Remembering James Earl Jones and Mr. Mertle’s Man Cave

Good Thursday morning Uni Watchers. I hope everyone had a reflective Wednesday.

As you likely heard, on Monday, James Earl Jones passed away at the age of 93. To at least one generation if not more, he was the voice of Darth Vader and to another he was Mufasa, but his versatility and talent as an actor led him to star in movies and television, including a number of roles in films about baseball. Shortly after his passing, Uni Watch writer/contributor/pal Jimmy Parker, who has contributed many an article to Uni Watch, reached out to me and wrote, “(G)iven James Earl Jones’ passing yesterday I wanted to offer up an article spotlighting the items in Mr. Mertle’s man cave from The Sandlot (see attached images). It would be similar to the Ebbets Field souvenir stand piece I did awhile back, where I try to track down as many items as I can identify.”

After a quick back and forth ironing out the particulars, Jimmy has crafted another masterpiece of sleuthing, with an incredible attention to small details — a classic Uni Watch deep dive! Please enjoy this latest bit from Jimmy as he brings us down into …

• • • • •Mr. Mertle’s Man Cave
by Jimmy Parker

The world lost a unique talent this past Monday with the passing of acclaimed actor James Earl Jones at age 93. In a career that spanned 60 years, Jones shared the big and small screens as well as the stage with some of the biggest names in entertainment. Although he may be best remembered for his distinctive baritone, voicing such iconic characters as Darth Vader from Star Wars and Mufasa from Disney’s The Lion King, Jones held a special place in the hearts of sports fans.

Fans of the National Pastime will long remember Jones for a trio of baseball films beloved by fans young and old. Jones portrayed slugger Leon Carter in 1976’s The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings, starring alongside Billy Dee Williams and Richard Pryor.

In 1989’s Field of Dreams Jones starred in the role of reclusive author Terrance Mann, delivering the film’s iconic “People Will Come, Ray” monologue moments after perusing the 7th edition of The Baseball Encyclopedia in the bleachers. It’s interesting to note that in the book “Shoeless Joe”, upon which the film is based, the character is actually real life reclusive author J.D. Salinger, not Terrance Mann. Fearing legal action from Salinger the film’s screenwriters and producers substituted the fictional Mann. Without this change to the script, we may have missed out on one of the most quotable moments in movie, and baseball, history.

While Field of Dreams resonates with the romantics among baseball fans, collectors of sports memorabilia will most likely regard 1993’s The Sandlot as the ultimate James Earl Jones baseball role. [While what follows could technically be called spoilers, the movie IS over 30 years old, so I’m proceeding.]

In the film, Jones plays Mr. Mertle, a former baseball player who lives behind the sandlot’s outfield and owns “The Beast,” a guard dog of mythical proportions. When Smalls and Benny go to Mr. Mertle in a last ditch attempt to recover a Babe Ruth autographed baseball belonging to Scotty’s stepdad they are ushered into Mertle’s house, ultimately agreeing to visit him weekly to talk baseball in return for a ball signed by the 1927 Yankees, to replace the Ruth ball mangled by The Beast.

When the two youngsters enter into Mr. Mertle’s baseball room we are treated to a mancave that would make even some of the most advanced collectors of baseball memorabilia envious. Though the scene takes less than 5 minutes of screen-time, the room is packed with collectibles in every nook and cranny and I wanted to try to identify as many of them as I could. What follows are my attempts to ID the contents of Mr. Mertle’s Mancave.

As Benny and Smalls close the door behind them we see several black-and-white photos as well as a baseball arcade game. Unfortunately, most of the photos that we see in the room are too small and/or out-of-focus to be easily identified. While I wasn’t able to make a positive identification of the arcade game, of the ones I’ve found it seems most similar to this circa 1930s Marvel’s Pop-Up game.

Both game cabinets feature a coin slot in the middle with a directional wheel on either side, allowing the player to control a “fielder” who attempts to catch a ball that falls between pegs embedded in the game board.

As Mr. Mertle holds the Ruth ball destroyed by The Beast we get a closer look at a corner of his room and several of his pennants. Apparently Mertle is a Braves fan as he has a trio of Milwaukee Braves pennants from the 1950s. We also see two pennants on the other wall that I was unable to identify. The top one, dark blue with white screenprinting, appears to be a pennant for the New York Cubans of the Negro Leagues. The bottom one, white with red and perhaps brown screen printing, looks to be a Philadelphia Athletics pennant, with an elephant clearly perched on a baseball. Searches for these particular designs were unsuccessful, and I was unable to even find styles that were somewhat similar to these two.

When Mertle starts to go across the room to his curio cabinet, we get a wider view of this wall. Here we see another pennant, this one a red Cleveland Indians pennant with white and black screenprinting similar to one of the styles seen in the left column here. We also see a 1955 Greatest Moments in Sports 33 1/3 record, featuring Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig on the sleeve, sitting on top of a cabinet among other memorabilia. Scattered around the cabinet top, and also seen throughout the room, are several player busts from the 1963 Sports Hall of Fame Busts set. There were 20 players included in the set and their inclusion proves to be a slight slip up by the film’s set designer and prop masters as the film is set in 1962.

Above the cabinet we see a framed color print of the 1866 Currier & Ives lithograph “The American National Game of Base Ball: Grand Match for the Championship at the Elysian Fields, Hoboken, N. J.” depicting an 1865 championship game between the Mutual Club of Manhattan and the Atlantic Club of Brooklyn.

To the left of the print, we see some type of red, black and white piece that looks similar in style to many of the Louisville Slugger Famous Slugger Yearbooks that the bat manufacturer used to produce annually. However, efforts to match this to any Yearbook were unsuccessful.

As Mertle opens his curio cabinet to get his “Murderer’s Row” ball, we see more Hall of Fame busts atop the cabinet, along with several trophies and books. The book closest to camera is “Breakthrough To The Big League: The Story of Jackie Robinson”. While the book has a beautifully illustrated cover, this is another faux pas by the film’s creative team as the book was not published until 1965.

Directly in front of the Robinson book is a waxed paper Milwaukee Braves Popcorn Megaphone. While I was unable to find a match to this Braves version, souvenirs of this type have been employed by teams and other advertisers for years in a variety of styles and designs. Once the popcorn is removed, the smaller end of the tube can be removed allowing the in-stadium fan to cheer on their team even louder. This Minnesota Twins version even included areas for autographs and to enter the score.

On the wall above the curio cabinet, we see the bottom portion of what I believe to be this “The Great American Base Ball Game” from the 1920s, identifiable by its wooden framing and the pegs at the bottom corners of the game board. On the opposite wall we see a Detroit Tigers mini pennant and bat. While I was unable to find an exact match, mini bat and pennant sets in this style date to the 1930s and I found what I believe to be a match for the pennant style.

As Mertle talks to Smalls and Benny about his “good stuff” we get a wider view of the back wall, where we see what appear to be 1953 and 1954 Topps baseball cards. The cards are framed and visible directly behind Smalls but it is difficult to identify the players or tell if they are single cards or portions of original card sheets. In the curio cabinet between Benny and Smalls, we see more trophies as well as some figurines and the 1944 Louisville Slugger Famous Slugger Yearbook featuring Stan Musial on its cover.

Looking behind Benny we see 3 frames on the wall with what appear to be scorecards or programs of some kind. The one on the left is this 1940 Cincinnati Reds Scorebook while the other two remain unidentified despite my best efforts. The one on the right looks like it may feature a cardinal on the cover and St. Louis Cardinals programs often did have illustrated cardinals on their covers but I was not able to match it. On the other wall we see this red 1950s Cleveland Indians pennant with white screenprinted headdress and team name. Throughout the shots of Mr. Mertle seated at the table we see portions of baseball player figurines that look like they may be either a chess set or some type of table top game but efforts to identify them proved unsuccessful.

As Scotty Smalls stares into Mr. Mertle’s cabinet in amazement we are provided with the visual payoff to this touching scene. We get photographic verification that Mertle himself did indeed know “George Herman Ruth” when we see a young James Earl Jones airbrushed into a shot with Babe and Lou Gehrig.

Some may recognize the original photo as this 1930 shot of Ruth, Gehrig and A’s slugger Jimmie Foxx. Fewer will recognize that the film’s creative team did a fairly decent job of putting young Mertle into the uniform of the 1935 Pittsburgh Crawfords, with a stylized “P” on the jersey chest.

Rewatching this scene and trying to identify some of the memorabilia displayed brought a new appreciation to the film itself. The lengths that the film’s creators went to to make Mertle’s mancave (even if that phrase didn’t exist in 1962) seem authentic are to be appreciated. But for all the gravitas that the items lend to the scene, it would be far less successful without the unmistakable presence, voice and laughter of actor James Earl Jones. He and his talent will be missed, by baseball fans and fans of cinema for generations to come.

Note: If you have further information on any of the pieces mentioned in this article, or have information on any of the other pieces of memorabilia seen in the film, please contact the author.

• • • • •Thanks, Mr. Parker!

Jimmy is the proprietor of the most excellent Beauty Of A Game website, and he also goes by that handle on Twitter-X. Jimmy has contributed several articles in the past, and most recently did an absolutely fantastic piece on the Top 10 Sports Movie Posters of all time, as well as two wonderful articles on Norman Rockwell: Norman Rockwell — Uni Watcher? and Norman Rockwell — Behind The Scenes.

I also have a confession: I have never seen “The Sandlot.” It’s been on my *list* for years, but I’ve just never gotten around to watching it (and I love baseball movies — Jones is terrific in “Field of Dreams,” which I happen to think is a fantastic movie). I will definitely be checking it out now!

Readers? Your thoughts?