Diamond Mind Baseball Screen Images

Last updated: September 22, 2001

This document shows you a few of the screens from Diamond Mind Baseball version 7 to help you get a feel for how the product looks and works.

NOTE: Version 7 is a character-mode DOS game. In December, 2000, we introduced version 8, which contains many new features and a totally-redesigned Windows user interface. We will continue to sell and support version 7 for the time being, and most of our season disks are available in version 7 format, but any new season disks we offer will be available only for version 8 and beyond.

Game Screen

The following image shows you a typical version 7 game screen. This game is between two teams on our All-time Greatest Teams Disk #2, the 1975 Boston Red Sox and the 1955 Brooklyn Dodgers.

The region in the upper-left corner shows the full batting order of the team at bat, including up-to-the-minute computer-league batting averages. The region in the upper middle shows key ratings and stats for the current batter, with the real-life stats inside the brackets. The region in the middle-left serves two purposes -- displaying your strategy choices before each play (top image) and showing you the result of the play in an informative radio-style commentary. The bottom shows the strategy choices for this play (these can be hidden) and the linescore.

The large region to the right shows the ratings for the defense and baserunners. Each defender has a range rating for his ability to cover ground. Outfielders and catchers also have a throwing rating, which is displayed to the right of the range rating. Pitchers also have a rating for their ability to hold runners close (h). When runners get on base, their ratings for running (r), stealing (s), and getting a good jump (j) also appear.

The current ball-strike count is shown in the lower-left of this region, and the number of pitches and number of strikes thrown by the current pitcher is displayed under the pitcher's defensive ratings.

Figure 1. Game screen showing menu of pitching options.

Figure 2. Game screen showing play-by-play.

Lineup Selection Screens

Diamond Mind Baseball displays all of the information you need to choose starting pitchers and starting lineups. One screen shows all of your active pitchers, with key ratings, statistics, and fatigue information. Another shows all of your active batters, again with key ratings and statistics. You can easily access the full statistical and ratings display for any player. And you can look at the same information for your opponent so you can tailor your choices to his strengths and weaknesses.

Figure 3. Pitcher selection screen.

The first column shows each player's status using a one-character code (A = available, T = tired, L = in the lineup for today's game). Players who are available are highlighted. After the name of the player, the next column indicates whether the pitcher throws left- or right-handed. The next two columns show the pitcher's durability rating as a starter and reliever. We'll come back to the fatigue section in a moment. The last three columns show the player's real-life win-loss record and ERA. The menu of pitcher selection options appears across the bottom of the screen. The right side of the screen shows the team's current batting order and information on the opposing pitcher (both blank for now since they haven't yet been selected for this game).

The fatigue information shows recent appearances and pitch counts. Fatigue is tracked over a five day period -- today and the four previous days. Anyone who doesn't pitch for four days is fully rested, so there's no need to look at appearances that are more than four days old. Fatigue column 1 shows that in yesterday's game, Dick Pole threw 96 pitches as the starter and Jim Burton tossed 27 pitches in relief. The next column shows that Bill Lee started the day before and was relieved by Dick Drago. The club had an off-day before that, and four days ago, Luis Tiant hurled a complete game, throwing 127 pitches in the process.

Once the starting pitchers have been selected (either by a human manager or a computer manager), you're ready to choose your starting lineups.

Figure 4. Lineup selection screen.

This screen, by design, is quite similar to the pitcher selection screen. The first few columns show the current status, name, and batting hand for each player. A few key real-life stats (average, HR, AB) follow. The remainder of this region shows the defensive positions each player is rated for.

The right side of the screen shows your batting order (once it has been selected) and some information on the opposing pitcher. The batting order shows how each player bats (right, left, or switch) and the defensive position currently held by the player. The opposing pitcher information shows the name of the pitcher, whether he throws left- or right-handed, and the batting average of opposing left- and right-handed hitters who faced this pitcher in real life.

The commands on the batter selection menu allow you to make changes to your batting order. Select Choose to insert a player into the lineup, File to load a saved lineup or have the computer manager pick one for you, Avail to mark a player as unavailable for this game, Stats to see the full-screen stats and ratings display for a player, Opp to switch the display between your lineup and your opponent's, Info to switch the display between showing batting, pitching and other information on this screen, List to switch between a list of your batters and your pitchers, Def to change the defensive position of a player in the lineup, PchrHit to insert the pitcher into the batting order in place of the designated hitter, Exch to exchange the batting order positions of any two players, and Move to move a player up or down in the batting order, shifting everyone in between by one slot.

Full-screen Stats and Ratings Display

Because access to player statistics and ratings is essential for everything from playing games to making decisions about roster moves, Diamond Mind Baseball gives you access to player statistics from many places. Wherever you see the Stats command on a menu, you can access four pages of detailed information about the player, including real-life statistics, computer-league statistics, player ratings, and status information.

The top row of the screen always shows the player's full name; primary position; whether he is a right-handed (R), left-handed (L), or switch-hitter (S); whether he is a pull (p) or spray (sp) hitter; whether he throws right- (R) or left-handed (L); and whether you are looking at a single-team record or a combined record for a player who appeared on more than one team.

Figure 5. Detailed player screen showing batting information.

The batter screen also shows three pairs of statistics. The top section shows the real-life and Diamond Mind Baseball (DMB) batting totals. The last column, Play%, shows his computer-league playing time as a percentage of his real-life playing time. The next two sections show the real-life and DMB stats versus left- and right-handed pitchers.

Note: This screen was taken from a game involving two teams from our All-time Greatest Teams Disks. We do not have real-life left/right splits for seasons prior to 1980, so the real-life splits are shown here as all zeroes. Left/right strategy is still very important for these older seasons, as all players are rated to be better when they have the advantage (lefty batters fare better against righty pitchers, lefty pitchers have an edge against lefty batters, and so on).

The bottom third of the screen shows the ratings that determine each batter's performance in other aspects of the game -- sacrifice bunting, bunting for a hit, running the bases, stealing and getting a jump, hitting for extra-base power, throwing (as an outfielder and/or catcher), injury risk, clutch performance, and range ratings for each defensive position.

The second screen is organized in the same way as the batting stats screen, except that it shows pitching statistics.

Figure 6. Detailed player screen showing pitching information.

The ratings that appear in the bottom third of the screen describe how durable the pitcher is in a starting and/or relief role, how well he holds runners, plays defense, induces ground balls, avoids injuries and gets out of jams.

The third screen is also organized in the same way as the batting stats screen, except that it shows fielding statistics.

Figure 7. Detailed player screen showing pitching information.

Because defense is a very important part of baseball, and a very important part of the design of Diamond Mind Baseball, the game tracks a full set of fielding statistics. Most other games don't. The above illustration shows the position-by-position fielding stats for real-life and computer-league games.

Weather Report

The last screen image in this document shows the weather report that is displayed prior to each game (assuming you have the weather effects option turned on). The league schedule is shown in the background. As you can see, the weather information is quite detailed and is appropriate for the location of the park and the time of year.

Final Thoughts

There are other screens in the game, but they look and work in similar ways to the ones shown here. We've tried very hard to achieve a consistent look so you have less to learn. The manager profile editing screen, to give just one example, looks and works a lot like the pitching and lineup selection screens. Everything in the product can be operated by mouse or keyboard. There are plenty of hot-keys that allow you to move around, scroll lists, and invoke frequently-used commands very quickly. Even though the user interface is still character-based, customers often tell us that they like the way the information is organized and how the product flows from one step to the next. We hope this document gives you a good idea of what you'd see if you purchased Diamond Mind Baseball.