A frequent question I get is “how important are points?” when considering how to play within the game. As I talked about yesterday, there is a lot of reason why inserts are valuable, but why is it cool to be a big player in the points game?

Status

Funny how status is a main driver for both insert collecting and playing for points, but like I said – vanity is a big deal. Scoring a ton of points and finishing at the top is a big deal in bunt, and it will fill up your awards case in a very similar fashion to collecting the top cards. I would venture as far as saying that the awards you get for being a top points player are almost more important to status than a collection, but that’s just me.

Additionally, there are articles released in game every week that highlight the top scorers, which is cool to be recognized in that fashion. There is a lot of clout that comes with finishing at the top, and that’s no joke.

Awards/Coins

Each week, Topps rewards players with coins who finish higher in the points. I would read through the articles and take a look at all the coins you can win just from playing along. If you can finish in the top 10 of your team, you can wake up to as much as 8500 coins in your bank just from the awards you will likely win. Finish in the top 10 overall and its even more. Sure, this may seem daunting, but that’s the highest of the high awards. There are coins for finishing in the top 1000, above the team average points, and all sorts of easier to win awards, and it goes a long way if you dont want to invest money to play.

Here are the available weekly coin awards:

• Overall Top 1-5
• Overall Top 6-10
• Overall Top 1000
• Top players based on favorite team (at least top 10 gets an award)
• Beat the set pts threshold (25k last week)
• Beat the average score of top 1000
• Beat the average score of your favorite team

Cards

Best of Bunt cards are a good thing. Yes, not many people value them in the same way as a pack pulled insert, but that is constant with every card of the same nature. If you find the right person who wants it, you can trade it for some nice cards, or you can keep it as a trophy. I like the look of the cards, but I am someone who likes trading them off to get more points cards and inserts for my collection. If there was a player I wanted, I would keep it, but I rarely get lucky like that.

Here are the way they are decided (one card reward per award):

• Overall Top 1-10
• Overall 11-25
• Overall 26-50
• Overall 51-100
• Overall 100-500
• Overall 500-1000

What is the Easiest Way to Score Points?

Here are the ways I would suggest getting going, because its going to take work, and its going to take almost a full week of watching the scoreboard to really capitalize.

1. Trade – aim for reds and silvers of the starting pitchers that are scheduled to start in the coming days. People protect their golds, but not as much silvers and reds
2. Set Your Lineup Early – There are 4 phases to each day’s schedule, make sure you are prepped for each one. Morning/afternoon games usually start around 12-2pm, first wave evening starts around 6pm CT, second wave around 7 pm, and late games around 9pm for the west (hour later if you are east coast).
3. Monitor  – there are a lot of reasons why its good to watch the first two innings of a phase, because there are a lot of pitchers who will tip their hands of whether or not they have control early on. Switch them out for others that are on pace to do better, especially if they are getting lit up.
4. Avoid Starting Based On Name/Team – just because a guy is your favorite player, or pitching for/against your favorite team, doesnt mean you should make that a reason to decide. Choose based on ERA, K/9, and WHIP. Another good stat is HR allowed, because those will kill you.
5. Never Have Empties – you should always be starting 9 guys. Trust me on this. Trade for other players if you need more.