Friday was a huge content day, with a new roster update, new Chase card, tons of offline content to grind and most notably - Team Affinity Color Storm.
A new branch in the Team Affinity content featured in MLB The Show 25, Team Affinity Color Storm brings 30-brand new cards to Diamond Dynasty. With these cards featured at 91 and 92 overall, this drop was advertised as "raising the floor" of the competitive scene.
We take a deep dive into that notion by looking at the top overall hitters and Starting Pitchers as Meta Overall sees them now. Just how many Color Storm cards helped reshape the meta?
Top Hitters
Utilizing ShowZone's Top 25-Rankings, we can get a glimpse of the top players at every single position in the game. Not only that, but you can expand out to best players by pitch, pitch combos, and other parameters.
Third Base saw an influx of Color Storm cards, with Royce Lewis, Mark Vientos, Javier Baez. and Austin Riley all moving into the top-25 at the position. Lewis specifically lands with a 91.34 True Overall rating, putting him narrowly behind Standout Luis Rengifo, 2nd Half Chase Headley, and Topps Now Willi Castro. Those three cards have been snuggled behind Awards Scott Rolen, the 99 overall that's easily the top 3B in the game. With the top-4 3B being expensive cards, having a trio of free cards that are comparable is a big win for no money spent players.
Catcher is often a positional need, and Color Storm brought several top options.
Perhaps surprisingly, Bo Naylor is now the #3 overall Catcher according to True Overall. Naylor is just behind the recently released All-Star Mike Piazza and Retro Lightning Carlos Santana, and just ahead of fellow Color Stormers J.T. Realmuto and Keibert Ruiz.
Ruiz might garner more attention with his switch-hitting, but Naylor has a solid bad and Defense wrapped up in a nifty lefty-swing. Realmuto offers some extra Speed with balanced hitting, while Ruiz features higher Contact with the switch-hitting.
That's three fairly unique styles of Catcher that you can add to your squad for free.
Second Base also sees an injection of new names, with Jake Cronenworth and Nico Hoerner landing at #3 and #4 respectively. Xavier Edwards of the Marlins also lands at #11, providing budget players another set of unique options. Again, Jason Kipnis is a divisional collection and quite expensive while Rengifo himself is still over 100,000 Stubs.
The big theme of the Color Storm release is grindable cards that are competitively viable without requiring money or Stubs. You'll have to spend close to an hour grinding for each Color Storm card, but that can be a worthwhile amount to scoop up extra packs, XP, Stubs, and legitimate top cards at their respective positions.
Top Pitchers
There's a slew of new Starting Pitchers in the top-25 from Color Storm. Bryan Woo, Nick Lodolo, Jack Leiter, Jared Jones, and Michael Wacha round out the top-11 Starting Pitchers with rather comparable True Overall ratings.
You're obviously going to get different flair with each SP, as some possess big-time Fastballs and others are more about movement and control. If you aren't grinding a specific team and looking to go for the best competitive options, you have a legitimate half-dozen new SP to consider when you also include Luis Gil who lands at #15 in True Overall.
Gil has monstrous attributes for a 91 overall SP, and I'm actually a little shocked he's so low. The low BB/9 and Control on his pitches is almost certainly what holds Gil back, but he features a truly ridiculous combination of 104 H/9 and 125 Clutch. The K/9 at 86 will certainly play, but overall, you're going to induce miniscule PCIs from opponents when Gil is on the mound.
125 Clutch is an ideal attribute for relievers. Getting that on your Starting Pitcher that also throws 100 MPH with a Sinker/Slider mix is big fun.
Perhaps most notably, bullpens across Diamond Dynasty got huge reinforcements in Team Affinity Color Storm.
Bryan Abreu debuts as a top-3 reliever, boasting undeniably elite 114 H/9, 105 K/9, and 118 Clutch. He throws 100 MPH with a maxed out Slider (99 Control and Break) and a Circle Change that he actually throws decently (77 Control and 84 Break).
Blake Treinen, Ben Joyce, and Jeff Hoffman are also new members of the top-10 reliever club. This batch of relievers has everything you want, from disgusting repertoires to elite attributes. Joyce in particular has double Outlier - featuring his 4-Seamer and Sinker. With a Slider featuring 95 Break that comes in at 83 MPH, Joyce is going to miss a ton of bats out of your bullpen.
Closing Thoughts
Team Affinity Color Storm brought some lesser-used names, but also brought the big guns with truly competitive cards. We can get jaded about name-value in Diamond Dynasty, as the big name stars of today and Hall of Fame legends are always the most sought after cards.
But drops like Color Storm have a great opportunity to introduce the player base to exciting, lesser-known players while still having a significant impact on the Diamond Dynasty meta.
Are you adding any of these Color Storm cards to your squad? Who are you grinding for first? Let us know in the comments!
Cory Wayne Dell
Cory has been writing about all things baseball and gaming since 2022 and has been featured at Operation Sports as well as cited by Forbes. Cory is also a multi-instrumentalist and founder of the band Cargocastle. Cargocastle's latest single, "Truth and Reconciliation," is available on Spotify and all major streaming platforms. Cory is also the author of Shadow of a Monster, a personal memoir currently seeking publication.
