Braves need tips from Playstation

By By Will Bardwell / sports writer
May 27, 2004
If you believe my Playstation 2, the Atlanta Braves are about to turn their dismal season around with a historic 70-game winning streak.
In my experience, though, life doesn't always turn out like it does in video games.
I bought "MVP Baseball 2004" when it was released back in March. Since then, I've been addicted to it. I play at least a couple of games every day, and each game lasts around 45 minutes. From Albert Pujols' awkward batting stance to Carlos Delgado's taste for inside fastballs to the wrinkles in Roger Clemens' face, attention to detail in the game is amazing. It's the most realistic baseball game ever produced.
And much like reality, my campaign with the Atlanta Braves got off to a bumpy start. I had an unimpressive 22-17 start, which is a pretty shabby record on a video game. Mike Hampton threw a shoddy slider, Rafael Furcal couldn't get a ball through the infield, and Andruw Jones struck out three or four times per game. Sound familiar?
But all that turned around in late May. My digital Braves hosted the Dodgers, as did the real Braves this past weekend, and swept three straight. Back in the real world, Atlanta only won two of three, but stick with me on this.
After the sweep, my franchise ripped a hole through the National League and didn't lose until late summer. I traded Marcus Giles, John Smoltz and J.D. Drew (I never liked him anyway) to the Toronto Blue Jays for Carlos Delgado. Maybe that's a little unrealistic, since Braves general manager John Schuerholz has made only one big trade in the last decade, but I needed someone to bat behind Andruw. After that, Andruw set a new single-season home run record by early August, and the lefty-hitting Delgado hasn't missed a right-handed fastball all year.
I moved Chipper Jones to third base, called up Jesse Garcia to play second base, gave Antonio Alfonseca the closers' job, and stuck Darren Bragg and Gary Matthews (never mind that he's not even on the team anymore) in the outfield.
Implausible and unrealistic, I know. But even in the world of video games, desperate times call for desperate measures.
Blockbuster trades are where video game realism ends for the Atlanta Braves, though. Think about it other than picking up Gary Sheffield prior to the 2003 season, how many big moves have the Braves made over the past few years? And no, getting J.D. Drew over the offseason doesn't count. Other than Sheffield, the last noteworthy acquisition the Braves made was getting Fred McGriff, but that was in 1993.
Of course, when you're an 11-time division champion, you don't have to get new talent. The only thing you have to worry about is keeping the talent you have.
But don't tell that to Schuerholz, who let Vinny Castilla, Greg Maddux, Javy Lopez and Sheffield all get away in the same offseason. Maddux isn't Cy Young Award material anymore, but even in 2003 when he had an off year, he still won 16 games. Lopez was coming off the year of his life, and Sheffield set a career high with 132 RBIs.
In the video game world, I would've easily re-signed all of them.
In the real world, at least a couple of them could've been brought back.
In the world of John Schuerholz, all of them were expendable. Genius.
My favorite part of the video game, though, is pitching. It's seen from the catcher's point of view, with a strike zone superimposed on to the screen. You use the joystick to control your location, and different buttons throw different pitches. As in real life, everybody is better at certain pitches than others.
Randy Johnson's fastball, as you might guess, is obscene. John Thomson's fastball is far friendlier to opposing batters.
The most helpful part of batting is what I call a "heads-up marker." When someone throws a bad pitch, a marker appears on the screen to indicate where the pitch will end up. If it's out of the strike zone, a big X appears so you know not to swing. If it's in the strike zone, though, a giant white circle pops up so you can prepare to mash.
Though these markers have never shown up on TV during any Major League Baseball game that I've ever seen, I'm convinced that they're real. It's the only possible explanation for how Hampton's ERA is nearly 6.00.
The most tragic unreal aspect of the video game, though, is that you have certain objectives that your franchise must fulfill. If not, you "lose your job" and have to take over another team. It sounds realistic enough, but Braves fans know better.
Schuerholz's only recent accomplishment is letting one of the greatest teams in baseball history fall into disrepair. He turned baseball's most potent lineup into one of its weakest in mere months, and one of the best pitching rotations ever into a laugher.
It may not be a video game, but it's still pretty unbelievable.