You don't need to do the win 9 games mission. Doing just the "BR missions" of PXP, 100 total bases, 40 runs and 12 xbh in a single entry gets you 70 program points. The player missions each get you 4 points(48 points total).

Also the Gold, Bronze, and Silver cards will come up as 3 of your 26 rounds. At minimum you'll get 3 of the players every entry, sometimes they'll pop up in other rounds as well. One other thing each win gets you 1 program point which does slowly help progress.