Baseball
2 Players, Ages 6+
Baseball is a 2-player sports-themed poker dice game. The goal is to roll matching faces to earn a hit against your opponents’ pitches, to score the most runs across 3, 6, or 9 innings.
This game is a Junior original, created by Louie Mantia.
Dice
This game uses five six-sided poker dice.
| 9 | 10 | J | Q | K | A |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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Setup
Track progress with a Baseball scorecard, this interactive scoreboard, or scratch paper.
| Away | Home | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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| – | + | – | + | ||
Choose a player to begin batting (Away); the other will begin pitching (Home).
Gameplay
Goal
The goal of Baseball is to match dice to score more runs than your opponent.
Sequence
The pitcher throws one die to determine the pitch. Next, the batter throws the remaining four dice to earn a hit or be struck out.
If one of the batter’s dice matches the pitch, that’s a Single. Two? That’s a Double! Three? Triple! Four? That’s a Home Run! Update the on-base diagram.
If none of the batter’s dice match the pitch, that’s an out! Mark an out.
Continue until the batter accumulates three outs. Switch roles and begin the bottom half of the inning.
Continue until all innings are scored.
Ending
The player with the highest total score wins!
If the players have identical scores, rejoice in the shared victory!
Scoring
A Single moves the batter to First Base. A Double moves the batter to Second Base. A Triple moves the batter to Third Base. A Home Run moves the batter around the diamond to Home, scoring one run.
Any on-base runner advances bases when they are “pushed” by other runners. A runner scores 1 point when they advance past Third Base to Home.
Strategy
There’s not much strategy in the poker dice version of Baseball. The results of pitches and at-bats are random. Refer to the following table for the chances of each type of hit.
| Single | Double | Triple | Home Run |
|---|---|---|---|
| 39% | 12% | 2% | < 1% |
