Fact1: Conor Worried shows up at baseball field, Fact2: rag tag bunch of trash-talking street-wise inner city kids live in projects, Fact3: people have to sit on projects floor in apartments to avoid stray bullets, Fact4: Conor 's efforts are hindered from onset, Fact5: life is threatened for not paying gambling debts
Output: Conor ONeill Keanu Reeves is a gambler who secretly bets 6,000 on his dead fathers account and is now severely in debt with two bookies. In order to repay the debts, he is told by a corporate friend that he must coach a baseball team of troubled fifth grade kids from Chicagos ABLA housing projects in exchange for 500 each week, for ten weeks. Worried only about getting his 500 check, Conor shows up at the baseball field to a rag tag bunch of trashtalking, streetwise, inner city kids who live in the projects, where people have to sit on the floor in their apartments to avoid stray bullets. Conors efforts are hindered from the onset by the fact that he does not have nine kids to make up the team—one kid, having altered his birth certificate to be younger and another, GBaby DeWayne Warren, who is far too young to play. The kids tell Conor it is because their teacher, Elizabeth Sister Wilkes Diane Lane, is making several boys finish a book report. Conor visits the teacher, but his life is threatened repeatedly by his bookies for not paying his gambling debts. He is visited by the mother of three boys that are allowed to play in exchange for his tutoring them. Conor works to get the team to support each other and stop trashtalking each others bad plays; but the team nevertheless, loses its first game 16–1, which fosters hostility between the players. Conor brings them together by buying them pizza trading sports tickets for the pizza and leads the team to win their second game 9–3. The team starts to come together as Conor tries to kindle a romance with Wilkes. Conor risks everything and makes a 12,000 bet with a new bookie to cover the 12,000 debt he owes to the other bookies. His stress, already high from his gambling debts, runs higher at the baseball field because one of his players is pulled from playing after a competing coach questions the boys age. Conor takes offense to the league presidents threat to be removed, after he voices his objection to his team having to wear ratty Tshirts while the other teams have full uniforms. In protest, he announces it was his last game which draws dissension and resentment from his players. Conor barely wins his 12,000 bet, pays off all his debts, and is pressured into making another bet for 24,000 using his 12,000 winnings. Conor connects with the kids and finds it harder to leave than he thought it would. He surprises them with second row seats behind Sammy Sosas dugout to a major league game. He stops gambling; his relationship with Wilkes grows; he gets new uniforms for the players sponsored by one of his bookies; and he assumes a fatherly role in leading the team to the championship game called, going to the ship by the boys. Just after Conor drops the kids at home after winning the prechampionship game, GBaby is struck and killed by a stray bullet. Conor wants to forfeit the game, but GBabys older brother rallies the team together.