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While I don't like the trend in video games, I do understand it from both sides. There is something addictive about collecting players/cards, buying/selling, opening packs, etc. And if I was a bit younger and playing online more, I'd probably be much more into it. The only sports game I've really grinded out is The Show and that's just because I find grinding in that to be somewhat relaxing and it's not tied that deep into the online play.
And from a developer standpoint, I get it too. You don't really need to improve gameplay, AI, or franchise modes that take up a lot of resources. Sports games really haven't evolved much in that regard in over a decade. So you're still capturing most of the people who just want to play any sports game while maximizing the spend of the percent who will buy cards. Whatever that saying is about 10% of your customers will make up 90% of your revenue probably applies to these games.
Sports games are mostly dead from a simulation aspect. That's been something that started with the Madden exclusive license. But I still contend you can find a lot of really good PC games (non-sports) that don't run like that. People just seem too caught up in AAA console games and ignore a ton of really good options made by medium to small studios that are aimed at specific audiences.
One positive is I do think there has been some pushback against "online" for every single game. Fallout 76 caused enough anger that they more or less re-developed it. RDR2 saw their online mode bomb. Everyone tried to copy the success of GTA Online but are finding out that's not an easy task. So I do think we'll see more games shift toward single-player mode.
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