I have totally given up on Legend mode. Hall of Fame mode is much more satisfying. I switched to Hall of Fame mode in 2015 while was in AA. I finally broke the Mendoza line with a .207 average! My stats overall are mediocre at this time in my career but at least I’m improving each year. Hall of Fame mode definitely seems to be a more challenging than last year’s game but at least I’m seeing success unlike legend mode.
In 2018, I was finally able to reach a level where I’m dominating at the plate. I got my batting average up to .300 but then I was hit with an injury which landed me on the 60 day disabled list. I think I hurt myself legging out a single or I may have fielded a ground ball the wrong way.
YEAR
TEAM
G
AB
AVG
H
R
2B
3B
HR
RBI
SB
BB
K
SLG
OBP
OPS
2018
Nationals
66
197
.259
51
24
6
0
10
32
1
13
37
.442
.313
.755
2017
Nationals
41
130
.246
32
15
4
1
4
21
0
18
27
.385
.331
.716
2015
Nationals
10
12
.000
0
0
0
0
0
1
0
0
3
.000
.077
.077
2014
Nationals
6
15
.067
1
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
5
.067
.067
.133
2013
Cardinals
64
136
.184
25
11
4
0
1
12
0
12
33
.235
.252
.487
TOTALS
187
490
.223
109
50
14
1
15
66
1
43
105
.347
.289
.637
Update on hitting tips
1. Never swing at first pitch – In the first at bat of a game, it seems like I’m always able to get to a 3-2 count. Be very patient in your first at bat at the beginning of the game. In the following at bats, I never swing at the first pitch unless I’m in a hot streak or if I’m facing a tired pitcher.
2. Guess the sides with two strikes in the count – I always guess fastball with two strikes in the count. As a right handed-batter, I’ll guess for a fastball outside if I’m facing a right-handed pitcher- especially if he has a slider in his arsenal. If the pitcher doesn’t throw very hard breaking balls I’m more comfortable guessing from the inside of the plate, however. The idea is not to let the pitcher make you chase balls outside of the zone.
Against a left handed pitcher, I tend to always guess inside even through I’m more comfortable guessing outside pitches. The CPU would tend to take advantage because I kept getting tied up on pitches inside. To avoid this, I will guess inside pitches.
Selecting a position – In MLB 08 playing 3B was a good choice if you preferred batting more than fielding because you would have less fielding opportunities than you would if you played outfield. MLB 09 allows you to limit the amount of fielding so choose a position you prefer to play. For your secondary position, it’s recommended that you choose either IF or OF. This can help increase your chances of getting into a game.
Base Running and Fielding – MLB 09 The Show offers options to turn off the RTTS baserunning and fielding. This will allow your games to play out more quickly which will also allow you to play more games in less time. From my experience, limiting the amount of base running and fielding opportunities is highly recommended. Let’s calculate how many games one would need to play per day in order to have a 20 season career: Let’s say you play 10 games a day. There are 162 games in a season. Divide 162 by 10 and you get 16.2. It takes 16.2 days to finish a season if you average 10 games a day. Divide 365 by 16.2 and you get 22 seasons. So, you may need to average 10 games a day in order to reach a 20 season career. In MLB 08 this did not seem to be attainable unless a you simulated a portion of your games. With the new base running and fielding options in MLB 09 having a 20 season career seems to be a bit more attainable.
Training points - Since there aren’t any deadlines during spring training don’t spend any training points during this period. When the season starts be sure to use your training points on attributes that have not been updated within three weeks. When an attribute is not updated after four weeks it begins to decline. Try to have batting attribute points between left and right balanced. Right attributes should be a priority, though, because you will likely face more right-handed pitchers than left-handed pitchers during the course of a season. All batting (contact and power) and durability points should take priority over base running and fielding points. Maintaining your bunting attributes should be a low priority but you should still try to update your bunting attributes before the four week deadline. It might be a good idea to let ‘Drag Bunting’ attributes take precedence over ‘Bunting Drills’ because the ‘Drag Bunting’ attribute also has speed as a secondary attribute. Give ‘Base Running Drills’ priority over ‘Sprints’ because ‘Base Running Drills’ include speed and base running attritues which are also the same attributes for ‘Sprints’. So, you’ll be able to update ’sprints’ at the same time you update ‘Base Running Drills’.
After having the game for a month I was finally called up (RTTS mode) and got my first major league hit playing on Legend mode. At 22, I certainly don’t belong in the major leagues (career .179 hitter) but thanks to the Rule 5 draft I was drafted by the St. Louis Cardinals. Under the Rule 5 draft it states:
“If the new team does not want to keep the player on its 25-man roster for the season, he must be offered back to the team of which he was a member when chosen in the draft.”
I probably would have preferred to stay in the minor leagues (with the Giants) but I seem to be performing better at the MLB level than I did in AA. In my opinion, AA even seems to be more difficult than AAA. Maybe the reason for this is that I tended to chase too many balls out of the strike zone in AA. Anyways, I already got my first major league hit – a line drive over the second baseman. The ball actually tipped the second baseman’s glove. I was luckily able to stretch a single into a double. Take a look:
Update on “10 useful MLB 09 The Show hitting tips”
Playing on Legend mode has been quite a challenge. Earlier last month I posted 10 useful MLB 09 The Show hitting tips. Moving the left stick up in the zone and wiggling the stick hasn’t really helped much. I do need to be more patient at the plate!
Additional MLB 09 The Show hitting tips
1. In the forums, some players have mentioned that they have been turning on the plate coverage indicator (PCI). This indicator (yellow oval) displays a visible area for the batter as a guideline when aiming the left stick. Using the plate coverage indicator seems to help a little bit. I believe I still need to work on my plate disipline in order to take advantage of this option, though.
2. We own a 50″ 1080i Panasonic Plasma television. I originally had my PS3 set for 1080i resolution. But, MLB 09 the show is optimized for 720p video mode according to the message that appears on the game loading screen. I just recently changed to 720p mode on my PS3 and have noticed a small improvement in my hitting. I definitely seem to be making better contact on the ball.
Earlier, I showed how to make MLB 09 The Show movies with Moyea FLV Editor Lite Beta. If you want to do more to your movies convert them to avi file format with Pazera free FLV to AVI converter. This will allow you to edit your movies in a video editor of your choice such as Adobe Premiere Pro.
Now that MLB 09 The Show offers video replays and pictures, gamers can now build dynamic team pages with screen shots and videos…and maybe now even statistics.
I learned that not only can you take pictures of your favorite plays in MLB 09 but you can also use this feature to take pictures of any of the menus, statistics, or box scores in MLB 09 The Show.
In MLB 07 and MLB 08, I manually copied my RTTS stats by hand and then entered them into HTML format. There may have been a less tedious way to do this but I was not aware of it.
With MLB 09’s new features, I may have found a better way to compile and display stats online by using an Optical Character Recognition service:
1. To take a picture in MLB 09, just hit the PS button and then go over to the picture sub-menu. There will be an option to capture the screen. Choose this and then then, hit the “X” button. You have now saved a screen capture.
2. Copy the image to your PC and use Microsoft Paint or any other image editor to invert the colors. Also, crop the area you want to capture.
Batting .167? Good thing I have a 3 year contract with the Giants.
3. Go to http://www.onlineocr.net, upload the image and then convert it to another format such as HTML or text format.
Now you have data to work with to publish to your team pages:
YEAR G AB AVG h r 2b 3b hr rbi
2010 12 34 .206 7 0 0 0 0 0
2009 115 406 .167 68 26 5 0 0 32
