Dudes Rock - I Absolutely Love This Guy Who Played Through 40 Seasons Of MLB The Show Then Gave Us An Incredible Thread Of Stats And How Players Careers Turned Out
Anyone who has ever played a sports video game and started a franchise has had this idea, we've all said it to buddies. "I'm gonna play this franchise until the wheels fall off, let's see how far I can take it." and then they play it for 3 seasons and get bored. Not Dean Ciriaco, he's built different. He played his Red Sox franchise as long as physically possible, until the game stopped collecting stats and awards. This is AWESOME. I can't express how jealous I am of this guy living out video gamers dreams by running a franchise for decades (virtually). The Show does have a great franchise mode, and Dean decided to put it to the test. 40 years of Red Sox baseball and he provided his Twitter following with updated stats and awards, it's incredible if you ask me. Let's take a look at what stats would look like for these guys following their 40 year careers.
First off, he showed off the franchise stats and let me be the first to congratulate the Red Sox on winning their 39th World Series, a hell of a run. In that 40 year run the virtual Sox have added 30 World Series titles, 30 pennants won, an incredible 39 Cy Young winners, 39 MVPs, and an additional 11 no-hitters. They also wrapped up a 141-21 season in 2062 to end the simulation, decent year! Cool to see Anthony Volpe and this year's cover boy, Elly De La Cruz, make the Hall of Fame. Volpe with almost 4,000 hits, 829 homers and 671 stolen bases. Guess he did find his footing at shortstop. Elly with some incredible numbers of his own, 794 homers, a .302 average and 667 steals to go with 3,616 hits. Congrats to both those guys on getting into Cooperstown in 2056 and 2058. Now lets dive into more of these stats after 40 seasons...
Somehow, someway Brayan Bello turned into the ace of the Sox and pitched to age 64. Casually finished with 890 wins, more than 9.600 strikeouts and won 8 Cy Youngs, not a bad career for a guy who I didn't think would be anything special. Look at that 2063 season too, 26-1 with a 2.61 ERA!
Raffy Devers ended up with 46 years in the bigs as he played until he was 67. Still posted a .865 OPS in 2063 and finished with 7,014 hits and 1,577 homers. Hell of a career for this kid.
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Boston fan's dreams came true and Vladdy Jr ended up on the Red Sox and boy did he not disappoint! He had a tough 2060 and 2062 and just fell shy of 1,600 career home runs. 7,069 hits in his career before he had to hang em up, shocker that he battled injuries as he got into his 60s but a hell of a career nonetheless.
Of course Dean made himself, still a spring chicken at 55 when all this was wrapped up. But you can see, an incredible career with over 6,300 hits, 1,495 homers and an incredible bWAR north of .300. Hell of a player.
Talk about someone who was hit with injuries, Bryce Harper played until age 71 but even with all that natural, holistic shit he does on TikTok he ended up breaking down in his late 60s. Only 899 homers, what a disappointing end to his career despite his 1.231 OPS in 2063. Saw that coming though, you knew he'd break down eventually.
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Now this is one that I think will age well, Jackson Holiday becoming the best player ever. At least 8 MVPs, 1,786 home runs, 7,500 hits on the nose, 1,802 doubles, a career .310 hitter, .393 OBP, 1,260 stolen bags and 5,501 runs driven in. Still only 60 when this franchise ended, he for sure had another good few years in him. Shoutout to Jackie for the great career.
If you had Wyatt Langford being a 10-TIME WORLD SERIES MVP please come claim your prize! Over 1,600 career dings for Wyatt, goes well with a .312 average, OBP of almost .400 and a 1.030 career OPS. I thought Langford was good but never thought he'd get to those numbers, let alone almost 7,000 hits! Sneaky good career for ole Wyatt.
Just as we all thought, Paul Skenes dominated, I mean he was incredible. Tough go of it in his 50s but he cashed in big time with a nice fat contract. Still married to Livvy Dunn as well, you know she loved his almost 800 wins, 791-95 ain't too bad! Even through in 14 saves along the way. 8,629 Ks and a 2.78 ERA to go with a tiny 1.07 ERA, laughable stats. Those numbers put him in the running for best pitcher ever, now I just wonder if his personality ever developed?
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Look at Mike Trout sticking it out until the ripe age of 72! We thought he was cooked and washed in 2025, he was only just beginning. Ended up with 5,351 hits and 1,247 but struggled to stay healthy in the 60s, a slow burn to end his career but still out up some incredible numbers. Tough last few seasons saw his average dip below .300 but that .389 OBP still helped out the Sox as they won another billion World Series. Nice to see him end his career with those numbers, he did get to the all time marks that we thought he would.
So there you have it, a great thread by Dean that provided tons of entertainment for us video game folks. Hilarious that he actually went through with it and got 40 seasons deep, that is a committed man. Safe to say these numbers won't be broken by anyone in our lifetime, unless we get another 40 season sim.