The Knuckleballer

Conway City Attorney Mike Murphy wasn't much of a baseball fan when he got intrigued by the true story that became his screenplay - and a movie if it hits a home run with an agent.

"This all happened by accident. I enjoy movies, but I'd never given any thought to writing a screenplay until I found out about this story," said Murphy, looking John Grisham-esque wearing jeans and sitting in an empty courtroom near his office.

The Knuckleballer is based on the life of the late pitcher Gene "Lefty" Bearden, who trained in the inaugural class of the Earl T. "Doc" Williams Baseball School in Greenbrier.

Life threw Bearden a curveball when he was seriously injured in the Navy - but he recovered, helped the Cleveland Indians beat the Boston Red Sox to win the American League pennant and got the girl.

Bearden was the surprise starting pitcher in that game, because conventional wisdom was "you didn't pitch a left-hander in Fenway Park," Murphy said, and Bearden had only had one day's rest. But, Bearden "was on a roll," Murphy said - his knuckleball being "his claim to fame."

Murphy, 47, is fulfilling a role others predicted for him.

Murphy said, "All my teachers thought I should be a writer."

He started in journalism at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, then switched to political science, because the pull of law was stronger.

Not that his writing skills haven't been used.

"Some people hate writing briefs, but I enjoy researching and writing briefs," he said.

He was doing some research about four years ago about the 1930s Civilian Conservation Corps camp near Greenbrier when he stumbled acrossthe story of the baseball school in Greenbrier. "Its biggest years were before the war," Murphy said. Williams, a physician, and his son Royce ran the school.

"I'm a bigger basketball and football fan than baseball," Murphy said. But when Murphy came across Lefty Bearden's name in another publication that mentioned the baseball school, his interest was piqued even more.

Bearden's family moved from Phillips County to Memphis when Bearden was in sixth or seventh grade. Bearden's father, who had played minor league baseball, sent his son to the Greenbrier baseball school.

Williams "saw something in him" and made Bearden a pitcher. The left-hander joined the Navy in the summer of 1942 and was injured in 1943 when his ship, the USS Helena, was sunk by Japanese torpedoes at the Battle of Kula Gulf. He was a machinist mate, working in an engine room.

He was in the hospital about 18 months, Murphy said. "They thought he might not walk again, and they sure didn't think he'd play baseball again." Bearden, who had played for Miami Beach Flamingoes before the war, bounced around to hospitals and ended up in Jacksonville, Fla., at a Naval hospital.

Enter the hero doctor.

"There was a doctor who used to be one of his [Bearden's] fans. His specialty was orthopedics. He patched him up and put a metal plate below the knee and a metal plate in his head," Murphy said.

It was at this time that Bearden's former high school sweetheart, Lois, started looking for him. She was dancing in the big theaters in Hollywood, and they lost touch.

Someone told her that Bearden was in a Florida hospital. "She called every one," Murphy said, until she found him.

Without telling anyone, Bearden got a minor league tryout and kept his injuries a secret. In the spring of '45, he was playing for a minor league team in New York.

In the off-season, he worked as a gaffer in movie studios and once pitched a charity game against the Hollywood Stars minor league team. Casey Stengel, who was managing the Oakland Oaks, saw Bearden pitch, was impressed and recruited him. Bearden was signed by the Yankees, but was traded to the Cleveland Indians in 1946.

Lois gave up her chance at fame to follow Bearden.

Murphy knows about this love story because he found Bearden's widow, Lois, who was in her early 80s and living in Alabama.

"When I started trying to look him up, I realized he had just passed away a couple of months before," Murphy said.

He went to visit Lois and her daughter, Gene Borowski, and they talked for five hours. "The whole story struck me as fascinating," Murphy said.

"Initially, I was hoping to find a treasure trove of information and pictures about the baseball school and write a story for the Faulkner County Historical Society," he said.

Although Lois didn't know much about the baseball school, she told Murphy about some of Bearden's baseball experiences and gave insight into his personality.

"We corresponded, and I started the beginning of a manuscript. She and I decided to do a book - a biography."

Lois told Murphy her husband had already turned down one biography, but she thoughtit was a good idea. She and Murphy continued to correspond.

Lois died unexpectedly about 1 1/2 years ago, Murphy said. Her daughter "told me how much her mother enjoyed talking to me."

Murphy is on the Faulkner County Museum board with Sondra Gordy of Conway, who put him in contact with her son, Graham, who is a playwright and screenwriter.

"I was hoping he'd write the screenplay," Murphy said.

Murphy wrote a 15-page outline and sent it to Gordy.

"Graham called me and said he loved the story, but he was busy working with Mike Myers on The Love Guru."

Graham encouraged Murphy to try his hand at writing the screenplay.

"I literally went to Hastings and got a book, The Screenwriter's Bible,'" Murphy said.

Murphy learned that just like writing legal briefs, "there were very rigid formatting rules. Once you accept - here are the rules of how you write this - that's pretty easy for a lawyer," he said.

"I gave it a shot," he said. When he got pneumonia and a doctor ordered him to stay home, "I said now I've got guiltfree writing time."

He spent two weeks on it.

"It was pretty raw, what I came up with," he said.

"Graham was sort of a mentor - he never told me what to write, but he gave me ideas on how to tweak it."

Graham Gordy said in an e-mail that Murphy did an "exceptional" job.

"In order for me to have been a mentor to him, I would've had to guide him and his work, but his work was already there. The Knuckleballer is an excellent script for anyone to have written, much less a first-time writer. Regarding its chances of becoming a movie, if the world were just, it would be opening this weekend, but even as unfair as this business is, I think it has a good chance. Regardless, though, I hope Mike will continue working and growing as a writer because with a start like this, the sky's the limit for him," Gordy said.

Murphy said he wasn't finding success submitting the screenplay, but he got a fax out of the blue from Conway attorney PhilStratton about writers and all the rejections they receive before finding success.

"It sort of encouraged me," he added. Stratton had no idea Murphy was working on the screenplay. "That was the weird thing," Murphy said.

Also, Murphy said a friend, Terry Love of Wooster, read an early draft and said, " 'I love it - who's the bad guy?" That made Murphy re-examine his storyline, because there wasn't a bad guy.

He came up with one. The Cleveland general manager in 1950 was Hank Greenberg, who had been a batting consultant in 1948. "I created a scenario that they got off on the wrong foot," Murphy said of Greenberg and Bearden. "In my version, Greenberg thought the knuckleball was junk."

Murphy found a newspaper article that said owner Bill Veck, going through a messy divorce, almost sold the team to Greenberg. "I used that to create a subplot," Murphy said. Ultimately, Greenberg traded Bearden in 1950 to the Washington Senators.

The screenplay started ranking in the top at film festivals and winning awards. It was in the top 20 percent of about 5,500 entries in the Nicholl Fellowships.

Last fall, it made the second round of the Austin Film Fest and was in the top 10 percent to 12 percent.

Murphy tweaked it again, and it won second place in the Ozark Foothills Film Festival in Batesville in March and received a platinum award for Dramatic Adaptation at the Houston Film Fest in April. "I was thrilled," Murphy said.

He sent the screenplay to a couple of agencies, but didn't have a taker. "They have to filter out all the lawyers in Arkansas," Murphy said, smiling.

In more research, Murphy came across an actor who is a baseball fan and has a production company.

Murphy, who already had been rejected by this agency, found another person to contact in the actor/producer's agency and sent an e-mail to him.

"I told him I thought his client, because of his interest in this topic, might like to hear about it. I told him I'd never written a screenplay .... I gave him all the reasons to say no. But he sent me a nice e-mail and said he'd behappy to read it," Murphy said.

He's gotten word that the screenplay was greeted with a positive review.

Murphy didn't want to name the actor and said he isn't trying to be coy, but he doesn't want to be "presumptuous" about the outcome.

He is quick to say that it isn't his writing ability that makes it good; "it's a great story."

"The storyline is close to The Natural. There's a love interest after a separation; it was his rookie season. I don't have a crazy lady with a hat box in mine," he said.

"Bearden was sort of the anti-Natural - he was the blue collartype who found a way to win."

Murphy said he talked with some of Bearden's former teammates. "They liked him - he was real confident and cocky to some degree, but he was a prankster." One of the stories told about Bearden is that Satchel Page liked ice cream sandwiches, and Bearden took out the ice cream and put soap in its place.

It also was said that Bearden would throw the ball "to send a message" to batters if they made racial slurs about his black teammates.

Murphy's screenplay ends after the dramatic game in which Bearden wins the pennant for Cleveland, which went on to win the World Series.

Bearden made his mark in history, but the only winning season he had in the major leagues was 1948.

Murphy is in a wait-and-see mode about his screenplay.

"Nothing's happening right now except somebody out there likes it. I think it would be great movie, but in doing this you find ... a lot of things can happen to get a potential movie gathering dust and off track."

Murphy said he hasn't let himself imagine sitting in the theater watching the opening of his movie.

"I'm not in a rush. I've got a great job, and I admire people who try to do this [screenwriting] for a living ... I know it's a millionto-one shot," Murphy said, and then with a little smile he added, "but so was Bearden beating Boston that year, too."