• Designers: Matthew and Garrett Weaver
• Publisher: Weaver Media Group, LLC
• Players: 1-2
• Age: 7+
• Duration: 30-45 minutes
• Price: $35

Over the years, the Opinionated Gamers website has made enough of an impression on our hobby that quite a few publishers are interested in us reviewing their games.  So it was that about a month ago, Dale, our esteemed editor, got an email message from a gentleman named Matthew Weaver asking if we would like to review their new game Baseball Card GM (henceforth, BCGM).  Dale, knowing that I’m a big baseball fan, asked if I would like to check it out and I agreed.  So it was that a few days later, a rectangular box showed up at my house and I had a new game to try out.

The game is a family project and they’re self-publishing it.  They’ve set up a website which gives the backstory of how it was created.  It says, “It all started in 2024, when Garrett Weaver (then just seven) asked ‘How can I actually play with my baseball cards?’  When nothing existed, he and his younger brother Simon invented a set of rules at our dining room table.”  Since the game itself involves a fair amount of probability, I have a sneaking suspicion that mom and dad had just a little bit of influence on the final design, but I’m sure that the inspiration for the game came from young Garrett and that he, Simon, and their friends were eager playtesters.

Sports sims, of course, go back almost 100 years (National Pastime may have been the first one and it came out in 1930).  My brother and I grew up in the 1960’s and we played simple titles like Challenge the Yankees (back when the NY Yankees were actually winning World Series) and, later, more sophisticated games like Strat-O-Matic Baseball.  But these games, like every other baseball simulation, feature special cards for each player, crafted so that they could be used to play an actual game, with each player performing more or less like the statistics put up by their real life counterpart.  What Garrett wanted to do was play the same kind of game, but only by using already existing baseball cards and the statistics they all show on their backs.  BCGM is his family’s attempt to do just that.  (For those not attuned to the world of sports, a General Manager, or GM, is the person in charge of personnel issues on a team, such as putting together a roster, trading for players, and signing free agents.)

The game that showed up on my doorstep comes in a long rectangular, simply adorned cardboard box.  Inside is a rolled up neoprene playmat which rolls out to reveal a professionally printed playing area.  It looks very nice and lays out nice and flat.  The game also contains two large six-sided dice and four glass markers.  There are no player cards, of course, because the whole point is to use your own baseball cards to play it with.  (When I mentioned to Matthew Weaver that I hadn’t owned baseball cards since I was a kid, he kindly sent me a bunch of packs from the late 80’s.)

The game also includes a couple of single-sheet rule sets, but they aren’t really necessary.  They cover the various ways you can draft players to form your teams, but just about any method you wanted to use would work:  use the cards from your favorite team, organize a simple draft, have multiple players create their own teams to form a league, etc.  The rules suggest that you use the same year for each card (most baseball cards list the stats for every year of its player’s career), but that isn’t strictly necessary—just agree which stats will be used for each card.  Once you figure out what everyone’s team is, the rules for how to play a game are all listed on the playmat itself.

Here’s how it works.  Take your cards and lay them out in a nine-player lineup (with one player for each fielding position, of course, including a designated hitter).  Select a starting pitcher and put down some additional cards to form your bench and bullpen.  Then, just as in real baseball, the visiting team sends their leadoff hitter to face off against the home team’s starting pitcher and you’re on your way.

Each batter’s at bat is resolved with a single throw of the two dice.  The dice can’t be distinguished from each other, so there are 21 different combinations that can be rolled.  The playmat shows all of these combinations, organized into seven different columns associated with different stats that can be found on the back of a baseball card.  They are Home Runs, Triples, Doubles, Batting Average, Walks, Hits, and Runs Batted In.

We all know that chicks dig the long ball, so let’s see how this works for the Home Run column.  Let’s say the dice come up 1-1.  Checking the playmat, we see that there’s a cell in the Home Run column showing 1-1.  It lists the following lines:

<15 → Single
≥15 → Home Run

Since this lies in the Home Run column, we need to check the number of homers the current batter hit that year.  If he hit fewer than 15, then the result is a single; if he hit 15 or more, then he slams the ball out of the park.

The other dice combination that falls in the Home Run column is 1-2 (which, as I’m sure you all know, comes up twice as often as 1-1).  It lists the following lines:

<40 → Fly Out
≥40 → Home Run

If this combination comes up, it will result in a fly out for most batters.  (It’s easy to picture the hitter launching a long fly ball, but he doesn’t have quite enough strength to hit it out of the park.)  But the elite sluggers, who hit at least 40 homers that year, will be powerful enough to register a four-bagger.  Touch ‘em all!

Each of the cells associated with the other dice combinations work the same way.  See which stat the combination’s column is associated with, check how well the hitter did with that stat, compare it to what’s listed in the cell, and come up with a result.  Thus, through a very simple (and fast) process, it’s easy to find the result of each at bat.  Best of all, it’s tied to the statistical performance of the hitter—sluggers will hit more home runs, high average hitters will get more base hits, and so on.

What about the pitchers?  BCGM ensures that dominant pitching will influence the outcome of the games.  If the opponent’s pitcher had an ERA of 2.25 or less, OR had at least 16 wins that year, OR had at least 36 saves (and these requirements are clearly listed on the playmat), then he will affect the thresholds that the hitter must meet to get their optimal results.  Again, let’s look at the Home Run column.  Above that column are listed the adjustments that must be made if the pitcher is a dominant one.  Baseball fans know that right-handed hitters have a tougher time hitting right-handed pitchers (as do lefties against lefties) than if they’re facing pitchers who pitch from the opposite side, so the game takes that into account.  If you’re a right-handed hitter facing a left-handed dominant pitcher, your home run requirements are increased by 3.  If, instead, the pitcher is right-handed, your requirement is increased by 6.  (The same is true for left-handed batters, but the pitcher’s handedness is naturally reversed.)  So let’s say your up against a dominant pitcher and you roll a 1-1.  Now, if the pitcher pitches with the opposite hand, you need to have hit 18 homers in order to get a long ball with this cell; otherwise, it’s a single for you.  And if the pitcher throws with the same hand, your requirement is now 21 home runs!  On a 1-2 result, only the mightiest sluggers can launch a long ball against a dominant pitcher who throws with the same hand—46 blasts are required!

So for each hitter, roll the dice, check which column it falls in, and resolve the result—it’s that simple.  Advancing on base hits is handled in a simple way.  To see if a runner takes an extra base (if, for example, they score from second on a single, or from first on a double), check how many stolen bases the runner had that year.  If they had at least 10 stolen bases, or if there are two outs, they take the extra base; otherwise, they just advance as many bases as the batter does.  Nice and easy and again, the ballplayer’s ability affects things—this time, with their speed.

All the normal rules of baseball are followed:  three outs ends an inning, whoever has more runs after nine innings wins, if it’s tied, play extra innings.  To show who’s on base, just take the hitter who reached base from their lineup position and place them on the base on the diamond shown on the playmat.  Then, you advance them based on the results you get.  You use the four glass markers to show the half inning, the outs, and the number of runs scored by the visiting team and the home team.  Because generating results is so straightforward, it’s easy to finish a full game in 30 minutes or so.

Pitchers are limited to how many innings they can pitch per game, based on how many innings they recorded that year in real life.  The rule sheet gives you some simple rules for how many games they need to rest, should you want to simulate a series of games (or even play an entire season).  Naturally, you can use your bench players to pinch hit for your starting players, as long as you ensure that you can cover all nine fielding positions.

There’s honestly not too many decisions the two managers need to make once they set their lineups.  You can choose to steal bases and your success rate depends on how many steals the player had in real life, but that, pitching changes, and pinch hit decisions are about it.  However, that’s really how most baseball sims, even the most sophisticated ones, work.  (In his initial note to Dale, Matthew even slyly mentioned his game could be considered an “auto-battler”.  Clever boy!)  No, the value of the design is how easily and quickly you can play a realistic baseball game and that you can do it with the baseball cards you already own.

And that’s the key thing to remember when you’re deciding on whether to buy BCGM:  how well does it deliver on Garrett Weaver’s initial request and if that’s the sort of game you and your family will enjoy.  Most baseball sims pride themselves on their statistical accuracy; the player cards are so detailed that if you played a full season, each player’s total numbers would be very close to what they did in real life.  BCGM is not that kind of game at all.  For example, hitters who slammed between 21 and 39 home runs will perform exactly the same as far as homers are concerned.  That’s a pretty big gap.  The same is true for all the other categories (there are at most four dice combinations in any single category), so you can’t really call the game an accurate simulation.  But that’s not the point, is it?  The point is that you can use your beloved baseball cards, which many people own hundreds of, to play a real baseball game and the statistics on the cards matter.  Not down to the third decimal position, clearly, but Aaron Judge will still easily outperform Aaron Boone.  I’m not saying that will appeal to every baseball fan, but I think there’s a bunch of people who will find that enjoyable and delightful.

And the designers actually recommend using those statistical thresholds to game the system.  The enclosed sheet gives some tips on how you can draft your team and they mention you should focus on players who exceed the specific levels cited in the dice cells and avoid those players who fall just short of them.  So there’s absolutely some ways to take advantage of this and create optimal teams.  Actually, the drafting process could be a lot of fun and I’m sure skillful drafting would be very important, just as it is in Fantasy Baseball leagues.  Of course, if you just want to play with players from your favorite team and have fun with them, BCGM lets you do that as well.

Because of the tiny number of in-game decisions required, BCGM, like most baseball sims, is easy to play solitaire.  Just come up with two teams you want to face off and start rolling dice.  All of the ways of playing the game I mentioned above could easily be used to play the game solo, if you wanted to invest the time and, of course, have the baseball cards to use as players.

As a gamer and game designer, I’m quite impressed with how the Weaver family managed to come up with a game from just a bunch of numbers on the backs of baseball cards.  I also like how they thought outside of the box and occasionally sacrificed realism to meet their principal goal of making those numbers be meaningful in playing the game.  The best example I can give is how fly outs are handled.  When a hitter gets a “Fly Out” result, a lead runner on second or third advances one base.  In actual baseball, scoring a runner from third on a sacrifice fly is fairly common (although far from automatic), but hitting one far enough to get a runner to move from second to third happens far less often.  So, again, this isn’t very realistic.  But wait, how do you get a fly out in the game?  We’ve already seen one way—when a batter just misses a home run on a 1-2 result.  Well, counting that as a really long fly ball seems reasonable.  The only other column where a batter can get a fly out is the RBI column.  Now Runs Batted In (RBI’s) are a much loved and valuable statistic, but since hitters need other players to be on base in order to get them, figuring out how to model them in a game would be tricky.  Well, this is the Weavers’ answer:  more sacrifice flies!  For each of the RBI dice combinations, if the batter has enough RBIs, he hits a fly ball; if not, it’s merely a groundout (which could turn into a rally-killing double play).  Again, we’re sacrificing realism, but it makes the players’ stats matter, by making a high RBI hitter more likely to drive in runs.  It’s not the only way they could have done it and baseball purists will probably turn up their noses, but I think it’s a pretty cool solution.

There’s one mild warning I should make.  The game claims that it can be played with pretty much any baseball cards from the 1980’s to the current day.  I honestly don’t know what backs of current cards look like, but the way the statistics were laid out on the cards that Matthew sent me to play the game varied greatly in their usefulness.  Some didn’t include all of the stats needed to play the game and many of them used very small fonts to display the stats.  The cards from Donruss were much better than the other ones and made the game easy to play, but I would have been hard pressed to use some of the others.  Now, I’m about 60 years older than Garrett and his friends, so I imagine they’re far better equipped to make out tiny numbers, but I’d still take a look at the cards you intend to use before you decide if this is a game for you.  Although I see that the purchased version of the game comes with a “wallet-sized magnifier”, so even that may not be a disqualifier!

Other than a game box which is merely functional, BCGM’s components are surprisingly professional for what is essentially one family’s labor of love.  The dice are good quality and are nice and large and the glass markers are fine.  But the real star of the show (and pretty much the entire game) is the playmat and it’s very well done.  As I mentioned earlier, it’s sturdy and lays out flat, making it a breeze to play on.  Everything you need to play the game is very clear, easy to read, and logically laid out.  It should be easy for youngsters to figure out, even without adults to guide them.  The text and illustrations are bold and attractive.  There are also some nice details in the depiction of the baseball field which are fun additions.  It’s not flowery or “pretty”, but I don’t think that would have been the right approach.  It was important that they did a good job with the playmat and they nailed it.

So who might like this game?  Obviously, not those who demand a realistic simulation, as I’ve mentioned.  But anyone who has a supply of baseball cards who wants a fast and easy game should at least consider it.  Something like Pizza Box Baseball, which used to be quite popular, is a good comp as far as complexity is concerned, except BCGM is even easier to learn.  It’s ideal for baseball loving kids, but could also be a great family game, that parents and other adults can play with children.  Because there are so few decisions made during the game, gamers of any age can participate in an engaging half hour of play and have pretty much even odds of winning.  Of course, if you want to put in the effort of drafting your teams, there’s a good deal of skill that can be applied, but that’s not a requirement to enjoy the game—just form your teams by any means you like, start rolling the dice, and have fun playing baseball.  Plenty of adults love collecting cards as well and I can see them as potential owners, possibly even developing leagues and playing full seasons.  The game’s most obvious appeal, of course, is the ability to use the baseball cards you love to collect and let the players function in a realistic fashion.  That’s a great feature and something that should be attractive to quite a few gamers.  If that sounds like it might be of interest, the game is currently available for sale at their website, www.baseballcardgm.com.

To summarize, Baseball Card GM is an innovative, clever, and logically designed sports game for folks who have baseball card collections and are interested in playing a fast and easy to understand title.  It’s an ideal family game and simple enough for young kids to play among themselves or with their parents.  It plays well with two or as a solitaire game.  As you probably know, when writing a review of any sports themed game, I’m required by law to provide a tagline that uses the sport’s parlance.  I won’t say that BCGM hits it out of the park, since it’s not for everyone.  But in real-life baseball, when a player comes up in the bottom of the ninth and the winning run is on third, it’s foolish to swing for the fences when a line-drive single will get the job done.  And that’s just what the Weaver family did with this game—they concentrated on answering the question their young son asked and came up with something unique that filled the bill.  And there’s nothing wrong with creating a game that’s a game-winning hit.  Play ball!

Postscript:  After writing this review, I exchanged emails with Matthew Weaver about how BCGM was designed.  It was indeed a joint effort between him and Garrett.  Garrett not only asked the original question, but came up with a few key ideas, including how to use pitchers in the game, and was the principal solo playtester, which included recording numerous scorecards that Matthew needed to make the game work as intended.  Matthew did the rest, but the two of them definitely worked together to create and fine-tune the game.  That’s one impressive 8-year-old kid!