MLB 2016 Changes

[Around the Horn]

I blame the Cubs for the blue on navy game last night. Cleveland's navy alts are really nice but those Cubs one's are yuck...

 

However if the Cubs are going to have an alternate, it should be something like this

[kroywen]

It is exceedingly rare, in baseball, for an alternate to be superior to a primary white or gray uniform, IMO. And I don't think either the Cubs or Indians alts come anywhere close to matching their respective teams' primary uniforms.

 

The Cubs' road uniform isn't great by any means, though I do think it unfairly gets some slack just because it's not half as iconic as their home uniforms. (I'd still replace it with an Ernie Banks-era road uni in a heartbeat, though.) But that blue alternate is nothing more than a batting practice top. The chest logo is mediocre and overly detailed and there's no piping at all on the uniform. An alternate with just a chest logo (or even a simple wordmark) and no piping at all looks like a BP top. Frankly, I've always found it to be one of the worst alternate in all of baseball.

 

The Indians' alternate isn't quite as bad, but the continued presence of silver piping, despite all other traces of silver being purged from their identity almost a decade ago, is mind boggling. And unlike most, I actually like the Indians' road uniform (though I also liked the "Cleveland" script uniform from the late 90's) - it's simple, but blue lettering with a red outline is a beautiful and surprisingly rare combo in baseball. It looks like a road uniform befitting a team as old as the Indians.

 

So you have one incredibly bland BP top going up against an indistinct alternate that bizarrely incorporates a part of the team's identity that was otherwise discarded years ago. Awful all around.

[BC985]

2 hours ago, SFGiants58 said:

At the same time, I can't really blame the Indians for not wanting to wear their road greys after they really dulled them down in 2011:

 

 

The navy alts at least have some color in them, and some degree of personality. The above is really bland, even by baseball's standards.

 

I really like the road grays. I think they have a classic old-time baseball look to them which is appropriate for a team that has been around as long as the Indians have been. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

[CitizenTino]

14 minutes ago, kroywen said:

The Indians' alternate isn't quite as bad, but the continued presence of silver piping, despite all other traces of silver being purged from their identity almost a decade ago, is mind boggling.

 

 

Since it was originally designated as a road alt when this set came out, I think it is supposed to be gray trim on the navy alt to match the gray pants--like what the Mets do. Not really a great idea, and it's even worse now that they wear it equally as often at home.

 

Ultimately, I don't mind the navy alt on the road for the Indians. That became their signature look in the playoffs in the '90s. Wearing white at home now would be nice, though.

[kroywen]

11 minutes ago, CitizenTino said:

 

Since it was originally designated as a road alt when this set came out, I think it is supposed to be gray trim on the navy alt to match the gray pants--like what the Mets do. Not really a great idea, and it's even worse now that they wear it equally as often at home.

 

Ultimately, I don't mind the navy alt on the road for the Indians. That became their signature look in the playoffs in the '90s. Wearing white at home now would be nice, though.

Yeah, once they started wearing it at home, the gray ceased to make any sense. Not that I really like gray for gray's sake (GFGS?  ) on the road either (especially hate it with the Mets), but at least it doesn't stand out like a sore thumb on the road.

[Ray Lankford]

Why does the Cubs alt jersey get knocked for not having piping but not the road jersey? And BP jerseys are exceedingly ornate now.

[Kramerica Industries]

I would generally agree that white jerseys at home should be the way to go; I tend to feel that way with all North American sports teams (even football to an extent, yeah). I don't agree with gray jerseys still needing to be the way road jerseys go, however; gray road jerseys originated in baseball's early days because teams didn't have access to washing facilities on the road as easily as they did at home, at least, so they felt, so they wore a color very similar to white but dark enough to cover up accumulated clay and grass and stuff like that. They served a purpose that no longer is necessary in today's world; they are vestiges of the past, which is fine, but when there are teams that tend to have preferred colored road alternates (the Marlins wearing black for the vast majority of their road games for the past who-knows-how-many-years is the most obvious example that comes to mind), as long as they aren't garish and ugly, I don't really mind. White is generally a part of every color scheme, generally out of necessity but also because it's a logical aesthetic color, but gray/silver isn't part of most team's color schemes, so in that sense, wearing gray uniforms wit only a splash of any team's actual color scheme doesn't always make a whole lot of sense to me.

[Ferdinand Cesarano]

4 hours ago, SFGiants58 said:

 

 

 

2 hours ago, Brandon9485 said:

I really like the road grays. I think they have a classic old-time baseball look to them which is appropriate for a team that has been around as long as the Indians have been. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

 

Right.  That uniform is essentially the same as this one:

 

That is the road uniform that they should be wearing.

 

[AnPheitseog]

I prefer the cursive script for Cleveland. 

 

I hope it they ditch Wahoo, they don't go block text at home. I also prefer script to block in general though. 

 

Orioles need to use the Baltimore white jersey from last year's reopening day as a regular home alt. I just love that jersey.

[Silent Wind of Doom]

7 hours ago, McCarthy said:

My crack at an Indians logo.

 

 

I've seen others do this before, but I wasn't in love with the execution. 

 

I've seen people do this with the upright feather and never found it very impressive, but this looks GREAT.  I'd love to see them do this.  It's worlds better than the C they're using now (and the outline is an added bonus).  I'd love to see the entire thing with a white outline on the road cap.

 

 

3 hours ago, Brandon9485 said:

 

I really like the road grays. I think they have a classic old-time baseball look to them which is appropriate for a team that has been around as long as the Indians have been. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

 

1 hour ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

Right.  That uniform is essentially the same as this one:

 

That is the road uniform that they should be wearing.

 

 

The difference between that and the current grays is that the old uniform has red lettering outlined in navy as opposed to navy outlined in red.  The old text pops more, whereas the predominantly navy wordmark doesn't stand out as much and feels drab.  On the Major League era home unis, the navy outlined in red looks great, because the navy pops against a white background.

 

 

Red on the away grays would do the same.

 

Since people are throwing in their opinions on the team's look, I'll join.  In my perfect world, the Indians would wear the script at home (It's unique, is featured prominantly on the park's scoreboard, and fits the character of the franchise), a red version of the Major League era serifed block on the road, and a navy alt with white piping and red shirt/socks.

 

 

[Sport]

44 minutes ago, Silent Wind of Doom said:

 

I've seen people do this with the upright feather and never found it very impressive, but this looks GREAT.  I'd love to see them do this.  It's worlds better than the C they're using now (and the outline is an added bonus).  I'd love to see the entire thing with a white outline on the road cap.

 

 

Thanks. Here's some cap mockups I threw together

 

I actually prefer the whole thing without an outline.  

 

[Ferdinand Cesarano]

18 minutes ago, McCarthy said:

 

Thanks. Here's some cap mockups I threw together

 

I actually prefer the whole thing without an outline.  

 

 

Those look nice.  Buuuuuut the use of the feather doesn't get us away from Native imagery.  While a pair of feathers is certainly not as overtly demeaning as the Wahoo face is, this logo would still suffer to some degree from the same flaw of the Wahoo logo, namely, using Native symbols.

So a new logo could not have depictions of feathers, tomahawks (even if one weren't being used by the Braves), moccasins, totem poles, tee-pees, or any other object associated with Native American people.  It will have to be solely letter-based.

 

<cough>     <cough>

[The_Admiral]

I told you already, that doesn't get them away from Native imagery either. Why do you suppose the Indians wore that style in the first place? because jagged carved-out letters looked good for a baseball team?

[8BW14]

45 minutes ago, McCarthy said:

 

Thanks. Here's some cap mockups I threw together

 

I actually prefer the whole thing without an outline.  

 

I agree. I think it looks sharp with out the outline. Not sure if I like the red or blue bill better though. I do think the blue hat could use a red squatchee though. 

[The_Admiral]

HOW. Me hit heaps big home runs! Great Spirit want me hit slider low and away. 

[Ferdinand Cesarano]

1 minute ago, the admiral said:

I told you already, that doesn't get them away from Native imagery either. Why do you suppose the Indians wore that style in the first place? because jagged carved-out letters looked good for a baseball team?

 

That font does not represent "Native imagery".  That cap and even the associated wordmark would be perfectly unobjectionable, as evidenced by the fact that they were used this season with no complaints by anyone.

[The_Admiral]

That lettering is pretty obviously supposed to look like some Indians carved it into a tree or something. Don't play dumb. You don't get to trash one but not the other.

[Ferdinand Cesarano]

10 minutes ago, the admiral said:

That lettering is pretty obviously supposed to look like some Indians carved it into a tree or something. Don't play dumb. You don't get to trash one but not the other.

 

I do in fact get to do exactly that.  

It's old West imagery.

[The_Admiral]

Old West Cleveland?

[Gothamite]

How on Earth does "Old West" for a team named Indians not evoke Native American iconography?