Number 1

I'll be straight up with you...I'm using a set of home brewed APBA cards for this season. I own two complete APBA sets purchased from the game company (1979 and 1988), so don't get the idea I don't fully avoid giving them business. But since this particular set is not what you might call, "official," I'll leave out any real images of their cards...On to some serious rambling!

I have exactly 284 APBA league games under my belt, along with a smattering of what I guess you could call 'one-off' games, so close to 300 APBA games played if you want to get a general feel of my experience with this game. This is the first time I've tried a complete season with APBA- 600 + games, and so hopefully whoever made this set knows what he's doing, and the results should be somewhat representative of what went down in 1949. I am playing the basic game, cards and dice, and the old boards that came with the game when I bought it in 1980. It's a good game, easy and fast to play, but like all tabletop baseball games, there are a few things about it that drive me nuts. I will say however, that it's only a few things. The rest of the game is pretty freaking solid, I have to admit. Again, let's see the results at the end of the season. As of this writing, none of the teams has reached the 20 game mark, so the numbers don't mean a whole lot just now...

The first thing I see in each game is the number of results where the runner on first goes to third on a single to left, in most cases regardless of his speed. Two out? Yeah, I get that- it happens all the time. But none or one out and Campanella takes third on a single to left by Westlake? C'mon...Next, we have a play result that says something like, "runner caught stealing and is ejected for arguing call." Sure, that happens, but check this out. Just three games ago (this morning in fact), I played game two of a four game series between the Sun Kings and the Mutuals. Rex Barney started for the Sun Kings. With one out in the top of the third, Barney reached on a slap single to right. Alvin Dark came up next, and rolled the caught stealing- ejected result. The hell is Rex Barney doing attempting to steal? Oh well, Barney out after two, and in comes Buddy Lively. He goes three innings, and woulda gone more, but you will never guess what happens...He reaches first on an error to start off the sixth. Dark comes up and---there goes Buddy! Oh no!! Caught stealing! He argues with the umpire and is E-Jected!!! Two pitchers, same team. Each one reaches base and is caught stealing and thrown out of the game. I hate when that happens, don't you? Of the four baseball games I own, APBA is the only one that calls the steal for you. I've had more pitchers try to steal this season than the previous six 5Y seasons combined. I'm getting pooped, but before I nod off, another thing that drives me up the wall is flipping the charts over depending on the base situation. Statis Pro and Strat have this problem as well, but at least in Strat it's limited to one defense chart that needs to be referred to once in a while. In APBA, you start with the bases empty chart, then if you get runners on base, you rummage through the charts until you find the one that fits the base situation. Then, these charts have three columns: Fielding One, Two and Three. Three is for the worst fielding teams, one is for the better ones, and two is for all the rest. You add up the defensive ratings of all the guys in the field, and the result puts the team in one of those columns. I don't really know the impact on defense as far as errors, but I have noticed that a stud like Marty Marion at short has already made quite a few miscues.

I'm done complaining for now. Like I mentioned, apart from these quirks and some I am sure I'm forgetting, the game plays pretty well. I like that some innings go as quick as ten seconds. I don't like that the results are written out in long hand (High fly foul out. PO-C) instead of scorekeeper shorthand, which we gamers love, right? At any rate, this game has been around a long time, so there you go! Well, keep calm, and let the dice fall where they may!