Dottie and Kit are extremely competitive, like most athletes. Dottie has more natural talent, but Kit is more passionate about the game. In addition to being a star player on the team, Dottie becomes a face of the league itself, casting an even larger shadow for Kit to climb out of. Dottie may not love the game the way Kit does, but she proves throughout the movie she’s tough and absolutely wants to win.
And despite briefly deciding to drive back to Oregon with her wounded husband, Bob, back from the war, Dottie also demonstrates her loyalty to the team when she returns for Game 7 presumably because she feels a responsibility to play (and because she still loves the game too).
So why in the world would a competitive, professional athlete who treated her sister like any other player — she was arguably harder on Kit — purposely hand her sister the victory? She wouldn’t.
Dottie, presumably, came back for just one more game before carrying on with the rest of her life married to Bill Pullman. She came back to win, not to throw the game and allow someone else become the hero.
Still not convinced? Maybe Petty, who played Kit, can help. Via this 2017 anniversary story from The Ringer:
“I knew you were going to ask me that,” says Petty, because it’s what everyone always wants to know; the internet is filled with painstaking did-she-or-didn’t-she analyses that delve into Dottie’s mind-set; her level of fitness and rustiness following her decision to bail on the team with Dull Bob at the start of the playoffs, only to have a change of heart in Yellowstone; her “high fastballs: she can’t hit ’em, she can’t lay off ’em” advice to the pitcher, who needs only one more out for the championship; her ball protection (or lack thereof); and her maybe-foreshadowing comments at the start of the film to her grandsons (“Now remember, no matter what you brother does, he’s littler than you are. Give him a chance to shoot,” she says to the older one; to the younger, she hisses: “Kill him!”). “They’re insane,” Petty says of the forensic sleuths who talk endlessly about all of this. “I kicked her ass!”
Davis, who played Dottie, spoke about it in a 2017 ESPNW oral history about the film. But she gave an answer fans probably won’t love:
“I’ll say two things about that. No. 1: I know the answer. Because it was me, of course, I know the answer. And No. 2: No, I’m not going to answer that question.
“I never have, and I never will.”
She doesn’t need to answer that question because we already know what it is. There is no way Dottie dropped the ball on purpose.
In the same ESPNW story, Bitty Schram — who played Evelyn Gardner and had Tom Hanks yell, “There’s no crying in baseball!” at her — said:
“[But did Dottie drop the ball] on purpose at the end of the movie? If I had to pick, I would say subconsciously yes because she knew how much more it meant to Kit, and she was too good of a player. From what I remember subconsciously, yes.”
So even if that theory is true and Dottie dropped it subconsciously, it, therefore, still wasn’t on purpose.
For the dominant, jaw-dropping playmaker Dottie is, she’s also human and capable of making mistakes. Dropping the ball after Kit smashes into her is the underdog finally the edge over the rockstar player who just had to hold on tight. Kit simply got the best of Dottie at the most inopportune time.
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