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A documentary exploring the development of baseball in Ireland, "The Emerald Diamond" is a humorous and heartwarming look at the ambition of a group of men aiming for an unlikely dream.

Although there were numerous [url=http://www.baseball-reference.com/bio/Ireland_born.shtml]Irish-born baseball players[/url] in the early days of the game's history in the USA, baseball was never a popular sport on the Emerald Isle.  19th century baseball greats from Ireland like [url=http://www.baseball-reference.com/m/mullato01.shtml]Tony Mullane[/url], [url=http://www.baseball-reference.com/b/bondto01.shtml]Tommy Bond[/url], [url=http://www.baseball-reference.com/d/donovpa01.shtml]Pasty Donovan[/url] and [url=http://www.baseball-reference.com/d/doyleja01.shtml]Dirty Jack Doyle[/url] picked up the game stateside.  In fact, there has only been one major league baseball player born both in Ireland and in the 1900s, and that guy, Joe Cleary, only had a cup of coffee in 1945 with the lowly Washington Senators, which underscores how barren Irish baseball has been.

So with baseball a non-entity in Ireland in the early 1990s, you have a group of Irishmen, a couple Americans with Irish parents and grandparents, a Mexican naturalized as an Irish citizen thanks to marrying an Irish woman, and some Cubans who immigrated to the Emerald Isle starting up a baseball league in this unlikely, rain-soaked setting.  We watch as the group cobbles together a team to compete in the European Baseball Championships.  The competition are a bunch of nations that Americans would view as baseball lightweights: Croatia, Sweden, Germany, Finland, Austria, Belgium, Serbia, Slovenia and more.  However, from the perspective of these hobbyist Irish players, these guys were practically pros.

Much of the film focuses on the Irish performance at successive European Championships, as they team's fate clearly illustrates the progress baseball in Ireland has made.  There are also nice scenes showing the development of the Irish Baseball League and the youth program designed to get baseball going at the grassroots little league level.

We see the Irish team get crushed in their first go-round at the tournament, though they do save face by squeaking away with a win in their last game.  In successive tournaments, they win more games and they even win the bronze medal in 2004.  Not shown in the film, the Irish team managed to take the silver in 2006.

The real charm of "The Emerald Diamond" is not in the drama of how the Irish team does at the European tournaments, while that is fun to watch.  The real charm is in the interviews with the people involved, the stories recounted and the camaraderie of a group going up against daunting odds and saying why the hell not.  You also see players from the Republic of Ireland playing alongside Northern Irish players, representing the Island as a whole, which is an example that should be followed in other more popular sports like soccer.  When you see the Belfast North Stars take on a team from the Republic in a league game, there's no trace of the Troubles on the diamond, just a bunch of men playing a sport they love.  While Irish baseball is a long way from producing major league prospects on a regular basis, this grassroots documentary shows hope that one day major league teams will shift a couple scouts from the Caribbean Islands to a long untapped island in the North Atlantic that once produced a couple of 200 game winners and .300 lifetime average hitters.

5/5 Stars.