Hardball

Summary
The death of a minor league player leads to a math prodigy and stirs buried feelings for Don, whose own playing career was nipped in the bud.

Main

 * Rob Morrow as Don Eppes
 * David Krumholtz as Charlie Eppes
 * Judd Hirsch as Alan Eppes
 * Alimi Ballard as David Sinclair
 * Peter MacNicol as Larry Fleinhardt
 * Navi Rawat as Amita Ramanujan
 * Diane Farr as Megan Reeves
 * Dylan Bruno as Colby Granger

Guest

 * Jay Baruchel as Oswald Kittner
 * Jon Hamm as Richard Clast
 * Bill Nye as Bill Waldie
 * Lauren Velez as Claudia Gomez (credited as Lauren Vélez)
 * Lauren Stamile as Kelly Johnston
 * Joel Anderson as Max Sheveransky
 * Andy Umberger as Frank Auster
 * Susan Beaubian as Stendhauser

Title
The serious version of baseball, playing for keeps, with no quarter given or expected. In the context, there is also the looming shadow of sabermetrics, and the tough calls Don has made and continues to make, professionally and personally.

In a generic way, the term often conveys that the contest is not a game.

Trivia
While canvassing an Asian-urban-pedestrian-friendly area of town in their search for a suspect, Colby (Dylan Bruno) and David (Alimi Ballard) talk about a sci-fi film directed by Ridley Scott and co-starring Darryl Hanah, and wonder if their surroundings might prove that the film correctly predicted the future. The film they're referring to is Blade Runner (1982); Scott is also a co-executive-producer of "Numb3rs".

Bill Nye reprises his role as Bill Waldie, who had played as Bill Waldie in Scorched.

Goofs
When Oswald Kittner is being initially questioned about his baseball statistics work, he says he never showed it to anyone to maintain his advantage at Fantasy Baseball yet the FBI was only led to him by comparing his work to some posted online at a Fantasy Baseball website.

As Don is walking through the dining room at the beginning of the episode, the light fixture over the table swinging slightly in the top left hand corner even though nobody touched it nor is there anyone else in the room.

Crazy Credits
32 Homeruns 97 Runs batted in 308 Batting average 1 Lethal dose