A Vulcan captain challenges Sisko to a game of baseball that the Captain feels he has to win.
This episode is built on immensely shaky ground. The baseball try-outs seem to consist solely of the series' main cast... and even the most useless people get on the team! Plus, as per too often in Star Trek the senior staff consists of the station counsellor who's been around for about five minutes, and an Ensign recently out of the Academy. Hardly likely, is it?
However, if you stop trying to take the episode seriously, it's actually surprisingly good fun. It has some amusing moments, and it's nice to see Dax having some fun and the usual supporting cast making an appearance, especially Kasidy Yates, who's been away far too long.
The only real problem with my perspective here though is that I have no idea how to play baseball, so watching the scoreboard meant nothing to me, and I didn't find any of the discussions about the rules funny as I had no idea what they were talking about. It is nice though that for once the writers don't expect us to believe that this team of inepts could actually win, that the worst player could pull off a lucky swing at the last minute, or that by some fluke the Niners pull off a stunning victory at the last minute.
Put your brain in neutral, and it's a passable way to spend 45 minutes. But if you want to pick the idea to pieces (and you can), you'll really hate this one.
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