Jackie Robinson Day Brings Massive Content Drop to MLB The Show 26

Jackie Robinson needs no introduction, and SDS got right to the point with their in-game celebration of Jackie Robinson Day this year.

An annual tradition in Major League Baseball and MLB The Show, Jackie Robinson Day pays tribute to the legendary Jackie Robinson. This year's content drop is the biggest in history for JRD, with a ton of new cards being released and a massive collection featuring Jackie Robinson as the ultimate reward.

Jackie Robinson Day Program Breakdown

Jackie isn't the main reward in the program, but he is the very first card you earn and he can be earned in the singular Moment within the program. As Robinson, tallying 1 Hit will earn 10 program stars and unlock 88 The Negro Leagues series Jackie Robinson.

The actual grind within the program presents several options to tackle. There's a handful of stat and PXP missions that you can complete anywhere in Diamond Dynasty with any players. This gives you about 50 program stars worth of progress.

There's also three missions that are more theme-specific and requiring specific cards. There's a total of 30 program stars on the take here.

If you do the singular Moment and all of these missions, you're 90% complete with the program.

You can also earn 20 program stars by completing the new Jackie Robinson Day Showdown. I've enjoyed the new style of Showdown this year, where beating each Mini-Boss rewards you the card you just defeated and you don't have to restart if you fail a Mini-Boss. I feel like that makes the method to gain 20 stars here a pretty sweet deal.

Earn the following cards by completing the Jackie Robinson Day Showdown:

• Andy Cooper, SP, FA (88 OVR)
• Luis Gil, SP, NYY (88 OVR)
• Jose Mendez, SP, FA (89 OVR)
• Bill Foster, SP, FA (89 OVR)
• Wilbur “Bullet Joe” Rogan, SP, FA (90 OVR)

For those that have completed Storylines Season 4, or complete it moving forward; the players featured so far can be collected for 5 program stars per card. Having the entirety of the Storylines content completed will pay off with 35 program stars.

Conquest

A new Conquest has also landed, featuring only three Stronghold games to complete the map. You can also earn four player card rewards, all of which feed into the Jackie Robinson Day collection.

The players you can earn are:

• Drake Baldwin, C, ATL (88 OVR)
• Leroy Matlock, SP, FA (88 OVR)
• Michael Fulmer, SP, DET (88 OVR)
• Norman “Turkey” Stearnes, CF, FA (90 OVR)

In addition to 88 Jackie Robinson, the other cards earned in the reward path are:

• Dontrelle Willis, SP, MIA (88 OVR)
• Walter “Buck” Leonard, 1B, FA (89 OVR)
• Monford “Monte” Irvin, LF, SF (89 OVR)
• Kris Bryant, 3B, CHC (90 OVR)
• Hank Thompson, RF, SF (90 OVR)
• Henry Aaron, SS, ATL (91 OVR)

The final reward is 91 The Negro Leagues Series Henry Aaron.

This is a very unique Hank Aaron card. Known as an outfielder in his Hall of Fame MLB career, this card showcases the young Aaron's prowess as a primary Shortstop with eligibility at 1B, 2B, LF, CF, and RF.

Even more notably, this card gets official MLB team designation. In the past, Negro Leagues series cards did not qualify for many Captain boosts as there was no official MLB team affiliation on those specific cards.

This Aaron card (and other Negro League cards) includes MLB team designation, meaning this card fits an Atlanta Braves theme team with Terry Pendleton and Greg Maddux as the Captains. This is huge as it gives the Braves Theme Team a legitimate starting Shortstop, and my next Ranked Seasons game will be a fully maxed Braves theme team with Double Captains.

In April.

There's been many reported issues with MLB The Show 26 so far, but I suppose I've been fortunate that I haven't really had any issues. This is by far the most fun I've ever had with MLB The Show, and I'm stoked with all the cool content we've seen just in the first month.

Jackie Robinson Day Event Program

We get our new Event today as well, also Jackie Robinson themed.

You'll need to build your best squad with Negro League Series, Awards Series, Live Series, Age 35+, and or Speed 75+ players to compete in this 6-day limited Event.

90 Negro League Series Biz Mackey is the Event reward.

It is my humble opinion that this Event is a must-play simply because Biz Mackey is earnable. This dude is absolutely nuts, and this version immediately debuts as #2 Catcher in Diamond Dynasty.

Don't forget that you can use the new Mission Optimizer to build your best squads for any mission. You can use this tool to build your Event lineups, too!

The offensive attributes might not blow you away at first, but remember that Mackey literally plays every position on the field except Pitcher. With Mods part of the Parallel system this year, you can significantly alter the make-up of cards in the best way. You'll be able to mold Mackey into virtually any kind of player you want if you're able to Parallel 5 him and unlock the Mod options.

Jackie Robinson Day Pack Breakdown

For the first time (that I can remember) we are also getting a Jackie Robinson themed pack today. As usual, there's the $4.99 Jackie Robinson Foundation pack in the Show Shop that benefits charity. You'll get some cool Jackie Robinson themed goodies as a thank you for rewarding a good cause. Look for it in your console store, or in the "Stubs" tab within Diamond Dynasty.

Pro Tip: Don't forget about your equipment collections! You can collect socks, bats, and other equipment items and earn Stubs and free packs! Check your collections tab!

The premium pack comes in three forms, with Deluxe, Premier, and Ultra packs in the Shop.

These packs will be in the Shop for about two weeks. As of now, while you should always expect to lose Stubs on packs, the EV on the Jackie Robinson Day packs isn't tremendously lousy. If you're planning on doing the collection (detailed below) then you can probably just have fun ripping packs if you so choose.

The cards featured in the pack are:

• Toni Stone, 2B, FA (89 OVR)
• Leon Day, SP, FA (89 OVR)
• Oscar Charleston, CF, FA (89 OVR)
• Jonathan India, 2B, CIN (89 OVR)
• William “Judy” Johnson, 3B, FA (89 OVR)
• Rap Dixon, RF, FA (89 OVR)
• Ryan Howard, 1B, PHI (89 OVR)
• Larry Doby, 2B, FA (89 OVR)
• David Justice, 1B, ATL (90 OVR)
• Corbin Carroll, LF, AZ (90 OVR)
• Willie Mays, CF, SF (90 OVR)
• Michael Harris II, CF, ATL (90 OVR)
• Scott Rolen, 3B, PHI (90 OVR)
• Jacob deGrom, SP, NYM (91 OVR)
• Gunnar Henderson, 3B, BAL (91 OVR)
• Josh Gibson, C, FA (91 OVR)
• John Donaldson, SP, FA (91 OVR)

Negro Leagues John Donaldson is the main event in this pack. Donaldson is arguably the most feared starting pitcher in Diamond Dynasty the last few seasons. He's had a primary Slider with Outlier, a 4-Seamer with Outlier, and unbelievably slow Forkball which was a lethal combination.

This iteration of Donaldson does not have Outlier on either pitch, which should theoretically reduce the difficulty in hitting Donaldson from "improbable but not impossible" to "improbable but not as impossible."

Jackie Robinson Day Collection

The massive influx of cards today seemed like a strong indication that Jackie would be collection-locked this year, and that is indeed the case.

There are three total rewards in this set.

#33 Starting Pitcher - Meta Overall

#1 CF - Meta Overall

#1 2B, #3 3B, #5 LF, #6 1B, #7 SS - Meta Overall

This Milestone Jackie Robinson is an incredible card. Loaded with Quirks, amazing attributes on a 94 overall body, with so much room with the Parallel Mods; this card is every bit of worthy of the collection reward status.

It'll take a bit of work and grinding, but this is an elite card that can easily moonlight as an "endgame" card for most of the year once you reach Parallel 5 and choose your Mods.

What are you jumping into first from this content drop? Let us know in the comments!

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