Major League Baseball 2K9 - Disc Only - Disc Only

While attending the University of Washington, MLB 2K9's cover athlete Tim Lincecum won the coveted Golden Spikes Award which is given to the nation's top college baseball player. He was drafted 10th overall by the San Francisco Giants in 2006. Known to fans as "The Franchise" and "The Freak", Lincecum was named to the National League All-Star team this past season while putting up astonishing numbers and leading the Majors with a remarkable 265 strikeouts. Lincecum also led the National League in other key pitching categories including win percentage (18-5, .783), opponent's batting average (.221), and strikeouts per nine innings (10.51), along with ranking second in earned run average (2.62). For all of his historic accomplishments, Lincecum won the Players' Choice Award as the National League Outstanding Pitcher this season, along with the National League Pitcher of the Year Award from Sporting News. Both awards were voted on by his peers. More significantly, Lincecum today was named the National League Cy Young Award winner, given annually to the top pitcher in both the American League and the National League, and voted on by members of the Baseball Writers' Association of America. Major League Baseball 2K9 is a simulation of the sport of baseball. The heart of the game is the franchise mode where the player can play whole seasons with its hundreds of matches and a managerial part. Besides keeping the balance, there are three main activities in this part: studying extensive statistics, player trading and hiring players through free agents. The latter is similar to other sports games: every player has other wishes for his team, e.g. athletic success. If the player's club can fulfill these wishes better the club has to pay less salary. Trading however is handled differently: Every club gives a value to the players on the roster. This value influences how the trading plays out. Training is another important part to consider.Matches can either be simulated or played manually. Every part of the match has its own control scheme: For pitching the player uses two parts of his input device: the first for aiming and the second to recreate a movement (depending on the used move). Batting is done by swinging the bat in the right timing. He can also influence the ball's direction in the way he hits it. During fielding the player basically tells the controlled player the direction in which he should throw the ball. Besides the franchise mode the player can participate in training, Home Run Derby and Postseason mode (play-offs). Players can unlock training cards.The are a few small differences between the versions: on the Wii the player controls batting and pitching directly with the remote and the nunchuck.