Lessons in Procrastination II: Ken Griffey Jr. Presents Major League Baseball

Were there an award for longest NotGraphs post title, I’d have just won it. And were I to give a speech celebrating the acceptance of said fictional award, I’d only thank Ken Griffey Jr., and the fine folks at Nintendo. Because it doesn’t get much more creative than Ken Griffey Jr. Presents Major League Baseball.

By now, I trust you have mastered R.B.I. Baseball 3. It’s time to move on to bigger, brighter and better ways to slaughter your productivity. I present — actually, Ken Griffey Jr. presents: Ken Griffey Jr. Presents Major League Baseball.

Be warned: the website’s a train wreck. And you’re going to have to download something called a Vizzed RGR Plugin to play the game. While I have no idea what the hell a Vizzed RGR Plugin is, because I trust anything and everything I find on the Internet, I downloaded it. I did it for you, yo. And I’m proud to report my laptop is alive and well.

Now, as you’ll soon find out, there are a number of things that make Ken Griffey Jr. Presents Major League Baseball, for Super Nintendo, one of the greatest games of all time.

A) The music. Epic.
2) The game has a Major League Baseball license, but no Major League Baseball Players Association License. Making Ken Griffey Jr. the only real player in the game.
D) Everyone’s got an arm like Ichiro. No matter where you collect the ball in the outfield, even at the wall in center field, it’s zero bounces to home plate.
5) The ability to hit 575-foot home runs. Steroids, y’all! (Make sure you try the Home Run Derby.)

The gameplay is, as expected, rather brutal. Especially without a controller, and in a small window on your computer. But good times can still be had by all. Thanks to some crafty Internet detective work by yours truly the game’s Wikipedia entry, I learned that, without a MLBPA license, each team has a theme for their imaginary players.

The Kansas City Royals are based on U.S. presidents (the third batter is D. Ike, whose real-life counterpart is DH Hall of famer George Brett).

I kid you not. Trust me: use the Royals. Richard Nixon bats leadoff, and Abe Lincoln cleanup. The starting rotation is damn impressive, too: Clinton, Bush, Reagan, Carter and Ford. The closer: the 30th President of the great United States of America, Calvin Coolidge.

A movie buff, are you? You’re going to want to use the Indians.

The Cleveland Indians have famous actresses and glamor girls on their team. (A. Margret, A. Hepburn, M. Monroe, G. Garbo).

When playing video games, nothing strikes fear in your opponent more than a team full of baseball players named after famous actresses.

Bookish, are you? Oakland’s your team.

The Oakland Athletics apparently hired more authors with H. Ernest (he replaces Mark McGwire), L. Byron, M. Twain, and L.Tolstoy.

Do you love booze, old television sitcoms, and history, like I do? Boston’s the way to go.

The Boston Red Sox contain members from the show Cheers. Cliff Claven, Norm Peterson, and Sam Malone are all present. Also included are Boston landmarks (B. Common, M. Harvard) and figures from early American history (J. Adams, J. Hancock, A. Hamilton).

Milwaukee’s imaginary roster might be best, though:

The Milwaukee Brewers have a pitching staff consisting of superhero “secret identities” (P. Parker, K. Kent, B. Wayne), while their position players are fictional secret agents and detectives (J. Rockford, J. Bond).

Happy procrastinating. And, as I wrote last time, don’t mention it.

Image courtesy moi, and an Internet fist bump to Old Time Family Baseball.