The Chris Moeller Archives

Tim of the Tigers-- A "Final Season" bonus feature

Tim Arp was a standout player on the 1991 Norway (IA) High School baseball team featured in the new independent film "The Final Season," playing in theaters now in selected cities. A friend, and former classmate and teammate, he graciously agreed to answer some of the questions I had about the film for the blog. I emailed him a few, and he responded in written form.

Tim tells me he attended the film's premiere in Cedar Rapids on October 7th, and he saw it again a week later in Peoria, Illinois, where he now makes his home. I believe he still visits this site from time to time, so if you have questions of your own for him, drop them in the "comments" box and you might get lucky. He's a star now, though, so don't bet on it.

His answers below are unedited for content. Any typos, and errors otherwise, belong to me...


CM: First, "The Final Season" is destined to become the definitive movie of all-time concerning Norway's 1991 baseball team. Are you pleased with how it came out?

TA: Considering the time constraints for a movie and the difficulty in getting a movie made by Hollywood and distributed to theaters, I am very, very pleased with how it came out.

I think its especially satisfying for the players (myself included) to see how many elements from the program and the 1991 season were actually worked into the film, albeit in slightly modified fashion:

a) Tyson Kimm’s (Tyler Kitt’s) failure to return for his Senior year in 1991. More playing time for me!
b) The long foul ball hit off Norway that was almost a home run. This actually happened to Jim Walter late in a sub-state or district game in 1991. Our season would have been over if it had been fair.
c) The effect that our pregame infield practice had on the opposing teams. Several years ago, I actually had a friend from CR Regis (his little brother plays a Norway player without a speaking role in the movie) tell me that his team had thoughts similar to those expressed by the Kennedy (High School) players in the film. Of course, my friend was talking about the Bobcat, er... Madison, infield from our senior year, but I know the same thing applied for Norway over the years.
d) The win over CR Jefferson in 1991 when Norway was ranked #1 in 1A and Jefferson was ranked #1 in 4A. What the movie didn’t tell was that, in the first game of the doubleheader, we were no-hit in 5 innings (maybe a perfect 5 innings, I can’t remember). Ask Harv (Editors' note: Brad Day) about his game-winning hit in the nightcap. I got even with the Jefferson pitcher on the next pitch I saw from him a few years later. I hit a home run off of him in town team when he was pitching for Norway and I was playing for Walford (keep in mind how short the fences are in Walford). He threw the exact same pitch in the exact same location…
e) Kyle Schmidt hitting a gapper when we were behind in the final inning in the final game, down to our last strike and last out. Of course, in real life, this is exactly when his father Francis (“Schmitty”) was having his heart attack. It was not while driving the team bus.
f) A certain somebody sustaining a hand injury and returning for key contributions in the last game. (Editor: Awesome!)
g) The kids playing baseball on the farms as Stock was driving by in the opening of the movie. Jim (Schulte) and I spent many hours doing that sort of stuff, and the guys who lived in town played “fast rubber” and “slow tennis.”
h) The actors who played Jim Van Scoyoc and Kent Stock portrayed the real men amazingly well.
i) The Mitch Akers character was complete fiction but the haircut had a real life parallel. Ask Harv about his haircut that year.
j) There were some days where we actually had a reporter traveling on the bus with us.

CM: If you could-- or had to-- change any element of the film, what would it be?

TA: More screen time for Rachael Leigh Cook! Are all lawyers from Des Moines like that? Also, the Sammy character on the team; we never had anyone with an attitude like that.

CM: You must have been pleased with the work of the thirdbaseman during the scenes of the infield drills. He started a quick double-play. I thought he did you justice.

TA: I thought the movie did a really good job of filming the baseball scenes. I actually played 3B, SS, 2B, and RF that year, taking the place of whoever was pitching that game.

CM: Your image appeared specifically in the final shot of the film, when a team photo of the actor/players in the trophy case morphs into the real thing (Tim is on one knee at the far left of the front row). Also, I believe I saw you crossing home plate at one point during the archival game footage shot by one of the local TV stations. Did I miss any other Tim-sightings?

TA: I think I also saw myself (#22) for a split second in some old TV footage of the real team celebrating after a game. There's a really good but quick shot of Jim Schulte (#21, I think) at shortstop, taken from left field, in another clip of archival game footage. I think Harv's haircut might have been immortalized too, but I'll have to look for that on the DVD. Look for Jim Walter's old Rawlings glove being worn by Kevin Stewart (a.k.a. Kyle Schmidt?). There are two clips of Jim Walter (#31) driving in a run (me, the first time, and Shawn Moss, #27, the second time); Jim receives a different alias in each clip.

CM: Is that the trophy case as it still appears in the high school today?

TA: I heard that it was built specifically for the movie and was torn down after filming.

CM: I thought the Norway uniforms were completely accurate. What's a better look, the red Norway cap or Coach Stock in his St. Louis Cardinals cap? And before answering, recall that Stock wound up getting the girl.

TA: I think the Cardinals should have had to pay money to have their team promoted so heavily in the movie, like the other sponsors :)

CM: Did the players really pull that stunt with the volleyballs in the dugout? What about the stickball game in the school yard? Was that an actual pastime?

TA: I'm not aware of anything like the volleyball prank ever happening, definitely not to the extent pictured in the movie. Although it's been sixteen years, and it's always possible that someone pulled a prank similar to that on a much smaller scale. It could have happened away from practice where I wasn't aware of it. I wasn't always "in the know" back then (or now).

We really played a game called "fast rubber" against the old brick school, but not in the exact location shown in the movie and with real bats.

CM: You are one of only two people on the planet that has experienced both the thrill of winning a state baseball title and participating in the annual Moeller Television Festival. Which spectacle ranks higher in your memory? Which had better sandwiches?

TA: Winning a thousand state baseball titles could never compare with the thrill of attending a single Moeller Television Festival. I'll reserve comment on the sandwiches to give you motivation for even more outstanding sandwich excellence in this year's Moeller Television Festival. Don't let this be "The Final Festival."

CM: What's next for Tim Arp?

TA: Well, I've hired an agent to help me pitch a movie script I've written about a pair of twins who start an APBA league... (Editor's link.)

Editor's final note: Announcement on "Moeller Television Festival VI" coming soon. Thanks, Tim.

posted by CM @ 3:52 PM