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  • Choose Your Team For Franchise
  • Choose The Best Settings For Franchise Mode
  • Tasks In Franchise Mode
  • Scouting In Franchise Mode
  • Budgeting In Franchise Mode
  • Play Ball

While some teams are content with being competitive and possibly making the playoffs, winning the World Series is the ultimate goal. Trying to build a championship-caliber team can be stressful, but in MLB The Show 23, the Franchise mode caters to your desire to operate a major league team.

Related: MLB The Show 23: Beginner’s Guide To March To October

Baseball fans love to gush about their knowledge and how they would better build a team than current general managers. Well, Franchise mode gives you several options to successfully run a team. Here are some important tips and tricks you should know before starting a new MLB franchise.

Updated September 06, 2023, by Sean Murray: If you're looking to take your team to the playoffs, then we've got the tips for playing Franchise mode to the fullest. We've also tweaked this guide with refreshed formatting to make it easier to read and with more relevant links to other subjects in MLB The Show 23.

Choose Your Team For Franchise

The first major decision in Franchise mode is selecting a team. By default, contracts for general managers are three years long, and whether or not you’re re-signed will be based on your team’s performance.

MLB The Show 23 allows you to turn off the GM contracts and control a team permanently.

If you're new to Franchise mode or MLB The Show, we recommend choosing a team with low expectationsor turning off the GM contracts.

You can access an in-depth view of the team's expectations in the GM Goals menu.

Each team will have different seasonal and contract goals; some might have goals to win the World Series, like the Los Angeles Dodgers, while others might have goals to simply finish over .500, like the Arizona Diamondbacks.

Choose The Best Settings For Franchise Mode

After selecting the team, you’ll have to choose the proper settings for your Franchise experience.

Franchise Mode Settings

Fantasy Draft:

  • When turned on, you will enter a fantasy draft where you’ll select a new roster from a pool of current players.

Allow Non-Active Free Agents:

  • When turned on, non-active players from other leagues will be available to sign from the free-agent pool.
  • If this setting is turned off, only players that have been previously assigned to a team roster will be available.

CPU Roster Control:

  • This setting should remain off unless you want to control the entire league.
  • Turning this setting on will also disable trades, budgets, and injuries.

CPU Trading:

  • To maintain realism, this setting should remain onto enable CPU-controlled teams to make trades.

Ignore Budgets:

  • This is an important setting that can make or break your franchise. When this is turned on, the budgetswill be ignored, and you’ll be able to spend as much money as possible.
  • If you’re looking for the most realistic experience controlling a franchise, you can leave the budgets off and calculate your team’s finances for all transactions.

Force Trades:

  • Unless you want to control the entire league, you should leave this setting off and allowCPU-controlled teams to have the option to accept or decline a trade offer.

Designated Hitter:

  • The National League finally adopted the Designated Hitter in 2022, making the position universal across the league.
  • If you want to experience the days of old, you can switch this setting to off and force pitchers to hit.

Extra Inning Runner:

  • Major League Baseball passed a new rule for the 2023 season that features a runner on second base to begin the tenth inning.
  • Turning this setting off will remove the base runner.

Once you’ve finalized the general settings for your franchise, you can select which tasks you’ll be responsible for.

Related: MLB The Show 23: Beginner’s Guide To Diamond Dynasty

Tasks In Franchise Mode

There are three major task areas to achieve success in Franchise mode: Coaching Tasks, Development Tasks, and Manager Tasks.

Each area has its own level of complexity, but you can adjust these tasks later on if you feel overwhelmed.

Coaching, Development, And Manager Tasks

Coaching Tasks:

  • Set lineups and rotations
  • Injury management

Development Tasks:

  • Scouting

Manager Tasks:

  • Hire and Fire Staff
  • 40-Man Roster
  • Roster Moves
  • Free Agency
  • Trades
  • Waiver Transactions
  • Contracts

While you can allow the CPU to handle all of these tasks, you should, at the very least, manually complete Coaching and Development tasks.

These are the main areas that impact the current and future roster.

Players will experience slumps, hot streaks, or injuries throughout the season. Having complete control over batting lineups and pitching rotations will help avoid a catastrophe during these situations.

Not only is it important to take your franchise's future into consideration, but scouting prospects will increase their interest in signing with your team.

This task could be the difference between you having a young, dynamic player or them potentially joining a rival team.

Related: MLB The Show 23: Beginner’s Guide To Road To The Show

Scouting In Franchise Mode

Scouting can be a bit more difficult, but MLB The Show 23 tries to make it as accessible as possible. Teams will have three scouts, which means you can scout up to three prospects.

There are a total of 14 weeks to scout players before the Amateur Draft.

Scouts can analyze players by specific prospect or position or discover new prospects.

You can utilize the Player Search to quickly look for a specific type of player to acquire through trade or just to scout. This is a helpful tool for improving specific positions on your team.

Each scout has four attributes determining their scouting abilities, allowing you to prioritize scouts to specific positions.

To help determine which positions you should prioritize, you can view thepositional needsmenu that shows how each position on your team compares to the rest of the league.

Budgeting In Franchise Mode

Manager tasks might seem a bit overwhelming, but they offer even more team control.

Depending if you have Budgets turned on or off will dictate how complex these tasks will be. Hiring coaches, signing players in free agency, or acquiring players via trade will all take finances into account.

If you plan on having the Budgets on, take that into consideration when selecting a team. Teams with more money to spend will make acquiring better talent easier​​​​​.

Play Ball

Finally, it’s time to play ball. After finalizing your team's settings and duties, you’ll choose to start the franchise in Spring Training or the Regular Season.

The main benefit of starting in Spring Training is perfecting the game mechanics like hitting, fielding, and pitching while also analyzing the team’s depth.

If the Budget is turned on, you can acquire and equipSponsorships to increase revenue.

These Sponsorships will help increase the amount of money you can use to sign better players to improve your team.

Once Spring Training is over, the Regular Season begins, and the games count for real.

There are five different methods to play a Franchise game. Do your best with the following methods in leading your team toward a championship.

How To Play Franchise Games

Play Full Game:

  • The traditional way of playing MLB The Show 23.

Player Lock:

  • Just as the name suggests, Player Lock will lock you into one player, and you’ll only play their plate appearances, fielding opportunities, or pitching.
  • This method is similar to Road to the Show.

Quick Manage:

  • This method simulates the game action based on decisions you make for the hitter or pitcher.
  • When batting, you’ll select Swing, and the game will determine if you reached base or recorded an out.
  • On the mound, you’ll choose regularPitch, Pitch Around, Pitch To Contact, or Walk Batter.
  • You will also be able to enter the game and play like normal.

Manage Full Game:

  • Unlike Quick Manage, you’ll be locked into the managerial side of the game.
  • This mode forces you to watch the game action while selecting actions for your players.

Retro Mode:

  • This is a simplified game mode where you only need to press one button to execute actions in the game.
  • At the plate, you can use the joysticks to move around in the batter’s box to get a better swinging angle.
  • On the mound, you can use the joysticks to shift on the rubber and manipulate the trajectory of the pitch.

Throughout the season, you can assign different training assignments to improve players. If you have a pitcher struggling with control on the mound, assign them to a training session with the pitching coach.

Or if a hitter seems like they're routinely coming up short of hitting home runs, they may need to hit the weight room.

Next: MLB The Show 23: 6 Player Ratings That Make No Sense