Play Ball! The American Pastime

July 3–16

“Baseball is our game: the American game. I connect it with our national character,” said poet Walt Whitman about a sport one just cannot help but romanticize. “[It] belongs as much to our institutions, fits into them as significantly, as our constitutions, laws: is just as important in the sum total of our historic life.” With 2026 marking three anniversaries — the 125th of the American League, the 150th of the National League and the 250th of the United States of America itself — AFI Silver presents these four films that capture the magic and history of the great American pastime.