'If you build it, he will come,' MLB pulls out all the stops for 'Field of Dreams' game

Major League Baseball played an official game in the state of Iowa for the first time in history Thursday night to celebrate the 1989 baseball drama Field of Dreams. The original event was delayed two years due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Thirty-two years after the film became a Hollywood success, Kevin Costner, the film’s lead, joined thousands of fans at a baseball diamond in the middle of a cornfield near the spot Dyersville, Iowa, where the movie was filmed.

The film centers around farmer Ray Kinsella (Costner) who hears a voice emanating from the corn field on his farm, which repeatedly says "If you build it, he will come." The "it" turns out to be a baseball field and the "he" is Shoeless Joe Jackson (Ray Liotta), infamous for his association in the Chicago "Black Sox" World Series cheating scandal in 1919. Ray eventually hears the voice telling him other things and sets off on a cross country baseball nostalgia trip to bring others to the field where long dead players emerge from the corn to scrimmage.

The pregame events at the specially constructed stadium, filled with movie references and baseball nostalgia, included Costner and players from Yankees and White Sox emerging from the Iowa corn in the outfield. just like the phantom players in the movie before the starting lineups were announced.

Baseball fans from around the world joined some of MLB's biggest former stars at the event including Frank Thomas, Alex Rodriguez and John Smoltz.

The Chicago White Sox won in Hollywood fashion thanks to a walk-off, two-run homer by Tim Anderson in the bottom of the ninth in an action packed 9-8 win over the New York Yankees. MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred said the league will return to Iowa next year for another Field of Dreams game.