Debra Winger backed out of "A League Of Their Own" because...

They cast Madonna.

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/debra-winger-madonna-a-league-of-their-own-171534670.html

Debra Winger dropped out of 1992's A League of Their Own because she didn't want to act with Madonna.

The straight-shooting actress, 66, gave a wide-ranging interview to The Telegraph, including discussing how she was supposed to be a Rockford Peach — specifically Dottie Hinson — and spent three months training with the Chicago Cubs for the role. However, when the Material Girl was cast as "All the Way" Mae Mordabito, the three-time Academy Award nominee bailed, accusing director Penny Marshall of "making an Elvis film." Winger's role went to Geena Davis, but she collected a paycheck anyway.

“The studio agreed with me," Winger said of her infamous "Elvis film" line, "because it was the only time I ever collected a pay-or-play on my contract. In other words, I collected my pay even though I did not play, and that’s very hard to get in a court.”

Winger said she met the real-life baseball players from the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL), which the fictionalized script was inspired by, and didn't think the film – also starring Tom Hanks with his famous "There's no crying in baseball!" line — honored them.

“As entertaining as [the final film] was, you don’t walk away going ‘Wow, those women did that,’" she said of the real-life players in the league, which ran between 1943 and 1954 after many men's minor league teams disbanded due to the World War II draft. "You kind of go ‘Is that true?’”

Winger said she feels the actresses in the film — also including Rosie O'Donnell, Ann Cusack, Tracy Reiner and Anne Ramsay — didn’t train long enough to look convincing. Lori Petty was cited as a possible exception.

Winger went on to say she thinks Davis "did OK" in the role she was supposed to play, adding, “I certainly don’t begrudge any of them.”

As for Madonna, who took the role when actress Lindsay Frost — mother of Chicago White Sox player Lucas Giolito — dropped out because a TV pilot she shot was picked up for to series, Winger said, “I think [her] acting career has spoken for itself."