Improvements for next year
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Just some ideas for how franchise mode could be improved for next year.
- Realignments/Expansion
- Let us truly customize our own league
- Let us rebrand teams whenever we want, not just at the very beginning. This means the whole league, not just the team you are a gm for. Also, rebranding minor league teams would be super cool, too.
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Add the WBC to the offseason every three years, like in NBA 2k with the fiba world championship. Don't have the rights for WBC? Don't call it the WBC and don't use international player likeness. Most of us won't care.
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Expand NCAA in some way to franchise. Even if it is just the ability to scout during a game between two of the teams you have rights for. I'm not asking for a full schedule, just a few games to sit in on. It's dumb to just have College for three games in rtts. Either have college baseball or don't.
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Some sort of international free agency. Why not even have international leagues, even if they are fictional. Call the NPB the Japanese league without using player likenesses. Or, use a system like i suggested for NCAA as a scouting only endeavor.
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I just hope that SDS adds a lot more last names to the last name voice file database for those creating historic or other players. Only a small number were added in 2025 which was very disappointing.
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In my opinion Franchise has been lacking in immersion for years. A few ideas I have that would make the game mode much better:
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Add Class-A teams and allow there to be three affiliates under the major leave teams.
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Non-roster invitees to spring training. I would like to get some playing time with some of my young guys that might make their way into the 40-man during the season, in spring training.
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I think player secondary positions should have individual ratings for positions. The more a player plays at that secondary position, the better their fielding rating at that position gets.
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Developing prospects. The training tab seems to be too basic. Add some type of system that makes it more likely to develop prospects. In real life, a unknown prospect might emerge in one season from performance and make his name known and expedite his MLB ETA, It would be nice to be able to see something along those lines, instead of just looking at my low 69s guys and thinking it will be 4-5 seasons before they are getting into the 70s in overall.
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Managerial staff: I would like to have more things to look at than the 4 attributes that those managers give. Make managers have different philosophies, habits.
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Morale: honestly the old morale system was great. I like that you had to think about that players happiness when thinking about their salary. If I offer a 10 MIL salary to guy over 5 years, will that 10 MIL keep him happy in year 3-5? Or will he be upset he’s only making that and it affect his overall.
Minor league stats history: Add a tab shows the minor league history for a player starting when the franchise begins. I’d like to see the statistical improvements or decline of some of my minor leaguers, because in MLB the show, the game does a great job of sometimes players play better despite their overall and that would help to call players up not solely based on attributes.
I personally think that there should never be a 18-19 year old coming out of the draft with more than a 65 overall, and even that is high. I tend to edit all of the drafted players and anyone that found gets dropped to the maximum of a 65. I don’t like the idea of 18-19 year olds being day one starters on CPU rosters. It is just not realistic. Most teams that draft those young players early on understand they are 2+ year projects to get to the MLB.
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- Y2y saves.
- Y2y saves.
- Y2y saves.
- Y2Y saves.
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I agree with the suggestion that secondary positions also have ratings. Some players, like McKinstry on the Tigers routinely plays in different positions. He should have higher second position fielding ratings than a player who occasionally, but rarely plays in another position.
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We need separate injury and stamina ratings.
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Main items to fix:
1)Scouting and Draft: this has been a huge improvement to the game the last few years, however I notice the other teams don't maximize the $300,000 to get the best scouts they can like I do. To make it fair, I use 30 team control and try to improve 1 scout for each team annually, thus I don't get to maximize scouting for my own team. The bigger issue is that teams don't scout logically during the season, so if I put effort into scouting for my team, I get about 5 times the amount of information as the other teams, thus leading to much better drafts annually for my team. My team gets such a better farm system after a few years that playing the game isn't the challenge it should be. To make counteract this, I autoscout so I don't gain the information advantage, however this reduces my enjoyment of the game because I don't get to scout. Also, teams aren't drafting logically. For example, a team with the 2nd overall pick drafts a player that they have scouted as the 66th best player in the draft.
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Waivers: the game has improved over the years by increasing the number of players claimed off waivers. However this is not true at the most important time of the year...when spring training ends and teams are finalizing their 26 man active rosters. I see players that are mid 70s to mid 80s OVR that should logically be claimed by the lower end teams. I never have to worry about trying to pass anybody through waivers at this time because I know they won't be claimed. This is taking away what should be a tough decision point when acting as the GM for my team.
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Free Agent Signings: while the game logically lowers FA contract demands the last few weeks before spring training starts, it is not logical that those contract demands go back to the original higher amounts after spring training starts. In addition, it is not logical that those unsigned free agent contract demands remain high as the season moves along. The reality is those demands should keep coming down. Maybe not for all free agents, but likely for most of them.
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Rebuilding Teams: Once the season reaches July and Current Roster Strategies are re-set for each team, those teams that are rebuilding should put all pending free agents on the trade block, or at least all pending free agents that are over a certain age and thus maybe not likely to be re-signed. In addition, teams that are rebuilding should be requesting players in trade that can help next year's team or beyond. Too many times rebuilding teams are requesting players that are on expiring contracts in trade returns.
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Lineup logic: In general lineup logic is good. The issue I see is teams playing a bad defender in the field but have a great defender at the same position serving as the DH.
Other items I notice in the game that could be corrected or improved:
1)Free Agents: After the December 2nd deadline to offer contracts, I always see a few young players that are "A" or "B" potential that were not offered contracts by their existing teams. These players are non 40 man, non rule-5 players, non high dollar salary players, so their release isn't realistic. Most of the time, these players are catchers.2)Roster: If my team is in the playoffs but has an injured player coming off the 60 day IL and my 40 man roster is already at 40, the game doesn't allow me to choose which player to release to stay at 40.
3)Roster: Sometimes draftees that I drafted and signed prior to the August 1st deadline the year before don't show up on my roster the next year. Instead they are in the free agent pool. Probably happens once every 3 years.
4)Roster: When a player suffers a long-term (6+ month) injury at the end of a season or playoffs, it should carry over to the next season.
5)Awards selections: game isn't good at selecting award winners. My catcher won a gold glove while only playing 180 innings at the position, spending the rest of the year at DH. Player won World Series MVP going 2 for 5 (0 runs, 0 rbi) across a couple of games, while other players had lower batting average but had many runs and rbi that led to the victories.
6)Free Agents: When signing some free agents that would be considered on the fringe of being good enough for the MLB roster, sometimes it adds them to the 40 man and sometimes it doesn't. It would be nice if that was made clear when signing the player.
7)Bunting: In manager mode, if I ask a player to bunt, it always tries to bunt, even if the pitch is ridiculously outside of the strike zone. Even for players that don't have high bunt attributes, this doesn't seem reasonable. Maybe for suicide squeeze situations, but not every bunt attempt.
8)Things that could make the game more enjoyable:
-non roster invitees available for spring training
-allowing for base runners to get more than a standard lead in manager mode
-no trade clauses for contracts
-front or back loaded contracts, but more choice than what the game allowed previously
-GM, owner & manager personality traits that affect how a team functions. For example, some owners spend freely and some pinch pennies. Some GMs make a lot of trades. Some managers play their starters every day, while some platoon bench players in a few days per week. This would greatly enrich the storyline of the game.
-Players drafted and signed this year should immediately be allowed to join the major or minor league teams. -
