Uphill Battle

By IAN WILSON

Rickey Hill reached the summit and a stop in Alberta helped him do it.

No, he didn’t play Major League Baseball (MLB), but the Texan did play professionally and he did so in the face of considerable adversity.

The hard-hitting righty slugger is the real-life subject of the uplifting sports movie The Hill on Netflix, which has been a top 10 flick on the streaming service in January.

Hill was born with a degenerative spine disorder that required him to undergo several surgeries and wear leg braces as a child.

The film chronicles his upbringing, including the poverty his family faced living in Forth Worth, Texas, and the objections his father, a Baptist pastor, had to his son playing baseball.

Hill endured, however, and his faith and his love of baseball helped him overcome injury in pursuit of becoming a big-league player.

Released in 2023, the two-hour movie stars Colin Ford as Rickey Hill and Dennis Quaid as his strict father, James Hill. It follows the many challenges the junior Hill encountered during his baseball journey, culminating in a three-day tryout camp that featured hundreds of top players from across the United States.

The tryout scenes depict Hill’s meeting with scout Red Murff, who was credited with finding and signing Hall-of-Fame pitcher Nolan Ryan to a deal with the New York Mets.

MAKING AN IMPRESSION

Hill described this meeting on the Baseball Together Podcast last August.

“I said, ‘Red, my name’s Rickey Hill, and I just wanted to let you know before I leave this camp that it’s a shame you’re never gonna get to see the best hitter in this camp.’ And he said, ‘Ya know, if your bat is in tune with your tongue, you’re a hell of a hitter.’ He said, ‘So you honestly believe you’re the best hitter here?’ And I said, ‘No sir, I don’t. I know I am,'” remembered Hill.

Murff gave Hill his shot in the batter’s box, where he impressed as a designated hitter by going 11-for-11 with three home runs. The ball-bashing display resulted in a contract with the Montreal Expos organization.

The outfielder and first baseman achieved his dream of playing pro baseball and his first minor-league assignment sent him to Lethbridge, Alberta, where he suited up with the Expos of the rookie level Pioneer League during their inaugural season.

READ MORE: The Pioneers – Lethbridge Expos

As an 18-year-old, Hill played in 39 games for Lethbridge and posted a .217 batting average with one homer and four doubles over his 106 at bats. He played alongside Hall-of-Fame outfielder Andre Dawson that season.

Lethbridge Herald columnist Garry Allison described Hill as a player with “hitting ability and intestinal fortitude” and made note of his heavily taped left ankle.

“It comes from an injury last year when I stepped in a depression for a water sprinkler on the ball field at home and tore the ligaments badly. It has been operated on and the doctors tell me that it will be as good as new soon. It’s coming around now,” Hill told Allison.

DIAMOND RINGS

Despite an underwhelming summer at the plate, Hill made headlines in southern Alberta when he tied the knot with his high school sweetheart, Sherran Lambert, during a ceremony at home plate at Henderson Stadium in August.

Hill’s parents – who were celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary on the big day – made the trip from Texas to participate in the festivities.

“Dad’s congregation got together and raised $700 to help send him and mom up here for the wedding,” Hill told the Herald.

The ballpark nuptials began as a gag, admitted Hill.

“The guys were kidding around in the club house, and I thought, why not? We went to the Expo management and they went along with it,” he said.

“Everyone has been just great. The Expo management has helped a lot. They’re putting flowers out on the field, they have a cake that the fans will get pieces of, and they have arranged for the players of both teams to line the base lines during the ceremony.”

More than 1,500 fans showed up for the pre-game event, which was followed by a matchup against the Billings Mustangs.

French-Canadian first baseman Denis Fleury was Hill’s best man and the groom’s father performed the ceremony.

“All in all it was a big night for the local baseball fans, the local ball players, and local wedding goers,” wrote Allison in the Herald.

“The wedding couple left the field under an archway of crossed bats held aloft by Expo ball players … instead of his usual Take Me Out to the Ballgame, organist Jim McLaren pleased the wedding guests with fine renditions of the Wedding March and I Love You Truly.”

Added Allison: “Rick, who stuck around after the wedding to play a little baseball, contributed to the Expo cause with two singles, a walk and two runs batted in.”

Any wedding nerves were worked out early in the game, which ended as a 20-8 runaway triumph for the Expos.

“The first two balls hit in the game went out to Rick Hill in left field … the groom proved his mind was on baseball however, scooping up the grounder with no problem and shagging the fly ball with ease,” wrote Allison.

Hill’s love interest in the movie is a character named Gracie Shanz, who is loosely based on Lambert. The couple’s real-life marriage ended in divorce in 1986.

LEAVING LETHBRIDGE

Hill played three more seasons at the Single-A level before injuries took their toll. In total, he appeared in 201 minor-league games and finished his pro career with a .298 batting average, 26 homers, 116 runs batted in (RBI) and 101 runs scored.

He continued to take the field in leagues in Mexico, Venezuela and Italy and attempted a pro comeback in the San Diego Padres system in 1979 but he collapsed when his back gave out during spring training that year and had to hang up his spikes.

“There is no such thing as no in my book,” Hill said in an interview with The Athletic.

“I hope (people watching this movie) take the fact that even though they told me my disease was going to end me, I wasn’t going to accept that. I said I’m not accepting no, and I didn’t. I said I would play (pro ball) until every tire went flat.”

The Hill, which was directed by Jeff Celentano, was named the 2024 Best Family Feature Film winner by the Family Film Awards.

Rickey Hill coaches Little League Baseball in Fort Worth, Texas.