All Time Teams Program - Greg Maddux and 5 Other Legends
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These are my last thoughts on this subject. It’s pretty obvious that a lot of the streamers and their followers are not the most agreeable people. With that I agree, but to say that they think everything is ridiculous, to me is kind of a dismissive and sweeping statement. You’re not curious what the best players of the game think about a very challenging program? Well, I am and I think it makes perfect sense to feel that way. Also, I agree that this is definitely the perfect time for SDS to experiment. But, in my opinion, to refer to the rewarding of a cosmetic only variant of a card as a reward for the most challenging program of the year is genius is something with which I just can’t agree. Also, it’s very noble to take on a challenge for the thrill of simply accomplishing it and I commend anyone who feels that way but this reminds me of my best friend from childhood who when we both still had dreams of being baseball players said Rickey, if I ever made it to the Major Leagues, I would play for nothing because I love the game so much. Well, that was 50 years ago and right before the advent of Free Agency. Do you see many players playing for free nowadays? This is the good ole USA, the land of baseball, apple pie and Capitalism. I, personally, want to be rewarded for my hard work…ahem, play. You know it just dawned on me we’re talking about a video game so I’ll wrap it up now. Anyway, good luck and in full disclosure, I did acquire 7 of the 13 Spooky Variants so I’m something of a hypocrite. Thanks, Rick
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Well said, I agree with you on all points. I personally, for me to invest the time into what would be time consuming should have a reward that matches. For me to say this ain't it is definitely premature because all the details have not been released but I can only go on previous track record for the time being.
For the record if they are going to experiment with things how about experiment fixing community agreed on issues instead of experimenting with variants that have no more value than the base card.
edit- I do have backtrack a little:
Value is the wrong word, because the Spooky and the Roch variants hold more value then their bases. I should say their attribute values. Then that gets into what @dolenz_psn said that there shouldn't be a slighty better card of a base card that's already really good. So.... the jury is still out for these variants.
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@DrBear100_PSN Agreed. Who knows what it’ll be like until Friday. And I realize that I need to stop being like a bull seeing red whenever I see the word Variant.

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@DrBear100_PSN Nope, too late. I framed your original response and hung it on my Wife’s mirror to show her what it looks like when someone actually agrees with me.
All I know is, I am craving new content! I only have 3 crazy long term goals remaining in the Spooky & Finest Mini Season. -
I think last year there was a fair bit of backlash with the extreme program- the prior couple of years the extreme program was manageable for most people but they changed that last year back to where it was for higher skilled players only (the conquest map requiring specifically the 10th game on the highest setting was especially rotten design)
This makes two years in a row where the majority of players will not have the 99 Elly card. More will have this year's because the collection is at least obtainable for everyone, but if I were a Reds fan I would be royally pissed off at this treatment.
I think its fair to say that putting an exclusive card behind high difficulty content upsets more people than it would please. Which is why I think they should lean into stuff like chase card selectors. It sucks to see your favorite players in places where you strongly dislike the method to get it, or can't even earn it period.
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To be fair the really good cards are the incentive to do these programs so I understand the need to use these cards.
But what is the issue in my book is making the same players hard to get every year. If they have made 99 Elly difficult two years running then that is a problem. I also find it unacceptable that it was the Red's only finest, guaranteeing that a large portion of one teams fan base didn't get a finest card.
If I thought that next year Pujols would be a collection again or that Musial, McGee and Ozzie Smith would be the equivalent of Chase cards again then that would be a reason to skip that version.
We can't, or should I say we shouldn't, go into next year and have the same group of switch hitters have their cards be hard to get.
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I swear the one guy in the new Utley signature card is stupid because he says that Maddux and Utley are gonna be captains but no where does it say that either card is a Captain
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@dolenz_psn I completely agree.
This was my biggest issue with Beltran. Last year he was the live series collection and this year he was a legend/flashback collection for his top card. In years past (2019-2022) SDS did a very good job of mixing things up where a difficult card to obtain one year was much easier to obtain the next. There were Chipper Jones and Ken Griffey Jr cards that were limited one year then in smaller programs or inning bosses or team affinity the next.
I wish they would go back to doing a better job of mixing rewards. -
Well, this kind of negates my thought that the rewards would be division based. Two NL East cards so far.

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These are my last thoughts on this subject. It’s pretty obvious that a lot of the streamers and their followers are not the most agreeable people. With that I agree, but to say that they think everything is ridiculous, to me is kind of a dismissive and sweeping statement. You’re not curious what the best players of the game think about a very challenging program? Well, I am and I think it makes perfect sense to feel that way. Also, I agree that this is definitely the perfect time for SDS to experiment. But, in my opinion, to refer to the rewarding of a cosmetic only variant of a card as a reward for the most challenging program of the year is genius is something with which I just can’t agree. Also, it’s very noble to take on a challenge for the thrill of simply accomplishing it and I commend anyone who feels that way but this reminds me of my best friend from childhood who when we both still had dreams of being baseball players said Rickey, if I ever made it to the Major Leagues, I would play for nothing because I love the game so much. Well, that was 50 years ago and right before the advent of Free Agency. Do you see many players playing for free nowadays? This is the good ole USA, the land of baseball, apple pie and Capitalism. I, personally, want to be rewarded for my hard work…ahem, play. You know it just dawned on me we’re talking about a video game so I’ll wrap it up now. Anyway, good luck and in full disclosure, I did acquire 7 of the 13 Spooky Variants so I’m something of a hypocrite. Thanks, Rick
I respect your take, Rick. I get why you'd want more than a cosmetic for finishing the hardest program of the year.
There are a few streamers I still enjoy. I ended up unfollowing almost everyone because it felt like the vast majority were looking for a reason to be mad. SDS can do something genuinely good and these guys, who built their whole audience playing SDS's game, will act like the studio just committed a crime.
And they're babies about any pushback. You can disagree as respectfully as possible and they'll still call you a bootlicker, throw slurs at you, or block you. It's weird. You're the bad guy for having a different opinion, and SDS is the bad guy anytime they don't get exactly what they want. SDS could make the best change this game's ever seen and it feels like 95% of the community would still find something to nitpick... due to the negativity passed down by the content creators.
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I love Chase Utley cards that's gonna be a good card. Dang, that card art on the extreme version looks so much better than the base. I may have to eat crow a little bit, where's the ketchup?
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I swear the one guy in the new Utley signature card is stupid because he says that Maddux and Utley are gonna be captains but no where does it say that either card is a Captain
LOL and then he calls someone else dumb for pointing out that nowhere in the post does it mention captain.
He apparently has no idea how many other team captains have also had 99 OVR cards issued who were not captains.
At times I do want to reply to these folks but my X account got hacked and then shutdown. I made one attempt to send in a report to try and get it back but they just reiterated that I broke some rule (does anyone here believe that?) and denied me.
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If there was one player per team, Chase Utley would make sense for this program. He is the best Phil's 2B of all time
But if we are only doing 6 players why is a guy like Utley one of those 6? I would expect this to be MLB elite players.
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@DrBear100_PSN
Yeah, At least the extreme signature card art is more distinguishable than the awards Maddox, for example -
They are really testing out these variants this year for next years game for sure. A better use of a variant is have variant card on another team. Such as Maddux for the Cubs. Then people would be a little less upset because they can’t complain that their favorite player didn’t get a 99 this year
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When it comes to Extreme - there are two groups on different sides of the planet. Is it extreme to have to beat a good CPU team on legend? Is it extreme to have to beat cpu five times in a row on legend? I'm far from an elite player (and on the wrong side of 40), but both of those things are fairly easy for me, and a pretty boring challenge. On the flip side, we've got people who play on Veteran and can't do Showdowns.
There's no reconciling those two groups, y'all. How in blazes do you design a challenge that satisfies those two groups?
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The answer is to release it earlier and have some grindier ways to get it. Last year's was released too late for the repeatable goal to be feasible.
Why not have missions like get 100 hits with Jolt Utley? Then hit 30 HR with the Utley you get in the program? Steal 60 bases with any Elly De La Cruz. etc . Some people hate those type of missions, but as an alternative to hitting for the cycle in a moment it seems fine to me.
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When it comes to Extreme - there are two groups on different sides of the planet. Is it extreme to have to beat a good CPU team on legend? Is it extreme to have to beat cpu five times in a row on legend? I'm far from an elite player (and on the wrong side of 40), but both of those things are fairly easy for me, and a pretty boring challenge. On the flip side, we've got people who play on Veteran and can't do Showdowns.
There's no reconciling those two groups, y'all. How in blazes do you design a challenge that satisfies those two groups?
This is why, while I don't like the variants personally, I think this was a great way to do it. I do enjoy doing the Extreme showdowns & Extreme conquest. For me it's satisfying enough while not being extremely easy or extremely difficult. Constantly beating up the CPU on Veteran is where I get a little bored (though I do it anyway if I'm super tired but want to play).
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By The way, the leaks, if you want to believe them, are:
Maddux
Utley
Nolan Ryan
Joe Mauer
Lou Gehrig
Hank Aaron -
It’s crazy they pay for the rights to these players and don’t have 99’s.
Lou Gehrig
Willie Stargell
Bob Feller
Satchel Paige
Roger Clemens
Nolan Ryan
Hank AaronAgain, SDS should be ashamed of themselves. Creativity is GONE. What are we doing here?!?!?
Goose gossage
Eric Gagne
Lee smith
Al Leiter
Paul O’Neil