Note from the editor: Carter submitted this guest blog in February 2018 and to be honest, I’ve kind of put it off until now. It’s not that it’s wrong, it’s just off topic. How many of my readers care as much about Backyard video games as Carter? Anyways, in honor of my next post, “The Roast Of Carter Fields,” I present to you “Ryan’s Bloggy Thing: A Biased Evaluation of the Backyard Sports Video Games Franchise” by Carter Fields. P.S. I haven’t made any grammatical or stylistic edits to this post. -RK

A Biased Evaluation of the Backyard Sports Video Games Franchise by Guest Columnist Carter Fields

I am going to settle the debate that every kid had while growing up, the best Backyard Sports game. I’m not just talking football or baseball either were covering every sports this franchise so gratefully gave us. So strap in and get ready to get your mind blown. Also, keep in mind Pablo Sanchez and Pete Wheeler are always involved in these conversations and they are obviously the two best backyard players in the history of ever.

#1: Backyard Baseball 2001

I don’t care what you say the backyard baseball games were always the best. All you had to do was put that mode on Tball mode and you were hitting for the cycle with every player, averaging 100 runs a game, especially in this game. With the pro players ranging from Sosa, McGwire, Chipper, Ripken Jr. and Griffey Jr. (plus more that would take too much time and you stopped after Chipper anyways). You could stack your team adding the traditional best backyard players and literally never loose. Plus when you got the aluminum bat upgrade and bonds came up to bat the steroids irony is just more funny now.

#2: Backyard Football 2002

This gets the nod for second because it was the first football game that introduced defenders into the game. The traditional quarterback and running back heavy designed first backyard football was fun, only because I could throw for 1,000 yards and 15 TDs a game. Now thanks to them adding Seau and Kerse all I had to do was get a power up and wait for the gopher sack I would get every third play. It first introduced this young age to defense and not only offense, and that’s neat.

#3: Backyard Basketball 2004

After years of just football and baseball, Backyard Sports branched out to basketball. (after a not so productive first one they tried again. Remember kids, don’t give up on your dreams). The best part and only reason why this makes number three on this list is because they added more NBA players to it. Also, if you turned the ball setting to beach ball you could shoot from the other side of the court with Tim Duncan (who is a career maybe 30% three point shooter) and never miss. Also adding Vince Carter in his prime and getting the dunk perk was just super fun with him.

#4: Backyard Baseball 2003

This one is on here for my brother. It was his favorite because it introduced us to the Pittsburg Pirate great Jason Kendall. Not often are Kendall’s good at things so that was a nice little boost for him. Also it had more up to date characters like Vladamir Gurrerror or how ever it is spelled im too lazy to copy and paste. It was also the last year for the expos to be used in the Backyard Sports Franchise.

#5: Backyard Hockey

Finally, Backyard Hockey. This was a nice change of verity of sports they put off. I barely knew much about hockey back then, so it was a fun way to learn something. I don’t know I’m a nerd. One fun perk of this game was taking offsides away and just passing and cherry picking to score 50 goals in a hockey game. Plus, I don’t know checking just seems more fun in those types of games.

Well there you have it my list of top 5 backyard sports games. If you disagree then, well that’s neat.

For more information on Carter check out “12 Reasons Why You Shouldn’t Suck at Fantasy Football.”