The O's Take Over Junior Sports Neighborhood!

Well that's my goal anyway. After watching all the E3 press conferences and still feeling underwhelmed, I went onto Facebook, and I found that my roommate had played his game of MLB 15: The Show for the day. You see, he has started a challenge where he plays the Boston Red Sox in franchise mode alongside the actual season happening now, until the end of their season. He has, despite running into various obstacles, stayed current up to this point (though it's not much of a challenge anymore since he's unemployed; I don't rag on him too much for that, the lazy freeloader.) But it gave me the idea: to do the exact same! But not with sim baseball, ew. So I went back and found the last baseball game that I loved: Backyard Baseball 2003. It was a little after this title that things started getting weird for the Backyard Sports franchise, but this was still pure, and I loved it. There aren't 162 games or anything like that, and I'm starting way late, sooooooo I'm just going to go at my own pace, on the weekends when I'm not too busy. The season will be set on medium difficulty, and for nine innings rather than the usual six (I would later regret this decision.)

THE DRAFT

I set my home as Playground Commons and quickly went into the player selection screen. I had the first nine picks of the draft, which made me question the league's draft system, but I instead bit my tongue and enjoyed my time picking through the multitude of players offered to me. Since there was a create-a-player option, I immediately made myself and made me player-coach, which means all the other players will loathe me by season's end. After that, I made my first mistake, which was picking out of nostalgic habit. It was only when I had finished that I had missed out on true greats like the Keisha Philips, the Kawaguchi siblings, Tony Delvecchio, the Webber sisters, and plenty others. But it's a loaded draft year, I can't be expected to find the best of the best here and leave without having any regrets. I shook off that regret as I looked at my completed team and began figuring out our game plan for the rest of our glorious season together.

THE ROSTER

From left to right of the team photo:

Everything here is sorta in flux as I get a feel for everyone, so it may change as the season goes on.

Now! With everything else set up, let's get to some baseball!

Will update when I can, check replies for updates :D

So I made a huge mistake making this nine innings and on medium difficulty. I'm afraid this will be a running theme throughout this season, so I'll try to air my grievances solely in this post. Before we even got started, Amir had lowered stats, probably from recklessly air-drumming. So I had to do a lot of rotating between decent pitchers. But that wasn't my biggest problem.

The game started, and I was taken aback as, in the first inning, the opposing team scored seven runs on me immediately. It was here that I had a sudden realization: I just opted into playing baseball with a bunch of young children. Do you want to know how many of them throw well, how fast they run, how long they run until they eventually trip and fall? Would you like to see how many times two of your players can run into each other and completely miss each others throws in one inning? Backyard Baseball quickly fulfills this need I'm sure you have, as I did. My expectations of a normal baseball game with a few zany sound effects were quickly chucked out the window as I tried to make sense of everything going on.

Here's a picture I took a little before my first inning embarrassment began. In case you were wondering how Pablo is so damn good, just look at his damn strike zone. The width of his bat almost fits it perfectly, like two puzzle pieces coming together to create a picture of complete bullshit that you pick before everyone else in the draft.

Thankfully, it didn't take me long to get a handle of the situation, and it was a one run game. But we had just reached the fourth, so a lot could still happen. And, well...it did.

So let's talk about the hellhole that is Tin Can Alley. I'm sure you can draw your own conclusions just looking at the picture, but let's start with the buildings. The buildings that are walling in the park are not necessarily the problem, though I can't imagine a better way of breaking multiple windows than this. (I'm sure the Fishes can pay for them all with all that revenue they're getting from these games in a secluded alley.) But you see, in the real world, any ball that hits above that first floor (that's clearly divided in color and general look from what's above it) is a home run. The top of the Moe Aluminum trailer, dumpsters, and the rest of that nonsense also counts as a home run. Simple, right? Not so in Tin Can Alley, where the only way to get a home run is to hit it over the god damn buildings, which are at least 3-4 stories tall. Oh, and the tops of all that crap the Fishes curiously like to call home? In play. Yep, if the ball gets up there, you have to wait for it to either roll off, or roll into some undefined area where the game decides it's a ground rule double.

This creates a scenario like the one seen above. I don't remember who hit it (probably Griffey), but I see Stephanie Morgan there, who is one of the slowest players I have, leading the runners around the bases and generally holding everything up. Luckily for her, Griffey placed the shot perfectly on top of the trailer, and the ball began sllllllowly rolling in one direction or another, not really in any hurry to fall to Earth. AND, since these children are all basically hobbits and can't climb anything, they are left to either run towards the ball endlessly, stare on in futility and think about how this scenario mimics the horrors of adulthood, or in the case of their shortstop, just jump around and generally freak out. The faux in-the-park grand slam was completed, and my own players and myself were forced to watch the damn ball continue to roll around until it was eventually called a ground rule double, which does nothing since everyone scored before the call.

This was the last picture I took in the game. I'd say that after this it really got out of hand, but that was already the case innings ago. Getting out of pickles is a bit easier in this game compared to most, since out of nowhere, kids will just heave wild throws that give you the perfect opportunity to advance. It's something I couldn't even be proud of because the whole thing was just a damn train wreck. By the time I had 30 runs, I could see the look in the pitcher's eyes as they muttered to themselves, "What's the point? We're all gonna die anyway." as Pete Wheeler smacks another line drive onto the dumpster in right and speeds around the entire diamond before it falls. The Fishes had no chance in the end. May I suggest a different field? One that, you know...matches your mascot a little better? Just, if you do have a body of water beyond the outfield, please don't count the boats the balls land in as in play. I can't imagine these kids can swim if they can barely run.

And that was the end of that! These guys are division rivals, so we'll be able to see them again soon. I can't imagine the fury that they'll bring down on us after this.

One game down, 13 to go! I'll update when the next game is finished!

Next Game:

Interesting blog. Heard about this game but never actually played it myself. Pretty cool that you could get a kid-sized Griffey to play on your team.

Also, fuck the Yankees.

That stadium is fucking awful.

You made a grave mistake.

Jesus what fucked mind designed that stadium?

Hopefully no tommy john surgeries will be required for you pitcher by season's end.

Wow, Tin Can Alley looks like a bunch of bullshit.

I definitely have some nostalgia for this series from way back, even though it's been so long since I've last played that I can't remember much about it. I think I played the football variation once or twice but it never clicked with me in the same way.

Good luck to your Orioles.

Oh wow! I got a few replies and even got featured on the Community Spotlight! Thanks, guys! However, I'm not exactly tech savvy, but something doesn't add up. I didn't feel the subject was worth taking up space in the General Discussion forum since E3 was dominating everything, so I posted it to the Backyard Baseball 2003 forum, and as far as I know, that's the only way to get to it, soooooo if you guys came here through some massive hole in the internet you fell into that ended in researching Backyard Baseball 2003, welcome brethren, and may God have mercy on your soul.

Or maybe I don't understand how blogs and forums here work. It's probably that.

Anyway, while the replies are at a small amount, I'd love to reply.

@dochaus: Thank you! It was a lot of fun as a kid, but I also spent hours playing the tutorial bit of Superman 64 over and over again, so I'm easily amused. This has been a nice, sobering experience.

And especially after this last game, yeah, fuck the Yankees.

@gorillamopena: God damn, it was as if the game itself was just like, "You never should have put me in, here's Tin Can Alley, get fucked." I can only hope I never encounter that place ever again. Once is enough.

@jiggajoe14: My money's on someone at Humongous Entertainment who got their thrills by making kids cry. I went ahead and took a look at the squad for my third game, and Amir still has lowered pitching stats. He curiously has an elevated 10 in batting, however, so I don't know what's really going on...chem trails...

@redyoshi: Thanks! The nostalgia is certainly keeping me going, but the rose-colored glasses can't repel some of the little horrors of this game. Yeah, I actually really enjoyed Backyard Football! But that was as a kid...I may have to check that out after this season.

Thanks guys, the game is finished and I have the pictures, just need to get the text together and I'll have the next post up soon! Let me just set it up by saying kid Derek Jeter has a Lebron James 2015 Finals moment; it was kind of sad to watch. But also hilarious.

I don't start blog posts very well.

Going into the second game of the season, Amir is still not feeling well enough to pitch (but is even better at batting now...?), but something far worse happened: Pablo came down with something bad. He can still do everything else at least decently, if not well, but batting was completely out of the question. Down a home run hitter and a good pitcher, I wasn't super optimistic, even though I'd scored over 40 runs in the last game. This game was being played on a (semi) proper field, against the Yankees. I mean yes, they were mostly regular kids with a few of the Backyard kids thrown in, but there was one big obstacle in my way, bigger than all the others: Derek Jeter.

With Amir still out, I decided to go with Pablo, since he threw a few strikes in the last game. This plan quickly unraveled when Derek Jeter came to bat. He made contact every at bat, and was only out once. Even as a kid, little Jeter knew every inch of the field, when to steal a base, where to hit a ball. All I could do was do the best I could and prayed it worked. In my match-ups against him, I lost every time. But there was one, and only one thing that saved this game: Jeter is one of nine Yankees.

With that fact in mind, I was able to get through four innings shuffling through potential pitchers, until I fell on Stephanie. She hadn't found success anywhere else, so I threw her in. In a very surprising turn of events, she rocked it! Despite the numbers, she quickly obtained power ups and struck out a decent amount of batters over the next five innings.

I feel obligated to explain the pitches since a few of the power ups are displayed here. To be honest, few of them actually do a whole lot. Zig-Zag plain doesn't work. As soon as you see it leave the pitcher's hand in a zig-zag formation, you can figure it out pretty quickly. Spitball is actually effective in that you can know exactly where it's going, and it'll still slip past your bat. Elevator only works if you're aiming above the strike zone; if you aim for the strike zone, it'll look like a pitch that's just rolling on the ground, and I'm sorry, but no one throws a ball like on purpose unless it's the Elevator. Crazyball is exactly what it looks like, but if you're lucky and in the right stance, it's hittable. There are others we'll run into, but trust me, you're almost always throwing fastballs. The rest is mostly a waste. This, combined with the shitty fielding happening around you, makes for a frustrating ass time on defense. But we'll get to talk more about that later. Let's take a quick look at the one pro of pitching, and one of the biggest cons of batting in this game:

There's one thing that's never addressed in the Backyard Sports Universe, as far as I know: there may or may not be an umpire. If there is, they have a Smooth Criminal-like lean towards the pitcher. I could've had my stance towards that pitch and swung right at it, but it would've been highly unlikely that I even touched it, let alone hit it fair. And let me remind us all: the very idea of the strike zone is an area over home plate where a baseball can be hit by a batter. So this horseshit is beyond frustrating, and you cannot escape it. All you can do is play the game. Then strike out and walk back to the dugout, avoiding the pitcher's taunting gaze and mocking smile, eager for the next batter.

Despite these setbacks, as you can see, I still jumped out to a healthy lead. This led to one of the weirder things I've seen in this game.

It was subtle, at first. You see, the inning before this, Jeter was on first, and their left fielder, Backyard Sports kid Dimitri Petrovich, was on second with two outs. I forget what caused them to run, but they should've advanced to second and third, and that's it. But Jeter then decided to go to third. Dimitri had no desire to go to third, but he saw Derek and began running. I threw the ball to home, expecting them to realize their mistake. But Jeter got to third...and stayed there. He looked on as Dimitri looked over his shoulder, meeting Jeter's eyes as they filled with anger, then back to the catcher he was now forced to run to. I could imagine tears running down his cheeks as Jeter made him end the inning. And no one in the dugout was going to blame Jeter. It would be on Dimitri for blowing the inning.

But I dunno, maybe it was just an honest mistake! Or I thought it was, until I got this picture above. Jeter was getting visibly angry, and as my worst player got another hit and advanced to first, Jeter ran out from shortstop and fielded a ground ball that should've been fielded by the pitcher or the second baseman. Was he...was he playing the entire infield? Had he gotten entirely fed up with the team he had been stuck with? Did he just find them to be a complete mockery, a mere sham that wore the pinstripes with unearned pride? No, I have to be imagining things. Twice is a coincidence...that's a saying, right?

Well let's take a moment away from all that and concentrate on this fresh load of hot shit. The batter used a power up with a name that's escaping me right now, but the effect is that it shoots the ball into the ground and digs through the earth until it pops back out in the outfield. The exit point sometimes angles it over the fence and counts as a home run, which is beyond nonsensical and against the entire concept of the home run, but that's not my problem here. My fucking problem is Dante over here at second base. The runner started advancing toward second as Pete Wheeler retrieved the ball and began throwing it in Dante's direction to get the runner out. It would've been close, but I would've gotten him out, had it worked like any other play.

But there are these things called idle animations. Sometimes there are special idle animations that don't take a lot of time, but can't be unbroken. They are usually used to give the players life, and simulate kids being bored on the field, because let's be honest, we all were when we played Little League. But in the middle of play, as the action converged on second base, Dante's single job, he does something I could not have predicted: He backflipped. He fucking flipped backwards as the ball was being thrown to him and as the runner was coming toward him. No, I'm not kidding! He literally just backflipped as he was looking at the runner coming at him and the ball missed him entirely, letting the runner on. I was so caught off guard by it, it took me a few seconds to start expressing my confusion and anger, and eventually just take a nonsensical picture of it a little too late after the fact.

This isn't nearly on the level of crazy that Dante's flip was, at least in video game terms, but it still broke my mind: Ken Griffey Jr dropped an easy out. I can only lay the blame on myself, because the guy does not drop the ball. Never.

So in case you were looking for realism in your game, don't come to Backyard Baseball 2003.

Despite all that nonsense, and the Yankees using it to avoid getting shut out, we were able to regain control shortly after. But not before Jeter took it to another level.

Yep, he's just playing everyone's positions now. He has taken over the franchise and will personally make sure he catches every out, even if it's out in centerfield, even if the centerfielder was right there to catch it. Jeter's had it with all of us.

And that was that! After all the loosely defined strike zones, rogue Jeters, random backflips, stupid power ups and inaccurate portrayals of pro players, the game was just about over. Oh, should I explain what Big Freeze is?

And that was all she wrote. They'll be suuuuper pissed at us when they play us again, since they're also division rivals. It's gonna be a rough season, even if most of the games will be blowouts.

Thank you guys again for joining me for another game of Backyard Baseball! I'll update once more when the next game is finished.

Next Game:

Oh man, thank you so much for reminding me of the Backyard sports games. The Backyard football with Barry Sanders and Steve Young in it was my shit.

I played the shit out of this game when I was a kid...Do you remember 2005's Backyard Baseball? I remember it having some terrible polygonal graphics...

@mechakirby:Haha, no problem! I love these games, flawed as they are. And oh god, the hours I lost to Backyard Football. That was a good time. Starting to seriously consider doing one of these for that game after this season.

@jaypb08: Ha, I do! I remember enjoying that one as well, though not to the degree of the older PC titles with 2D mixed with 3D. Also, man, if you thought Backyard Baseball 2005 was bad, Backyard Baseball 2007 is a trainwreck. I want to say that it was their first big push with the new brand of Backyard Sports, where they restyled everyone, got rid of a few people, Sunny Day's not commentating, and it all just seems awkward. it's something I don't ever want to play.

Gonna be playing the third game tonight, guys, so I'll likely have an update tomorrow. :)

I remember having a good time with one of the Football games on Gamecube.

@jjor64: Ooh, I've never played the GameCube version! I'll have to check that out.

Well, I was planning on posting tonight, but we decided to go to a Mariners game tonight against the Royals, so my post will have to be postponed a day. The game is finished, all I have to do is write it up, so stay tuned! :P

Man this blog post brings back memories of playing these games when I was a kid! Really happy you picked Pablo, aka the greatest video game character ever, on your team. My favorite Backyard Sports game was Baseball 2001, which had Cal Ripkin Jr as the cover boy, and I'm pretty sure he's not playable in 2003 right, or else I'd imagine he'd be your first or second pick (behind Pablo).

And another question, is Mike Piazza in 2003, because if you have him as a pitcher, he's a real jerk. I had him as a pitcher against Ronny Dobbs and after Mike struck him out, Mike was taunting Ronny and calling him names. Shortly afterwards, Ronny walks off crying. That is arguably my most vivid Backyard Sports memory.

Oh this totally brings back memories. I had 2003 as well, but I put hours upon hours into the original, and the soccer game. Pablo Sanchez is awesome. You lineup, just from remembering the players from all those years ago is about what I would have picked, although I always had Pablo on the mound.

@aorey: has the league gone on strike?? i need updates man!

@lead_dispencer: I'm sorry you guys, the short version is that my internet got cut. I can still type on my phone, but not for ~1500 words. I'll get it back on track soon and respond to all you guys, promise!

Edit: Just wanted to mention that the game against the Blue Jays gave me a scare! I ran headlong into the biggest problem this game has, can't wait to break it down for you guys.

Soooooo, I wrote up a whole damn thing for the third game, hit post, and I apparently suffered a server error ;_; God. Dammit.

I'll still give a summary of the third game, but it's gonna have to be later, and it'll be short. I'll be raring to go for the fourth game though, rest assured. I'm just very tired now :P

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Well, shit. As if I needed more evidence of my naivete regarding forums, I can't post more than twice in a row, it seems. Well, I hope someone sees this post so I can continue the blog :P So unfortunately, the blog post for my third game got written up, then was completely deleted when I hit send, and I have no desire to write it all up again, so I'm going to upload the pics I took and just give some quick blurbs. If I can continue this, I'll go back to my big posts for the fourth game.

Just to clarify, the Infield Fly rule is only used for pop ups that are easily caught, there are multiple people on base, and there are less than two outs. The problem here is the "easily caught" part, because every single character in this game is shit at fielding. That rule should have no part in the Backyard games.

The biggest problem with this game is that energy gets drained quickly. I have no problem with energy being a mechanic in sports games; it creates a lot of fun, random situations at the end of the game that makes those tight games that much more exciting. When everyone is tired halfway through the game, and in a game like this where no energy means you can't run, throw, or catch, I have to pray to the Backyard gods that I can win, because skill has nothing to do with it at this point. It's a punishment by this point that I participate in any of this at all.

God damn, this game was such hell, I couldn't even have fun with it by halfway through the game. Meaning only one game so far was any sort of fun. But next game will be at home! So hopefully this blog continues :P

Hope to see you guys later!

I've really enjoyed all these little recaps of the games. I vaguely remember these games. My friend really was the one that played them and I just watched. I thought cool kids and real baseball players!! I had no idea how much more the game actually was. Thanks for providing a little shot of nostalgia. Keep it up and take the Orioles to the 'ship!

At least you didn't get burned by any lil' MLB-pro again...right?

Hey guys! The game is finished, and I'll hopefully be writing up a summary tomorrow! I think I've voiced this concern before, but I'm worried about the longevity of the long form blog posts I did for one and two, since I've voiced quite a bit of my issues with the game already. Harping on the old stuff would serve no purpose. So I may jump between long essays and little blurbs posts with lots of pics like the last game. I hope that will work well for you guys, this is a kids game after all, I can only make it so deep and entertaining before the gas runs out. I can only frustrate Derek Jeter so many times.

@mattadord: I'm glad you've enjoyed them!! It's very interesting seeing some of the details up close now that I've grown up. As a kid, you're just playing and enjoying playing as kids or as yourself alongside people like Mike Piazza and Jerry Rice, and that's cool! But after years of gaming and then coming back to this, it's a very surreal experience, your nostalgia clashing with wondering how the designers came to the conclusions they did. Thanks for the encouragement! ^^

@dochaus:I didn't necessarily. Shawn Green, a supposed pro that I guess existed at some point, led a nice rally one point, but couldn't get the best of my crumbling crew, and I can only be thankful for that. Also, I meant to say, thanks for the shoutout on the baseball thread! I meant to post about the Mariners game I went to on there, but the same stuff that took me away from the blog itself took me away from the rest of the forums. :P

Tomorrow I'll post about the O's first home game against an honestly depressing opponent, whose only "famous" player is Backyard kid Mikey Thomas...He's a...he's a dude.

@aorey: Yeah it's so surreal coming back to games you played as a kid. A couple examples that pop into my head are Pokémon and Ratchet and Clank. In Pokémon I didn't know about repels at all as a kid so I would just fight everything I can across, and in turn be super over leveled. Now I know all about repels and found the game somewhat difficult because I was actually under-leveled at points. It made me wonder why the developers made the wild Pokémon so much weaker than all the trainers in that area. You have to fight 2 or 3 wild ones to get the same XP from a single trainer battle. It just frustrated me, and made me wish I could go back to my pre-repel days.

As for Rachet and Clank, I got on the planet that they sell the Rhyno gun. I figured I needed it to proceed because it was right there. So I just grinded bolts, mostly by getting the same gold bolt again and again, till finally I felt lucky and gave it another shot. I finally got past this swimming part and had so much money I could buy every thing I came across. That's more a story about how my untrained video game mind thinks rather than the developers. But looking back at it now there is no way I would do something like grind out all those bolts now. I would just stop playing or look it up. It's crazy to see/remember what you did when you first started playing video games.

@aorey: No problem, thread's still open if you want to post baseball-related things.

Also, re: Shawn Green, apparently he was an all-star for the Dodgers at the time (and the Blue Jays before that), though the only times he ever saw the playoffs were when his personal performance began to crater at the end of his career.

Okay, guys, time for the fourth game! I can't say I'll be as quick getting to future games as I was this time, now that Rocket League is out.

But first, some replies:

@mattadord: Haha, I know exactly what you mean! Your understanding of how games are played change as you play more, and it's like watching a classic movie and realizing there were a bunch of adult jokes that you never got, like the developer had certain intentions in mind for the player, but you as the player aren't equipped to play that way at that age. It's cool that in both those games, you still have the option to brute force it, as drawn out and painful both those options you took are. I'm pretty sure I'm not missing anything with this game, I just don't think it's entirely well made. If only this game were made now, we could get an AMA together and ask about how the hell fucking strike zone works in this game.

@dochaus: Cool, I'd be happy to when I get a chance.

Huh, interesting. This game provides a real interesting window into baseball at the time, featuring people that at that time were looking to be big players, but looking back just kinda fell into obscurity. Poor ol' Shawn Green.

---

Okay guys, so this is our first game at home, at the nostalgic Playground Commons. I went ahead and took a peek at my lineup; guess who's still a fucking whore?

So, fucking awesome, we're going in with no real pitcher for the fourth game in a row, absolutely swell! I'm starting to wonder if Amir just lied to me when we were picking people, like he had to lie his way into the getting onto the same team as Achmed. Achmed's a great hitter, but man, he wasn't worth this. Welp, let's just jump the fuck in and let the swirling chaos of the Universe take hold.

Okay, so I missed my chance at a screenshot, but along with Amir and Dante being a bunch of assholes, Achmed threw his hat into the mix with a badly dropped ball. I can't tell if it was just accidental or not, but he's on my shitlist now too, though only as a temporary measure until I can be sure he's truly incompetent.

But yeah, look at this field! We have our own version of the Green Monster, though I guess we could call it a steel curtain, but I wouldn't ever do that 'cause I'm no Steelers fan. Maybe the, uh...the Chains? I dunno, try to hit to left field. Also, white roads. Love 'em. And that area over the left field fence seems like a bad spot to play around since baseballs will be flying a lot, but I guess it wouldn't be Playground Commons otherwise. Know the risks when sliding down the slide, man.

Dante fucking backflipped AGAIN! As the ball was being thrown to him, AGAIN!! Part of me wants to say the guy is just fucking stupid, but I'm starting to lean towards the idea that he is trying to sabotage me. I mean, as long as I'm in direct control, he does fine, but as soon as I leave him to his own devices, I'm down to eight players. He had been doing well as a pitcher up to this point, but that's because I control every pitch. This shit though, to happen twice in four games, I can't even...And it's not like we're far ahead enough to start toying with them, that kid is heading towards third now while we're up by one! THIS IS NO LAUGHING MATTER, ROBINSON.

This play came about from an awful drop, which happened immediately after another bad drop. Which basically just sums up how this game works. All you can do is try to hit a little better and drop a little less, which, try as you might, is not very controllable, which puts you on edge. I mean, I tend to win these games in blowouts, which seems to suggest I know what I'm doing, but man, it certainly doesn't feel like it. Maybe the only thing I'm doing is using the Power bat when the CPU alternates between the three that aren't bunt. I also imagine the players I picked helped a lot.

Yep, I've confirmed it, Dante is rebelling. Ball rolled up to him as a double play situation presented itself nicely. I clicked on the ball right next to him, and Jocinda, my catcher, ran up to it, because Dante refused. This resulted in no outs, and I had to stop for a moment to figure out what the hell I was going to do with this kid. I still have quite a bit of season left with this asshole. My best bet is to keep him at pitcher though, since that'll keep him away from most fielding situations, and he'll be under my control.

One thing that I also noticed now, though I didn't notice during the game, was that at home, the CPU would never hit to right field, due to THE CHAINS...eh? Anyway, I can probably put people like Amir out there and be confident that they won't be involved in a lot of the game.

So as you can see, we were able to keep the score well managed, and Dante, with his free will taken away, does decently enough on the mound. I'll have to keep this in mind as we play future games.

So I went to change pitchers after Dante ran out of energy, and apparently Achmed's just about out of energy. I'm starting to think the Khan brothers are both just a couple of liars. Achmed's done nothing but bat and get involved in the occasional infield play. Maybe if he stopped headbanging and took off his dumb headphones, he'd be better off. I didn't ask for this.

Also, for shits and giggles, I looked up Mikey Thomas. Here's his summary:

"Have a lot of tissue around"? Does "tissue" function as both singular and plural? Is "tissues" incorrect? I have so many questions.

And that was that, our first win at home! It wasn't super eventful, and it honestly revealed a lot more about our own team than theirs. We'll see how I do with potentially three players rebelling against me. Well, since this feels a little sparse, lets take a look at the stats sheet:

To be honest, none of this was surprising, especially poor Steph finding a way to be worse than this Fay Dawson person. The most frustrating thing? I had one name on the list of errors. That name? Ken Griffey Jr. >.>

Well thanks guys for joining me for another game, hopefully this won't disappear as soon as I submit it. Join us for our next game, which is...

@aorey: It's so weird to hear about the pitching being wonky. The couple times I remember playing against my friend I remember him absolutely destroying me when he pitched. I would usually play a game get destroyed and pass it off to my other friend to give him his wallops.

Though after reading that maybe pitching is totally screwy, and it all makes sense now. haha

@mattadord: Haha, well, the key thing to remember here is that for the entire season so far, I haven't had a player with high pitching stats. I've had to play 5/10 pitching or lower most of the time, which has done me no favors. If Amir ever recovers from the Tommy John surgery he's apparently hiding from me, the pitching situation may get better. However, I'm thinking if the next game doesn't get too crazy, I'm gonna try to dive as deep as I can into the mechanics of the pitching and batting and how they work together, or don't. :P

No updates today, just wanted to share this status update from SportsNation regarding the Home Run Derby that took place today:

@aorey: sorry i had a hiatus from this series! looking forward to the yankees sega continuing! Love your writing! your voice is so telling for your pain and anguish with how you feel tortured as a player-coach-god for your team. keep this coming please!!