Flash forward a few years.

I went to college, and discovered Camden Yards. I rooted for the Orioles, mostly cause they were the closest thing to a “hometown team” in Charlottesville, Virginia, other than the Atlanta Braves (and I refuse to root for any team from Atlanta for any reason in professional sports). I rediscovered my love for baseball, particularly in the ballpark, and even more so after I could drink beer in the ballpark.

Flash forward a couple more years, and I’ve moved up to northern Virginia for work just as the Montreal Expos move down to and become the Washington Nationals. You do NOT root against the home team, and the whole idea of the Nationals – it just works. They quickly became my second favorite team, still trailing the Pirates (who have failed to do much since my boyhood hero Andy Van Slyke played for them).

For fun, I open up Baseball Mogul 2007. I click “play” and select 1991. It builds a database, and I select the Pittsburgh Pirates. Batting #3 in the line up is center fielder Andy Van Slyke. “Andy had a good 1991 on the basepaths, swiping 10 bases in 13 attempts. Van Slyke is in his prime and able to play for most teams. Andy loves Pittsburgh and would like to finish his career here.” He’s 31 years old, in his eleventh season, batting leftie and throwing right, earning $2.9 million through 1993. In 1991 he was batting .265, down from .284 in 1990, is showing 139 games, 491 at bats, 87 runs, 130 hits, 24 doubles, 7 triples, 17 home runs, 83 RBIs, 71 walks, and 85 strike outs. His on base percentage is .355 and slugging is .446. He bats after Jeff King and before Barry Bonds.

If you’d like to make a “man crush” joke now’s the time.

Baseball Mogul 2007 isn’t just a sports game. It’s a sports economics simulator, coupled with a baseball game, coupled with a historical database. For example, continuing with my 1991 Pittsburgh example, I click on “Budget” and go to “Concessions”.

Hot dogs are $3.45 (+6%). Beer is $4.55 (-4%). Ice cream is $2.50 (+0%). I can change these if I want, or, with the click of a button, look at any other team’s concessions.

That’s one thing to remember about the game – don’t feel tied down to one team. In almost any scenario, with one click, you’re handling another team.

Oh, and while looking at that, my background shows the schedule. Wednesday, April 1st, the Pirates play the Padres at home at 7:05 PM, followed by two more games against San Diego at 1:05 on Thursday the 2nd and Friday the 3rd. The Braves are in town for a three game series the 4th through the 6th, followed by two more Padres games at home.

Clicking on the name of my team, I change to the Padres, and see that during that three game break they’re playing the Cubs at home.

Just looking at the menu options shows you the depth of the game: “Game”, “Team”, “Players”, “Budget”, “News”, “Play”, “History”, “League”, “Tools”, “Windows”, “Help”.

You’re not even limited by real life. Want to run a season with entirely fictional players? No problem. Want to build your own players, your own teams, your own stadiums? Go for it!

And what happens if your team changes in real life – well, patches will come out during the year to update it, and often times people on the web will make their own rosters, including possibly tweaking stats to make them fit more the way they feel they should.

Graphics? They make do. You don’t need high falutin’ top of the line graphics for a game like this. Sound, too – click on Concessions and you hear the “crack-hiss” of an opening beer can, but that’s all you need.

It’s hard to review a game like this. Why? Because it’s so good – and so specialized. This is a game for the true baseball fan. If you like baseball, if you love baseball, you need to go RIGHT NOW and buy this game. Get it! Seriously! If you want to learn more about baseball, get this game. You’ll learn tons.

If you don’t like baseball, this isn’t an arcade game. You’re not going to have fun trying to hit some dingers like Mark McGuire in an episode of the Simpsons. So don’t go into it thinking that way. It’s the ultimate in simulators – and at the same time so easy to use that really, any baseball fan can play it.

I say this occasionally in reviews, and I think it holds true here. This is the kind of game that you’re going to know if you’ll like or not. If you love the details of baseball, or you’ve always thought “I can run the team better than those schmucks”, this is the game for you.