First, let me say that I love baseball. Since I don't have a PS3, this is all I get.  I plan to remedy that some day, but until then, I have to deal with this.  Being that this is all that I get, my opinion of it isn't as harsh as it otherwise would be.

For those of you who follow baseball, the title will give you all you need to know about my feelings about this game.  It has a ton of potential and there are bright spots that really come through once in a while.  The pitching is fantastic.  Once you get it down, it's the most enjoyable part of the game for me.  The depth of the franchise and my player modes is amazing as well.  Including sabermetric stats and giving you goals to meet is a great way to keep you focused.  I've logged hours upon hours into the game already and I've enjoyed the vast majority of it.  It really gets me thinking that they finally got it right and will be able to contend with The Show in a couple of years.  The game even realistically presents umpires as the half-brained and inconsistent twats that they are.

However, much like the Indians who went from being one win away from the World Series in '07 to arguably being the worst team in baseball entering 2010, many inexcusable things go wrong that remind you that yes, this is a small market team...I mean game and it just can't compete consistently with the Yankees and Red Sox...The Show.  It starts out as just little problems that you think can be a quick fix.  Like the bullpen for the Indians during this time.  They signed Kerry Wood and it did help a bit last year.  2K10's Kerry Wood are the little game glitches that a patch will be able to fix.  For instance, with a runner on third and less than one out, the runner should tag up on a fly ball to the warning track.  He doesn't.  In franchise mode, you can fix this yourself by taking control of the runner.  In my player mode, you can not.  You miss out on an RBI.

I'm sure a patch will come along that will fix that glitch and a few other minor ones that aren't game breaking.  It will make you think that, "Okay, maybe it stands a chance now."  It will be a false hope though because ultimately, it will force you to start over from square one by trading away an ace in back-to-back seasons.  By that, I mean the bug that is causing the game to freeze during my player mode.  I lost my save file and for some reason my backup save file due to this freezing.  I was an eighty-seven overall.  I was on my way to a .413/.457/.769 MVP season when it happened.  I can't play it anymore.  I still have the franchise mode, but I'm missing out the newest addition until it's patched if they can patch something like that.

So, ultimately, it has quite a bit of promise.  The glaring glitches and poor freezing ruin the experience in the end.  They do have a solid foundation to work on though.  Patching a few things up and having a few of the young guys step up could go a long way for the game.  It could be enough to usher in another era of contention.  I'm not getting my hopes up again though.