With one week to go before the launch of Season 4 in Diamond Dynasty, we get a sampling of the usual content offerings this week. The latest releases of Diamond Duos and Topps Now, a new Conquest map and Double XP Days to help you get your weekend started in The Show.

MLB The Show 23 Diamond Duos 33

This week’s Diamond Duos set is certainly an eye-raiser as it pertains to the featured names. Trevor Rosenthal and Miguel Sano get 99 overalls and they don’t exactly sit at the top of a lot of people’s wish lists. That’s not a bad thing – I think it’s insanely cool these guys are getting 99 overall cards. How good are they?

CP Kaiju Trevor Rosenthal (St. Louis Cardinals)

Meta Overall rating: 104.33 – #6 CP/RP

Not only is it a pleasant surprise to see a 99 overall Trevor Rosenthal, it’s even more surprising that this card rates out as a top RP according to Meta Overall. It might be easy to forget that Rosenthal once logged 45+ saves for the Cardinals and made the All-Star team. To me, that’s part of the magic of Diamond Dynasty as it can highlight players that might not often get deserved shine. While Rosenthal didn’t exactly put up a Hall of Fame resume, he’s a flame-throwing reliever and we can always use more of those in DD. This card rates out pretty good.

The face-value attributes are what you want on relievers: 125 H/9, 125 K/9, 94 BB/9 and 125 Clutch. We get plenty of relivers that have velocity, but often they have mediocre-at-best BB/9 which makes them harder to control. Rosenthal being in the mid-90’s is awesome, though his individual pitches don’t necessarily have the highest Control ratings.

Rosenthal features an Outlier 4-Seamer with a Circle-Change at 87 MPH with 88 Control and 94 Break, a Slider at 88 MPH with 83 Control and 90 Break, a Curveball at 81 MPH with 79 Control and 84 Break and a 2-Seamer at 97 MPH with 74 Control and 82 Break.

Rosenthal’s pitch-mix isn’t the greatest, but for a bullpen arm an Outlier 4-Seamer with a Circle-Change and Slider at the same speed can play. The Slider has a decent speed differential from the Outlier Fastball which should be a great weapon. Having the Circle-Change at the same speed, with a different plane of break makes these three pitches a good combination. The 2-Seamer won’t get as much run as a Sinker and the 74 Control and 82 Break actually makes it a risky pitch in most situations. You’re probably not going to catch a lot of hitter’s looking with a backdoor 2-Seamer, but having it as an option is good I guess.

Overall, this card rates out really well and has plenty of good reasons to give it a try.

3B Retro Home Run Derby Miguel Sano (Minnesota Twins)

Meta Overall rating: 106.90 – #6 3B

Talk about options you didn’t have on your bingo card. Not only did I not have Rosenthal ever getting a 99 overall card, I definitely didn’t have Miguel Sano showing up with a top-10 card at 3B. Obviously, Sano has tremendous power and a great swing and has been a popular player in the DD community. But he’s typically been a BR beast or someone that might be a solid pick in Showdown or a fun card to use in Events for a while. This card is legitimately a top option at multiple positions and an absolute monster at the plate.

Those attributes make Cano the perfect DH option if you don’t have someone you love there. You can play him at 3B and 1B without worrying too much about the poor Fielding, though you’ll definitely see him fail to scoop every single yellow throw on the infield. He does have 99 Arm Strength and LF and RF eligibility…with 63 Speed…*shrug emoji*.

In all seriousness, this card doesn’t sniff the outfield so using him at the infield corners or DH will return the most value. Unrelated side note, but it’s objectively funny to me that Sano’s Power and Clutch ratings are 124.

Topps Now – August Week 3

Another week, another chance to grind some Moments for free Set 3 cards in Topps Now. This week’s featured players are:

• • Jordyn Adams, CF Los Angeles Angels (95 OVR)
  • Cole Ragans, SP Kansas City Royals (95 OVR)
  • Nolan Schanuel, 1B Los Angeles Angels (95 OVR)
  • Eury Perez, SP Miami Marlins (95 OVR)
  • Luis Urias, 2B Boston Red Sox (95 OVR)
  • Brandon Lowe, 2B Tampa Bay Rays (97 OVR)

Brandon Lowe gets the featured 97 overall this week, which is the “best” card in each batch of these drops. Lowe has a tremendous swing in this game and gets huge power on this card. He doesn’t rate out as a top card when looking at Meta Overall, but this will undoubtedly be a fun card to grind with. You could add this card to your Ranked squad and do serious damage, Meta Overall rating and 97 overall tag be damned.

Friendly reminder that keeping up with Topps Now makes the Monthly Awards grind quicker and easier. Take ten to fifteen minutes to knock these out, get the free cards for collections and be a step ahead for the August program.

The Life Conquest Map

A new Conquest map lands this week as well. A fairly quick run with five games to play, this map features a Diamond Duos 29 Choice Pack which increases your chances at landing one of the featured players. There’s also a 3-pack bundle of Diamond Duos packs and a Ballin’ Is A Habit 5-pack bundle. These are fairly good pack rewards for the time and gives you a chance to grind some PXP as well. Granted, you’ll most likely pull a bunch free agent cards that go for quick-sell value. But you never know!

Double XP Days

Finally, celebrate the last week of Season 3 with Double XP Days. Running from August 25 to August 29, Double XP Days will help you finish up the Season 3 XP Reward Path if you haven’t yet. I’m two tiers away from finishing so should get there much quicker. For those of you already complete, it just means more and quicker wheelspins at some extra free rewards.

Not only will it help you complete the program and earn some extra goodies, it’ll be a huge help when Season 4 launches. Don’t forget about the extra rewards you receive at the beginning of each new season for completing various programs the previous season. The Reward Path has always been one of those, so ensure that you’re getting some extra Stubs, packs and more next week.