Basic Trope: The Benchwarmer finally gets off the bench, and turns out to be so much better than anticipated.
- Straight: The Montreal Maulers are up against The Winnipeg Wildcats (who, ironically, are actually the Opposing Sports Team for today) in the Big Game. The team's top players, like Clay T. Finnigan, Cole Ramone, and Billy T. Finnigan (Clay's dad and the coach) are getting their asses whooped... And then The Benchwarmer (who also serves as an unused heavy muscle), Flash Young, urges Billy to put him in the game. Billy finally obliges after a while, and when Flash gets out on the field, he casually rips the Wildcats a new one and manages to score the game winning goal.
- Exaggerated: Flash was derided as some bench warmer and fourth string player on the Montreal Maulers, but the moment he enters the field, all hell breaks loose and Flash manages to score 100 consecutive goals while not even giving a single chance for any of his opposition's players to even breathe.
- Downplayed: Flash only manages to score the game winning goal, and only checks a few guys, but nothing else.
- Justified:
- Everyone underestimated Flash's savagery on the field, and it's pretty much like having their own version of the nastiest player from the Opposing Sports Team, but turned up to a thousand.
- Flash is a Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass.
- Inverted: Flash is tired and overworked, practically dragging the team down, and constantly begging to warm some benches.
- Subverted: Flash isn't actually all that good...
- Double Subverted: ...But when he's in a defensive position, good Lord can nobody get past him and even try to score a goal.
- Parodied:
- Flash was considered a hundredth string player that was treated worse than even the Team Pet. Billy decides to put Flash on the field for shits and giggles, expecting Flash to drag the team down and cause them to lose... But Flash straight up manages to prove that he can be pretty much his very own team, managing to absolutely DECIMATE the opposition, score hundreds of thousands of million consecutive goals, and pretty much come out with his team vs the Opposing Sports Team 9.999999999*10^100 to nil.
- Instead of Flash that needs to be put out on the team, it's his buddy Pete Perkins, a much scrawnier, more traditionally underdog-looking character. Instead of making a Miracle Rally or scoring the game winning goal, he gingerly goes out on the field while everyone's too busy beating the shit out of each other... And performs an honest-to-God striptease much to the titillation (of course, accompanied by that song), Stunned Silence, and outrage from the Maulers and spectators, Coach Billy and the Wildcats, and the Coach of the Wildcats and the Color Commentators at the ludicrous performance, which pisses one of the Wildcats off enough to punch out the referee when the referee refuses to get Pete off the field. The Wildcats get disqualified, and the Montreal Maulers win!
- Zig-Zagged: Flash's usefulness varies whether or not he's warmed a bench enough. Cold bench? Shit performance. Lukewarm bench? Okay-ish performance. White hot bench? The other team's fucked.
- Averted: Flash isn't taken off the bench because he's just as bad as people expect him to be.
- Enforced: Pretty much a one-man variant of Underdogs Never Lose.
- Lampshaded: "Flash should be on the field. He's been sitting on that bench for some time, he should get his fair share of action. Who knows, maybe he'll actually help us win for once."
- Invoked: Desperate and crazed, Billy searches for any possible measure to help the Montreal Maulers win. Flash approaches him with this trope in mind, and Billy accepts with little hesitation.
- Exploited: Flash's absolutely devastating performance coupled with the genuinely surprising fact that he even plays that way makes him an unpredictable threat.
- Defied: "No, Flash, you're not being put on the field. Last time we tried that, we've been barred from that arena for life and have been considered Persona Non Grata. You want a repeat of that?"
- Discussed: Characters discuss about how they should probably put the lesser known ones in, because they know that they'd probably perform good.
- Conversed: "Of course, The Benchwarmer begs to be put in, and makes the game winning goal. Typical sports movie."
It's Down to the Last Play! Quick, quick, Put Me In, Coach!!
