Baseball Reflections Product Review: ABC Sports-Sports Master

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This product claims that sports fans can “resolve nearly any sports argument with the push of a button.” While this may not be completely true, the Sports Master does provide a unique way to test one’s knowledge of sports while on the move.

While the baseball trivia is no doubt in depth, it also features trivia from other sports including basketball, football, hockey, golf, auto-racing, tennis and boxing.

The Sports Master comes in a convenient size that can easily fit in the palm of a hand and seems to be perfect for occupying one’s self on trips in the car or plane.

In addition to featuring trivia, the sports master as a few other parts that a sports fan can use to expand their knowledge. One of those sections is entitled “Bios” which is “a source of brief biographical sketches on famous sports personalities.” The bios are reached in alphabetical order by last name and include most of the household names (and many more) from the sports listed above. It also includes personalities from off the field as Melvin Allen Israel is listed in this section as the voice of the New York Yankees from 1939-1964.

Another facet that the program features is one entitled “Facts & Stats” where statistics are listed for each of the sports. After choosing baseball, it asks the user to choose whether they would want facts from the Major Leagues or from NCAA Champions. After picking the Major League option, the user has the ability to chose between different topics ranging from franchise shifts (where one will find that in 1953 the Boston Braves became the Milwaukee Braves), to hitting records (which reports that Pete Rose is the career leader in at bats with 14,053), to honors (where one can find the roster of the All Century Dream Team).

With the way these categories are broken down, it seems that there is easily enough knowledge, simply in the baseball section of this product to keep one occupied for quite some time.

Highlights are also listed on the main menu and this part lists all major sports highlights that have happened in the last 10 years in addition to having a transcript of Bob Costas listing his 25 most important sports moments of the 20^th century.

This hand held device also features the main rules for all of the sports listed above. In addition to having the rules, it also lists who has been credited with coming up with the game (in baseball’s case, Abner Doubleday is named) and even state the objective of the contest.

Also featured in this device is what is called a “stadium finder” where fans can find statistics about and the exact locations of their favorite sports venues. When looking up a baseball stadium, the Sports Master spits out statistics such as what year the stadium was built, the exact address of the stadium, what the surface of the outfield is made of and what the dimensions of the outfield are.

All in all, this device is pretty interesting, especially with all of the information it is able to provide from the size that it is. Perhaps the makers could have found a better way to display the information, as it is hard to read at times, but overall most sports fans should find this a decent use of their time.

The Grade: 3.5/5

Bill Jordan is a contributor to BaseballReflections.com. He can be reached by e-mail at [email protected].