OK, among two-sport athletes, David Neidorf isn’t up there with Bo Jackson or Deion Sanders. He never climbed a wall to make a snag or gave a Hall of Fame acceptance speech. You almost certainly don’t know his name. Still, if you’re any sort of sports or movie fan, you remember his finest moments—you just know him by other names. He was Everett, the son of the town drunk in Hoosiers. Later, he was Bobby, a second baseman cut loose in mid-season in Bull Durham.
Neidorf had roles in other Oscar-nominated films—Platoon, Empire of the Sun and Born on the Fourth of July—but retired from acting in the mid-’90s and later moved to Bend, Ore., where he’s a businessman and father. His player’s-eye view of life is maybe a little too candid for DVD extras, but gives you an idea of what life was like on Hickory’s surprise championship team and the bus-riding Durham Bulls.
HOOSIERS
AUDITION I really didn’t know what I was getting into. I had landed an agent and had been doing auditions for about six months. I read for the part of Everett—the hospital scene where Everett tells his father he loves him. I think I made a good impression—I could tell by the reaction of [director] David Anspaugh. Part of the audition was done in the gym. I hadn’t ever played organized basketball, but I could play a lot better than some of the actors like Chad Lowe, Rob Lowe’s brother, who was auditioning for the same part.
TEAM BUILDING The rest of the guys were from Indiana. All but Maris Valainis [Jimmy Chitwood] had been varsity ballplayers. Brad Long [Buddy] and Steve Hollar [Rade] played NCAA. My roommate, Wade Schenck, played Ollie, the sub with the underhand free throw. Wade was the youngest kid in the cast and a really good ballplayer. He was a farm kid, never spent much time in the city. He blew his first two paycheques on his car and then left it outside with the keys in the ignition. We had to tell him, “You’re not on the farm anymore.” During the weeks of the shoot, we played a lot of ball together, and by the [time we shot the] championship game, other than Maris’s big shot, there wasn’t a lot that was choreographed. We competed hard against the other guys.
DENNIS HOPPER AND GENE HACKMAN Dennis was great with us. He hung out with us, went to bars and strip clubs, but he had given up drinking. His character overlapped with what was going on in his life. Gene didn’t want to be there. He was in a slump with roles and thought the film was going to kill his career.
HICKORY’S STORY ALMOST DIDN’T GET TOLD Fact is, the production was in a lot of trouble. It went over budget and things were getting cut. It got behind schedule. Gene wanted David [Anspaugh] fired. He was just hanging on [until the end of shooting].
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BULL DURHAM
AUDITION I totally faked it. I walked into the room and saw a baseball. I picked it up and started tossing, and [director] Ron Shelton said, “Yeah, you can always tell when a guy has played.”
KEVIN COSTNER, TIM ROBBINS AND SUSAN SARANDON It was like the three leads were in three different movies. Kevin was real, Tim played things as broad comedy and Susan was in a breathy rom-com. Tim didn’t look or act like a ballplayer, but Kevin was completely believable. He didn’t have a catcher’s body, but he could throw out runners. At the plate he switch-hit and even hit homers during the shooting. All the leads were really supportive. Kevin was generous, earnest, not jaded like more-established stars, and wanted the film to be good. Tim was really smart—a cultured guy, a thinker, unlike his character.
TENSIONS BEHIND THE SCENES Tommy Silardi [Tony, the outfielder] bugged everybody. Tim hated him, and they got into a shouting match. Tim didn’t like Danny Gans [Deke, the third baseman] either. Danny had played minor-league baseball, and [eventually] became a comic and impressionist, doing Vegas shows.
KILLING TIME Really, Bull Durham was more fun on the set just because we could goof off a lot more. Most of the extras were farm guys for the Atlanta Braves, and while other stuff was going on, we’d be shagging flies or playing baseball golf. It was probably like it is with real baseball teams—a lot of downtime.
FULL FRONTAL Ron came to us and said he wanted someone to do a full-frontal shot in a shower scene. None of us wanted [to do it]. It ended up being Billy O’Leary, who played the religious virgin kid who married Millie, the easy girl who had been with Nuke and others. Billy really wanted to do it, and if you watch closely enough you can understand why.
This story initially appeared in the August 2016 issue of Sportsnet magazine.