. . . DEATH ON THE DIAMOND virtually gives viewers a play-by-play of this sport's upcoming Bud Selig Era. As "'Roid Rage" claims the lives of more and more former hopped-up Real Life "stars," one cannot help but see the handwriting on the wall for all of this prospective carnage as the St. Louis Cardinal's top slugger John "Truck" Hogan succumbs to a similar fatal poisoning minutes after a Red Birds victory toward the end of DEATH ON THE DIAMOND. (Selig still backs Lance Armstrong's candidacy for the Bicycling Hall of Fame!) Furthermore, when a sniper guns down the Card's Duncan Spencer as he's rounding third with the tying run (and two out in the bottom of the Ninth) during a pivotal contest and the Commissioner callously saddles the home team with a devastating defeat because dead men cannot score, what does this remind you of? Right, it's perfectly analogous with Selig viciously ordering the 2001 baseball season to resume as if nothing happened while 9-11 victims were still roasting at Ground Zero in New York City solely to enable Racist Cheater Big Head Bonds to continue bad-mouthing the Nelson Mandela of Baseball--New York's George Herman "Babe" Ruth--while making a mockery of the sport's most hallowed standards!

(there are Spoilers) Unusual murder mystery involving the National League St Louis Cardinels baseball team who's star player seem to be targeted by an unseen assassin in order to keep the team from winning the league pennant.It's when Cardinel owner manager Pop Clark, David Landau, bought Texas League pitching ace Larry Kelly, Robert Young, for a cool $25,000 that the team started to move up the ladder from the cellar to first place. With the St.Louis mobsters headed by big boss Joe Karnes, Henry C. Gordon, betting heavily against the Cardinels to win he pennant they try to get Kelly to throw an important game against the Cincinnati Reds by leaving an envelope of $10,000.00 in his hotel room. To prove that he's not involved with the Karnes Mob Kelly not only beats the Reds but pitches a no-hitter against them!With Kelly not going alone with the mob he's later injured when the taxi he's in has it's tire blown out, with a high-powered rifle, causing it to overturn and Kelly put out action for two weeks. With the Cardinals still holding on to first place despite their star pitcher Larry Kelly being on the disabled list three of the top Cardinels players end up dead, with their deaths taking place in the ballpark, under the most suspicious circumstances: Gunshot strangulation and poisoning.***SPOILERS*** With the pennant now just a game away the Cardinals bring in Kelly to pitch the final game of the season also against the Reds more to get the killer out in the open, with Kelly as bait, then to win the game! In fact it's Kelly himself who catches the killer, while on the mound, by bopping him on the head with a fastball as he tried to sneak a time-bomb into his warm-up jacket! It's then that the real deal or truth comes out to who this assassin is and even more important whom he's working for! ***MAJOR SPOILER*** The person who's been trying to get the team off Joe Clarks hands since spring training by keeping it in last place in order for Joe to be forced to hand it over to him.P.S Over the top and hysterical final sequence by the killer when he's finally exposed and captured by the police and Cardinel players. This guy gave the performance of his life that should have easily earned him hands down the Academy Award for best actor in 1934 over Cark Gable's performance in the movie "It Happened One Night"! Even though he was in the film "Death on the Diamond" in a supporting role!

Death on the Diamond (1934) ** (out of 4) I love a good murder-mystery but I think there are probably lines that shouldn't be crossed. This film passes that line and just keeps going and going and going. The Manager/Owner of the St. Louis Cardinals pays good money to bring in star pitcher Larry Kelly (Robert Young) so that they can win a championship and save the team. Someone else doesn't want them to win and soon players are being killed one by one. It's up to Kelly and the owner's daughter (Madge Evans) to try and strike up a relationship as well as catch the madman. I think having a murder-mystery set on a baseball field is pretty far-fetched but I guess with the right screenplay something entertaining could have been done with it. Sadly, this isn't the screenplay and in the end one can't help be rather bored by the actual story but nevertheless the film manages to be entertaining simply because you haven't seen anything like it before (or since). I think the biggest problem is that the story, in its "B" picture form, just doesn't have enough to make it interesting. Can you imagine if baseball players were really getting picked out what type of stuff would be happening? Terror from the players, the opposite team, the fans coming to the game and I'm pretty sure the media would be all over a player being shot and killed while rounding third base. The story here pretty much looks at the players, the owner and a few cops so there's nothing big or believable that happens. The film offers up everyone as a red herring and I must admit that I laughed out loud when the killer was finally shown. How we learn who it is and what follows almost makes this movie an instant classic. Young and Evans both turn in decent performances and the two seem to be having a good time with all the flirting. Nat Pendleton and Ted Healy are on board and the supporting cast includes Joe Sawyer in a small role and we even have a very young Mickey Rooney playing the ball boy. Ward Bond and Walter Brennan also have small, uncredited roles. Fans of the genre will probably want to check this out if they're like me and just want to see every film of its kind. Others will probably hit the stop button well before the ending but the strangeness of this film and the weird story keeps its mildly entertaining.

Seeing that this film was released in September of 1934 when in real life the St. Louis Cardinals were in a tight pennant race with the New York Giants, it's a wonder that this film didn't give some miscreant the idea of doing in the Dean brothers who were to lead the famous Gashouse Gang to the National League pennant and World Series that year.The Cardinals are in desperate financial straights this year as owner/manager David Landau and daughter Madge Evans put the team in hock to get star pitcher Robert Young. Madge has a thing for Bob, but other players have a thing for Madge.In the meantime the rejuvenated Cardinals are screwing up all kinds of gambling interests who don't want to see the long-shot Cardinals win the pennant. They'll stop at nothing including murder to see the Redbirds of St. Louis don't triumph. Murders of three players do occur before the culprit is found.Nat Pendleton and Ted Healy provide the comic relief as a perpetually quarreling catcher and umpire. Someone did some research for this film or was a fan because legendary umpire Bill Klem who was still active in 1934 had an unbelievable aversion to the name of 'Catfish'. In Healy's case Pendleton calls him 'Crawfish' to get his goat.Some establishing shots will give you a look at Sportsman's Park in St. Louis which is long gone now. Otherwise the cast MGM put together for this film shot it in and around Wrigley Field in Los Angeles, the minor league park of the Los Angeles Angels of the Pacific Coast League which also now history.The ending of the film is the very least bizarre. Nearly the entire cast is suspect at one point, but the guilty party in this baseball mystery comes right out of left field. No, the left fielder didn't do it.Paul Kelly has a very good role as a sportswriter with a nose for news that serves him well, the scoops he does get in this film.I might have liked the film better had the ending which I can't reveal been so bizarre. It did give one player an opportunity for a grand piece of scenery chewing.