A step-by-step guide to building an all-star player in MLB 15: The Show

Check out our review of MLB 15: The Show here. 

Spring has sprung, and it’s time for baseball.

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MLB 15: The Show released for the PlayStation last week, bringing hordes of fans back to the digital diamond. This year’s installment of Sony San Diego’s virtually unchallenged baseball franchise brings a ton of new features, including an all-new equipment system and new hitting controls.

This guide offers advice specific to the Road to the Show career mode, but it also has some observations on the new additions that could help in others. The first two pages are general tips for all career modes, and the last page has two sample builds.

If you are looking for advice on building a pitcher, I can’t help you. I noticed pretty quickly that I am a terrible pitcher in MLB 15, so I felt obligated to spare the world any more bad advice.

General tips

Character creation

The most important part of creating a great Road to the Show player is mastering the variables you can control.

Players choose a position and spend five flex points on any of five distinct attributes: contact, power, speed, fielding, and arm. Your position choice dictates where each of these statistics stand before you spend your points.

This feature follows the conventional baseball wisdom. Power hitters play the corner infield and outfield positions. First basemen start with the best overall power stats, followed by left/right fielders and then third basemen.

If your goal is to create a speedster, center field will give you the best beginning stats, followed by second base and shortstop.

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You can break all of these prototypical builds if you are willing to work at it, but I generally stick to 150 years of tradition and create my player accordingly.

I like to make my player pretty short because it shrinks his strike zone, which leads to more walks. Use a crouched batting stance like “All-Star 33” to reduce the zone further.

I also always create a switch hitter. This gives him the perceived righty-on-lefty or vice-versa advantage. Although this doesn’t really matter in a video game, your player’s A.I. manager will think it does in pinch-hitting situations. This should give you some extra at-bats as you push into the majors.

I always handpick my team in every sports game. It isn’t authentic, but filling a need on a squad always gets you into a star role much faster. If you really want to play a position on your favorite team, you can always edit the position of any player in the creation section. If you want to play center field for the Angels, just put Mike Trout in right field, save your roster, and create.

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Hitting

Like last year’s guide, you will want to make sure you select the pure analog hitting interface with the classic guess-the-pitch style in the gameplay options menu. Pure analog uses only the right stick to hit, which you want, and this allows you to know exactly where the ball is coming maybe one out of every 10 pitches.

MLB 15 debuted some new, simplified hitting controls that should make your batting experience a little easier. You no longer have to time your step; the players do so automatically. Instead, the stick is now for specific swings.

Pulling down and then up on the right stick executes a power swing. Use this early in the count, on pitches up in the zone or when you have perfectly guessed a pitch in the strike zone. If your character has power stats below 50, you will probably want to avoid using this swing until you beef him up.

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Flicking the right stick to the left or right performs a contact swing. Don’t ever do this. In MLB 14, contact swings are an effective tool on two-strike counts or in hit-and-run situations. Somehow, the transfer from the Circle button to the right stick gutted this option. It does not work. You will chop the ball foul or chunk it to an infielder every time you use this swing.

Flicking the right stick up will deliver a regular swing. This is your go-to swing. Use it when you just need a hit. You no longer have to time your step, which will give you an extra second to focus on if the pitch is a strike or not.

The left stick now influences where the ball will travel off the bat, or at least that’s what the manual says. In practice, it functions much as the contact swing does. You press it in any direction, and your ball chops harmlessly into foul territory. Don’t use it.

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Plate discipline

Swinging at strikes is the easiest thing to think about and the hardest thing to do. Finding good pitches is pretty easy in the minor leagues (AA, AAA), but it becomes the most difficult part of the game once you are called up to the majors.

I have two pieces of advice here: Learn your weaknesses, and predict pitcher tendencies.

You will know pretty quickly what you suck at. For me, it’s low curveballs. I can’t hit them, and I can’t lay off of them. So when I am in a two-strike count, I always use guess pitch to predict a low curveball, slider, or changeup (depending on the opposing pitcher’s pitches). I figure that I can adjust to anything else tossed my way.

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Predicting pitcher tendencies is a little trickier. MLB 15’s A.I. pitchers tend to also follow general baseball practices. If the batter is ahead (with more balls than strikes) in the count, pitchers will throw a lot of fastballs. When the batter is behind (more strikes than balls), they tend to throw off-speed junk out of the strike zone. Make sure you guess accordingly.

Fielding

Fielding has been a joke in the MLB The Show franchise for the last few years. I’ve routinely told people to basically ignore their fielding stats unless they are playing a key defensive role, such as shortstop or catcher.

I am still going to do that. You certainly want to avoid attribute decay, which happens if you don’t level up a stat every 60 days or so, but you want to focus on contact, vision, and either speed stats or power.

However, this will actually bite you in MLB 15. My juggernaut of a left fielder channels his inner Manny Ramirez every time a ball is hit his way. I miss pop flies and stumble while attempting running catches, and a few of my throws have traveled less than 50 feet before hitting the grass.

In the long run, staggering offensive numbers still heavily outweigh your dozens of errors. You lose about eight training points per error, while you gain about 30 per home run. You will gain more training points per game and be of greater value to your team. You will also earn all-star appearances and season awards, which both come with hefty training point bonuses.

Equipment

MLB 15 debuts an all-new equipment system, similar to the one found in Electronic Arts’ NHL games. Players can earn bats, fielding gloves, batting gloves, cleats, and strange ritual items that boost certain attributes. You get these by logging in every day, unlocking certain achievements, or using in-game and real currency to buy booster packs that contain one item and several cards that the Diamond Dynasty mode uses.

The equipment system is an invaluable tool for all modes, but it is especially useful in Road to the Show. Items are separated into simple bronze, silver, and gold tiers according to rarity and strength. Five silver-tiered items will probably boost your players stats by 20 points or even 30 points, which is huge — especially late in your player’s career, when attributes cost a fortune in training points.

You can also buy and sell equipment on an online market. Do it. If you are focusing on a speed build, then sell that power item and buy what you need. Play around with this item system; it will make life much easier.

Training

The random training sessions are actually worth doing in MLB 15. I typically skip these, but scoring gold in the early levels of training is both simple and rewarding.

Finishing the first level of a drill with a gold score will grab you 200 training points that you can use on whatever you like. The second level awards 250 points, and so on.

Eventually, it’s difficult to score in the gold range, and you may not need the points. But for your first few seasons, do your training.

Suggested player builds

The Adam Dunn

The Adam Dunn build is similar to last year’s bomber build. You want to follow the above creation steps (short, switch-hitter, etc.) on a first basemen, left fielder, or right fielder. Use your flex points to max contact and power first then pour the remnants in fielding. The build is called the Adam Dunn because, like the former Chicago White Sox player, you will either hit it 400 feet or strike out.

Continue to pour your training points into contact and power. Plate vision is also important. Keep the other statistics from decaying, but ignore them until you are a respectable offensive player in the major leagues. You will be liability in the field. Your average will go through extreme lulls. But you will be a monster.

Use any equipment that boosts your power. The Golden Thong ritual gives you staggering plus-7 to power, and the 2K1 Maple bat will give you plus-5 to power and plus-3 to contact. These are priority-one items. Having 12 additional points in power will make you a monster throughout your career. The batting gloves, gloves, and cleats don’t really matter for you.

I like to turn off baserunning when playing this character. You are far too slow to steal, and I find it tedious waiting around on the bases. I also turn off fielding opportunities early on because this guy can’t really field, either. Once you pour some excess points into speed and fielding, turn them back on.

When batting, I always start off by guessing fastball up in the zone. Pitchers won’t give you this pitch often, but you will absolutely crush it when they do. I always use power swing until I have two strikes, when I will shift down to a normal swing.

You will have the most success if you join a team with a good, speedy lineup. You will be a fourth or fifth hitter, so you need the first few guys to get on base. This isn’t mandatory at all, but it will help.

The Ichiro Suzuki

This is a purely speed-driven build. Your goal is simply to make any sort of contact with the ball and outrun the play, or draw a walk. Like the former Mariners and Yankees right fielder, you will play an old-school type of game.

First off, build a center fielder. This position comes with the perfect set of starting attributes. Use your flex points to max speed and contact. This will give you a starting speed of 90 — which makes you one of the fastest players in baseball from day one — and a decent hitting skillset.

You can also pull off a decent Ichiro build with a shortstop or second baseman.

Level up your contact hitting and baserunning attributes first. Because you play an important fielding spot, you will also need to throw some points into fielding and throwing attributes. Don’t level up your speed skill — plenty of cleats and ritual items will do that for you.

I use the Power of Pouch ritual, a silver-tier item that grants five points to speed and 10 points to stealing. Use contact-heavy bats, speed-heavy cleats, and whatever else you want.

When playing this build, I always guess low fastballs. Those are the most common pitches in the game, and I don’t mind hitting it on the ground with this guy. I use only normal swings, and I do get sassy with my drag bunts every now and then.

I also bunt in every single sacrifice situation, meaning a runner on first and/or second with less than two outs. A sacrifice doesn’t count against your average and offers a respectable 14 training points, and — about half the time — your speed will actually net you a bunt single instead.

The most important thing with this build is patience. You have to be able to take walks and foul off pitches. I like to take the first pitch of the at-bat unless I guessed correctly. I find that most first pitches are balls or fastballs in your happy zone.

I always recommend the power build first and then building one of these guys. They can get a little tricky.