If there is one word to describe my roommates, it is not “athletes.”  Why then were our lives altered so dramatically by a harmless sports simulation featuring jolly Italian plumbers?  It could only be through the power of Nintendo.

As a self-proclaimed gamer all my life, I’ve witnessed virtually everything, and I do mean “virtually.”  I’ve slain dark lords, I’ve saved all manner of damsels in distress, and I’ve used elemental critters to battle my way to the top of a hierarchal society based upon animal cruelty.  Sometimes I do all three in the same day.  That’s why when I was presented with a game called “Mario Super Sluggers” by my roommate Max Wollner, Fordham College at Lincoln Center (FCLC) ’13, I was more than willing to give it a shot.

It started out as a gradual thing; the novelty of Mario and Bowser setting aside their differences for a good, old fashioned game of baseball was simply too good to refuse.  Plus, with the motion sensitivity features of the Nintendo Wii, I could now assume the persona of everyone’s favorite festively plump jumpman, swing my Wiibat and throw my Wiiballs with the best of them.  So, once Max asked the fateful question, “Do you want to play,” it was a force no less powerful than destiny that goaded me to say yes.  He was clearly better than me, but I’ve never been one to accept a video game loss gracefully, so I challenged him to rematch after rematch until I didn’t look so much like a drug-addled Neanderthal with a muscle spasm in his arm.  From there we would casually pick it up from time to time, and as we got more into it, Max, being a baseball fan, suggested we keep track of some basic statistics, such as who won, which team won, etc.  I said that would be fine.  Little did I know what we had just gotten ourselves into.

The next chapter of the story is what happens when you let two young men with highly overactive imaginations try to apply statistics to a decidedly vague sports game.  I’ll be frank: I know a lot about Mario.  It’s an attractive trait, or so I’ve been told (by myself).  I would get a lot of satisfaction seeing Wario outdo Mario on his home turf, or Diddy Kong scoring a strong homerun against his buddy Donkey Kong.  From there, Max further suggested we spice up the stats a little bit by turning the game into a league set-up, with each designated team captain (Mario, Bowser, etc.) vying for the eventual World Series championship games.  He thought this would be a fun and engaging way to figure out which captain had the best team in the game, and I thought it would be a great way to attract women in a macho and alluring way.  At least one of us was right.

It began by Max writing up a schedule that was essentially an abridged version of an actual season calendar tailored to our purposes.  He also divided the 12 main captains into three conferences each grouped according to certain alliances.  For example, heroes such as Mario and Luigi made up Conference A, while Conference C was comprised of unsavory villains (i.e., Wario, Bowser, etc.). From there, we chronicled several stats for each game that one might commonly find on an average baseball website, from basics such as win/loss records and points for/against to more specific stats such as how a captain fared against a certain conference.

As for the standings themselves, the most thrilling arc of the season came from the battle for royal dominance between the fan-favorite Peach Monarchs team and the underdog Daisy Flowers. Peach led for the earlier half of the season by one win, but a critical loss to the Luigi Knights allowed Daisy an opening to eventually overtake the Monarchs for the number one seed in the World Series.  The number two seed went to Villain Conference newcomer Bowser Jr., who was able to edge out his father, the would-be tyrannical turtle Bowser, and the number three seed went to the Critter Conference champ, the Yoshi Eggs. Finally, despite being edged out by Daisy, Peach easily seized the Wild Card position with its number four seed.  The championship game was appropriately a duel between Peach and Daisy, with the Flowers besting the Monarchs in game four of the series.  The Flowers’ coach could not be reached for comment, and Daisy has likely taken a break in the interim to take care of all the royal duties she neglected while spending months abroad frivolously playing baseball.

A full three months and 16 simulated weeks of baseball later, we find ourselves with a sheet full of assorted statistics and a great deal more of free time.  It wasn’t quite the lady-killer I had thought, but being that it’s the closest thing to an organized sport FCLC has, it was definitely a memorable experience.  When all was said and done, Max ultimately bested me with 47 wins, beating me by two wins.  That being said, who was the mastermind behind Daisy’s victory?  I’m pleased to say, in the immortal words of Mario, “It’s a-me!”