The ball happened to be the one hit by San Francisco Giants slugger Barry Bonds for his record-setting 73rd home run at the end of the 2001 MLB season. When the ball landed in the right-field bleachers at what was then Pac Bell Park (San Francisco), there was a mad scramble for the precious ball, bodies piled up on the walkway above McCovey Cove. Patrick Hayashi, who stood quietly with a sheepish grin on his face as the scrum continued, eventually held the historic ball up for a TV camera to reveal that he had possession of it. MLB and Giants security grabbed Mr. Hayashi and escorted him down to the bowels of the ballpark and authenticated his baseball as the true #73.
Lou Gehrig (Cooper) is a young Columbia University student whose old-fashioned mother (Elsa Janssen) wants him to study hard and become an engineer. But the young man has a gift for baseball. A sportswriter (Brennan) befriends Gehrig and persuades a scout to come see him play. Before long Gehrig signs with the team he has always revered, the New York Yankees. With the help of his father (Ludwig Stössel), he endeavors to keep his career change a secret from his mother.
Bert Tulliver (Dix), a pitcher for a baseball team in a small town, is given the opportunity to try out for a team in the big leagues. Unfortunately, he incurs the enmity of McRae (McCullough), the league's leading home-run hitter. In addition, Bert falls for the team owner's daughter Mary (Arthur), who McRae has designs on.
During his year in the fifth grade, ten-year-old Joshua Beal (Joseph Cross) begins a personal search to find answers about life and death — a journey triggered by the passing of his beloved grandfather (Robert Loggia).
The actual members of the Hong Kong National Baseball Team appear in the film as themselves, in a story set in 2004. Their isolated existence leads them to take unconventional choices in both love and friendship, and to summon great courage in the face of their lonely and disconnected existence.
Kim Sang-nam (Jung Jae-young), a hot-tempered professional baseball player, is sent to the countryside to coach a team of hearing-impaired players in order to avoid media coverage of his recent involvement in an assault case. At first, Sang-nam has a difficult time imagining how he can teach baseball to a group of boys who can’t hear, but as he spends time with them he starts to believe that they can play the game. Motivated, Sang-nam decides to help them prepare for the nationals. As Sang-nam trains them, he forms bonds with the players, as well as with the music teacher and baseball manager Ms. Na (Yoo Sun). But things don’t go the way Kim plans and their difficulties communicating with one another exacerbates the situation.