This post contains spoilers.
Will Baker (B.J. Britt) has returned! Ginny Baker's (Kylie Bunbury) mysterious older brother had disappeared since the second episode, and I won't lie, I kind of thought he was dead.
Sometimes this show does things that don't make sense, like dangle Ginny's brother in front of us and not follow up on the storyline. Fans have long memories (ask me how I feel about Aria not being at Callie and Arizona's wedding in the seventh season of "Grey's Anatomy"), so it seemed odd, if not inexplicable, to know that Will existed, but was absent from the MLB All-Star Game and his sister's on-field brawl.
However, the writers were kind enough to explain why Ginny's brother went MIA for the majority of the season. Will is apparently wrapped up in some shady business, and Amelia Slater (Ginny's agent, played by Ali Larter) is doing her best to manage everything away, as usual.
In fact, Will did show up to his sister's second start with one hell of a shiner -- thanks to being behind on a loan payment -- and Amelia handed him a check, and told him to get going so he wouldn't be a distraction.
I'm sure most people are fed up with Amelia's micromanaging of Ginny's life, and her interactions with Will come off as a little patronizing, which isn't helped by the fact that they are racialized. The optics of a wealthy white woman publicly shaming a black man over finances are not great for her, no matter how good her intentions might be. The admonishment she received from Evelyn Sanders (Meagan Holder), the wife of Ginny's teammate Blip, was more than just the acknowledgement that putting Will's business in the street is awkward as hell; there was a "watch it" tone, which probably had a double meaning. This show has proven itself to be all about identity politics, so there's no way the writers missed any part of that dynamic.
Will has some sort of business plan for which he wants Ginny's backing, and Amelia is totally suspicious. And honestly, I don't really blame her. He's Ginny's brother, and I want to believe he has her best interests in mind and is not just trying to make a buck for himself. But he is acting shady.
Additionally, who knew a rain delay could provide such a dramatic background? Is this what happens in the majors? I have questions.
In other news, there's trouble in paradise. This episode featured some heavy squabbling between Ginny and catcher Mike Lawson (Mark-Paul Gosselaar), which is sure to give the #Bawson fandom heart palpitations. The two of them couldn't be chummy forever, but I would love to see some more sophisticated drama than Mike lashing out at Ginny over the Padres benching him for a game and shopping him around for a trade.
However, Mike's barrage of bitterness was quickly tempered when fellow player Omar Robles (Jason Canela) confides in Mike and Blip that he thinks he has feelings for Ginny. Mike dismisses the thought with a spirited explanation of how Robles doesn't know Ginny at all, and if he did he'd know that she hums Katy Perry songs horribly off-key, and that she loves grape soda and hates cilantro. He declares to Robles, "You don't have feelings for her."
But everyone, including Robles and Blip, knows that he's talking to himself.
After acknowledging to himself that he has feelings for Ginny, Mike tells general manager Oscar Arguella (Mark Consuelos) that he wants to be traded to Chicago. Couple that with the promo for the next episode, which shows Ginny and Mike getting awfully close, and the #Bawson followers were sent into a frenzy.
The idea of Ginny and Mike being a "thing" is kind of cute, but I'm pissed off about it. There's the obvious fact that Ginny is 13 years Mike's junior and the cliché of a team-based romance budding, just because a woman has joined the majors. Plus, there's the anger I feel as a queer person who played sports growing up in a heterosexist environment where crushes on teammates were not cute.
There's also something tone-deaf about the way Ginny's teammates flirt with her and the way Mike has developed feelings. I can't help but feel that if Ginny Baker was Jeff Baker and the first openly gay pitcher in MLB, the working environment wouldn't be nearly as "cute."
No one would want him to see them naked; no one would be flirting with him. But, because everyone is straight, a teammate romance is forbidden love. It's playful and sexy. Never mind the fact that in real life, the fear of intra-team romances has created homophobic environments on many a ball club.
I've been hoping the writers wouldn't take this storyline there because it does everyone a disservice, but it looks like they are. It bums me out. I hoped they were better than this, which reminds me: Where is that waitress when I need her? What's her name? Cara?
Bring back Cara! At least she's not Ginny's freaking teammate.