I finished half the outline for the second draft of my screenplay. It's turning out quite different from the first one and I'm a little concerned because I really liked the original story. I'm telling myself I should just go with it because the new structure makes the story stronger, I think. I made my baseball player get into a fight in the locker room and I have him in a really strained relationship with this his wife. So basically my guy is a totally typical spoiled athlete on the last year of his career and going nowhere fast. I have to have him redeem himself somehow and I'm not sure how. The whole thing about fixing his swing is gone. Now he has to fix his whole life and I have less than 30 scenes for him to do it in.

I keep telling myself it's only an outline and once I start writing, I almost never follow my outline exactly. I don't know how my baseball player guy is going to redeem himself with his dad, his team and his wife. I guess I'll find out when I finish the outline. I think I'm going to have to have him fight with his brother and then maybe have a revelation that way. I don't know. The idea just flahsed in my head.

Once I get the outline done, I can start writing and the writing will go very quickly. It's getting the outline done first that's hard. I've been trying to correct things that people didn't like about the first draft and I think that's why my story has more conflict early on and less namby pamby stuff.

Still not sure how I feel about my original story changing, but my screenwriting teacher did say to start from scratch again on the second draft and that's what I'm doing, although I do refer to my previous outline.

Me and baseball, what a combo! I wouldn't have written about it except that I can't get this story out of my head and I hate when that happens. The story won't rest and I feel compelled to write it. Why baseball as a subject for my first screenplay is one of my life's biggest mysteries since it' s not like I'm even a big fan of the game. I mean I like going to watch baseball games, but I'm not a baseball fanatic. Shouldn't a movie screenplay about a cocky aging baseball player and his dying fathers be written by someone who's a real baseball fan?