MLB Showdown Obsession

 Now we reach the awkward point of the Perfect Game series, where I cover a game that took place during the official Showdown era. Most players involved have cards, so what do I do? Well, not *every* player in that game got a Showdown card, so I can fix that, but some notable players involved can't be avoided (like Cone himself, who was chosen as one of the holo cards for the starter set). So here I'll make a few exceptions for those few notable men and give them "special" pennant race variants. Most pitchers know better than to strive to pitch a No-Hitter. Sure, they can start each game fresh, thinking they can retire every hitter, but once that first baserunner reaches, it's a forgotten worry. No so with David Cone, who obsessed over the notion that he could etch his name into history. There were several notable close calls for Cone in which circumstances or poor luck got in the way, and each instance was maddening to him. And while the vast majority of pitchers...

  Baseball was extending it's reach in 1947. Fans everywhere would read box scores (a lost art it seems nowadays) and follow their teams on radio, but the only way to see them live was to buy a ticket and spend a day at the ballpark. Television was changing that and one of the very first teams to broadcast to it's fans were the Yankees. Helps that they played in the biggest market, but the Yankees were also a national brand behind their team of legends. After an unthinkable 3 seasons without a title, the Yankees had entered the 1947 season with a new Manager in charge with Bucky Harris. The change worked as the Yankees rolled to a 97-57 record, running away with the pennant by 12 games over the 2nd place Tigers. The World Series that year was the first ever televised, but since it was still the early days of TV, only the big cities had access, which was good that the opponent to the Yankees was also a major market team that their fans could watch in the Brooklyn Dodgers. Three ...

 300? Holy cow! When the Showdown Bot was released I never thought I'd be able to hold attention for this long on such a project, but baseball has such a wealth of history that I have yet to run short on inspiration. Thus far, I've gotten a bit carried away, seeking to make dozens of team sets , reviewing entire careers , seeking to highlight every Hall of Famer and other such topics all while going from the occasional update to at least once a week. I've learned quite a bit of baseball history in the process and gotten to flex some trivia I'm aware of as well. Now this ambitious project of mine has reached 300 posts, as I take a break from other themes to crack open my autograph book again to show off the players I've had the honor of meeting face to face. ( 100 and 200 specials) Most of the players I've received an autograph from usually come with an uneventful story. Not so with Alfonso Soriano. Back during the Yankees dynasty, Darryl Strawberry was reh...