A film about a group of young baseball-enthusiasts who test the terrifying myth of Mr. Mertle owning a freakishly large and dangerous dog in his backyard.
In the 12-years-since comedic sequel to 1993's The Sandlot, a new group of kids have moved into the sandlot: David Durango (Max Lloyd-Jones), Mac McKing (Brett Kelly), Saul (Cole Evan Weiss), his deaf brother Sammy "Fingers" (Sean Berdy), Tarquell (Neilen Benvegnu), Scotty's younger brother Johnnie Smalls (James Willson), and a surprise for The Sandlot 2, a girl in the group Hayley Goodfarier ('Samantha Burton'). When Johnnie mistakenly sends a model rocket over the junk fence in The Great Fear's yard, the gang must retrieve it. Even with the help of The Retriever (Griffin Reilly Evans, the director's son), a kid who steals dog tags and finds The Great Fear's a challenge. Yes, complete with another psychotic name-calling scene with Mac and little league captain Singleton (Reece Thompson). And, of course, with James Earl Jones as Mr. Mertle.—Alex Madison <SouthParkFan1-2905>
The start of the movie flashes back to 1962 when Benny becomes Benny "the Jet" Rodriguez. The main part of the movie is set in 1972, ten years after the events of The Sandlot. New kids have moved into the neighborhood of San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles. They have started playing baseball in the sandlot. The previous kids have all grown up and moved away. A young boy named Johnnie Smalls, the little brother of Scott Smalls (the protagonist of the first film), has heard the legend of "The Great Fear" (a beastly mutated dog, as he puts it when he later on tells the group about The Beast) owned by Mr. Mertle, who lives behind the Sandlot. David Durango (Max-Lloyd Jones) is the leader of the boys. Behind the Sandlot, next to Mr. Mertle's home, lives the Goodfairer family. Hayley Goodfairer (Samantha Burton), the daughter and her two friends initially befriend the other boys in a census to share the Sandlot, but their relationship burgeons potently into a friendship when they find themselves in a big problem with The Beast next door, despite Hayley calling David a little baby, and David calling Hayley a spoiled brat.
The next day, David and his friends Mac, Tarqell, Saul and Saul's deaf little brother Sammy (referred to as "Fingers"), repeatedly demand Johnnie to tell the girls to leave the sandlot, but they keep refusing. Johnnie then suggests that they share the sandlot. The others agree but David doesn't feel good with the idea. Although since the girls are amazing at playing ball, he plans to make a deal with them; that they have to be on their team, they agree. Friday afternoon, the kids play a game with a little league team. But when the team captain, Singleton (Reece Thompson), ends up hitting Hayley in the stomach for playing with them, David responds by punching Singleton in the face and forces him to leave, but not before telling him that the sandlot is theirs forever.
One day, when Mac gets an aluminum baseball bat, he hits the ball over the junk wall, and afterward they attempt to retrieve it. But just as they are about to cross over through a passage in the fence, Johnnie stops them and tells them the story of "The Great Fear": how it was born to bite and was different from its sibling puppies. There was a boy who loved the comic book hero named Rapid Rocket, and believed he ran as fast as him. On his first day of school, he went past the house belonging to Mr. Mertle (who forgot to lock the back gate where the Great Fear was), and The Great Fear got out and chased the boy. It was unknown what happened to him after he was cornered by "The Great Fear." Soon afterward, a wall made of assorted junk was built. Ever since, if anything went over the fence, nothing would ever come out.
The main conflict comes when Johnnie accidentally launches a model Space Shuttle. The model was built by Hayley's father, a NASA engineer. It was said to be the future of NASA. Unfortunately, Mr. Goodfarier's rocket lands in Mr. Mertle's back yard (which is now the home of the "Great Fear"). Hayley, along with everyone else, frantically attempts many ideas of getting it back, including hiring the boy called "The Retriever" (Griffin Reilly Evans), but every time he fails, and decides to retire and go home. Then, just like Benny Rodriguez from the first movie, David decided to go over the wall himself to retrieve the rocket. (Here it is revealed that the little boy who was bitten by "The Great Fear" in the story was David himself.) He retrieves it and escapes the Great Fear's yard. The Sandlot kids soon discover (just like The Beast) that The Great Fear got loose. David then hops on his bike and rides out of the sandlot. The Great Fear then chases after David. David then goes through a construction site, and then David gets off his bike and runs back to the sandlot. David hops over the junk wall back to Mr. Mertle's yard and falls through the tunnel that Mac used to try to get the rocket back. The dog knocks over the wall and saves David from suffocating. When David defeats the dog, it's revealed that the dog's real name is Goliath; after that, the kids can be seen running to the sandlot because Goliath got away, and realize that he only wanted to get out to see his girlfriend dog, Tiny (who was also behind a fence). As all the kids are leaving, Hayley and David share a kiss, and Mr. Mertle, tired of kids thinking he's grouchy, decides not to build a new fence.
In the final moments of the movie, the narrator tells what happened to all the sandlot kids. Mac joined the army when he graduated from high school, and received a Purple Heart when he was injured in the Gulf War, and then joined the Peace Corps. Saul and Fingers started a record label for a "new" kind of music called hip hop, and they named their company Def Jam Records; with the money Fingers made in the music industry, he started a successful gum company known as Kissing Booth Bubblegum. Jenny and Penny both raised three kids and had a happy life with their families. Tarquell was believed to be abducted by aliens and was never seen again. Hayley became a supermodel and a pitcher for the United States Olympic Softball team, winning two gold medals in the process. David earned the nickname "Rocket" after he defeated Goliath, and he eventually went on to marry Hayley, while Johnnie went to work for the Jet Propulsion Laboratories, as rockets were still his life.
