MLB The Show 25: Team Affinity Neon Breakdown

The latest addition to Team Affinity is here in the form of the Neon card series. Each team gets a new 99 overall Captain card in this drop. As usual, the Captains scale based off their respective team's overall power level. If the team in question has several quality cards available, the Captain boosts are lower than teams that aren't as well represented.

Here's what to expect with each team's grind.

Program Structure

• 50,000 TA Points to complete each team.
• Each team program includes multiple mission types, repeatable gameplay opportunities, and layered PXP grinds.

Start Here Moment

• One per team
• Worth 10,000 TA Points
• Kicks off each program with a quick boost.

Team Stat Missions

Each worth 5,000 TA Points unless noted:

• 20 Hits – 5,000
• 15 Strikeouts – 5,000
• 50 Total Bases – 5,000
• 9 Innings Pitched – 10,000
• 5 RBI with hitters / 1 Win with SP – 10,000
• • Most teams allow any players or any version of their Neon reward.
  • There appears to be some random exceptions, like the Nationals' mission to earn 1 Win with Milestone Jordan Zimmerman (the NL East division collection).

PXP Missions

• 1,000 PXP with pitchers from each team – 10,000 TA Points
• 1,000 PXP with hitters from each team – 15,000 TA Points
• 1,000 PXP with Jolt, Color Storm, and/or 2025 All-Star (previous TA rewards) – 25,000 TA Points

Rewards

Each team program grants the following in addition to its Neon Player:

• Team-specific icon
• Team-specific uniform items
• 3x Show Packs
• 1x Ballin Pack
• 4,500 XP
• 99 OVR Neon Series card

Notable Neon

There's a healthy mix of young or relative unknown players and Legends this time around. Here's some of my personal favorites from the new Neon series:

Getting a crack at a free Willie Mays and Derek Jeter should make a lot of players happy. In addition to these huge name legends, we get a very good 99 overalls of Lance Berkman and Bobby Abreu - two of the legends I was most excited to see added this year. There's also some very good versions of Adley Rutschman, Adrian Beltre, Ozzie Albies, and Hunter Greene.

Neon Collection

• Collect 15 Neon cards → Al Leiter - #4 SP Meta Overall
• Collect 23 Neon cards → Lou Gehrig - #1 1B Meta Overall
• Collect 32 Neon cards → Bryan Reynolds - #1 LF, #1 RF, #3 CF Meta Overall

A fun mix of cards at the top of the Neon series collection. Al Leiter is routinely one of the best SP in Diamond Dynasty, and a favorite amongst the competitive crowd. A nasty pitch mix with elite attributes, Leiter is earned by collecting 15 Neon series cards.

Lou Gehrig lands as the top 1B option in Diamond Dynasty. Massive offensive attributes with 85 Fielding, Gehrig also features a tasty swing from the left side.

Finally, Bryan Reynolds takes the spot as the ultimate Neon collection reward as you'll need to acquire the entire set of Team Affinity and collection cards. It's well worth it, as you get a switch-hitting outfielder that's top-tier at each spot with insane attributes across the board. Parallel 4 with Neon Reynolds gets you Diamond Fielding at each outfield position, with 86 Speed/Reaction stock to make him truly elite defensively.

The pacing for these cards seems pretty good to me. Those that grind the new Team Affinity content relentlessly will get some of the best cards currently available in the game. For the rest of us that might unlock these slower (or not at all), the power level should balance out well with the cards that release over the next couple weeks.

Meta Impact

Bryan Reynolds, Lou Gehrig, Lance Berkman, Adrian Beltre, and Konnor Griffin (not-pictured in this article) all debut within the top-25 for Meta Overall across Diamond Dynasty. Reynolds and Gehrig being collection rewards checks out, but Berkman, Beltre, and Griffin all offer elite-level power within the team specific Team Affinity programs. The budget and no money spent crowds get some very nice pieces to add with some grinding.

There's your Team Affinity Neon drop! Which teams are you grinding away? Any cards stick out to you that we didn't cover here? Let us know in the comments!