jigokusabre

I think would have been a really sharp look for the 2003-2011 Marlins.

The sleeve piping is a bit much, but I really like the teal lettering on the gray jersey.

That's nice, where'd you find that? Was that supposed to be a real jersey at one point or is that just a fashion jersey?

It's a prototype jersey from Russell. The name on the back is "PLAYER - 5." I picked it up off of eBay a few years back. I considered having the jersey re-named/numbered, but decided to leave it as-is.

I think would have been a really sharp look for the 2003-2011 Marlins.

The sleeve piping is a bit much, but I really like the teal lettering on the gray jersey.

That's nice, where'd you find that? Was that supposed to be a real jersey at one point or is that just a fashion jersey?

My first thought was Asian knockoff, because of the character wordmark.

Yeah, I though it was a good idea to watermark my jersey photos. I'm not sure why, now...

I think would have been a really sharp look for the 2003-2011 Marlins.

The sleeve piping is a bit much, but I really like the teal lettering on the gray jersey.

Seems appropriate, given today's news... I present to you, Astros legend Yogi Berra:

Terry Crews, best known for being "that guy from the Old Spice commercials."

Did anyone get Canseco as a Expo?

Eddie Mathews

That's a good one. I had no idea. He actually played for the Boston Braves and the Houston Astros; wow.

The Tigers, too.

Yikes. I didn't want to use this year's attendance to back up my statement, but this situation isn't going to clean up.

So, you didn't want to use relevant facts to back up something you said. Makes sense.

Well the relevant facts are these:

1. Marlins Park is 1 year old

2. Loria cannot sell the team until 2015 without giving a chunk of it back to the city of Miami.

I don't think that Loria is even leasing the stadium... I cannot find any information on lease terms for the stadium. In either case, Loria is pocketing literally every dollar than comes into the park. It's not as if he's going to get a sweeter deal anywhere else. The Marlins are staying put for the foreseeable future.

I think the Marlins are pretty safe. They won 2 WS titles and were 18th in attendance last year.

Then Loria went Loria and sold off the roster for Jeff Mathis and some magic beans. Now they're 29th in attendance (27th by percentage of capacity). I agree that their new stadium will keep the Marlins in town in the short term.

Just for fun...

I think it makes more sense to have the Expos in the NL East and move the Nationals into the AL East. Baseball in DC has always been an AL affair, and the Expos are an NL team.

Omaha - Too small, I think.

Montreal - While I would love to see the Expos again, I'd rather it not be as an AL team.

Orlando - I would rather see the Rays leave Florida.

San Antonio - Three teams in Texas?

Portland - AAA left because of player apathy

Las Vegas - Objectively the best choice. I never understood the whole fear of Vegas, considering that gambling could just as easily corrupt any team.

Charlotte - Habitually incapable of supporting teams.

Nashville - I think that Memphis might be a better choice. Anyhow, baseball in underrepresented in the American South.

Newark - Like the Mets don't have enough problems.

Long shots - I would like to see a team in Mexico or PR... but I don't see it happening.

Raleigh/Durham is another option.

I think the Rays can be successful in Tampa Bay, however; they shouldn't build a giant, cavernous stadium like their fellow Florida-ites the Marlins did.

Uh.... What? Marlins park is literally the smallest park in the MLB in terms of capacity. Or are you talking about OF dimensions? If so, then I think that a pitchers park would fit far better into the Ray's style of play than a band-box like Citizen's Bank.

Any NFL jersey is "wrong" for Tebow.

My unpopular opinion, modern over traditional uniforms.

ESPECIALLY for modern teams. The Astros in a 1950s looking uniform is just plain silly.

i completely forgot this ever happened

Also, the rest of the 1997 Cleveland Indians:

Kenny Lofton

He was actually traded to Atlanta before the '97 season for Grissom and Justice haha.

A lot of people forget, because he ended up in Cleveland for the 1998 season via free agency.

I thought that was a mid-season trade

*checks Wikipedia*

Oh well...

i completely forgot this ever happened

Also, the rest of the 1997 Cleveland Indians:

Jim Thome

Omar Vizquel

Roberto Alomar

Sandy Alomar

Kenny Lofton

Oh yeah, and of course, there's:

Mark Grace - Arizona Diamondbacks

Mark Grace - Maricopa County Jail

Speaking of the D-Backs:

Troy Glaus:

Matt Williams:

I agree the black was completely unnecessary, and just junked up the whole look, but to me, the dark red was just as bad of a decision. How anybody could prefer it to the classic cherry red is beyond me.

What a period for NFL uniforms... logo on the sleeves? Check. Repeat logo on hip? Check. Add black? Check. Darken primary color? Check. Add in oversized drop shadow numbers and you have a textbook example of full-blown 90's nonsense.

The color darkening is something I associate with the turn of the century, personally. That's about the time the Patriots, Jets, Bills, Sehawks, Rams,and Titans/Oilers "went dark."

The Pats have played the Panthers a number of times, but only once in their Big Elvis jerseys.

Montreal Expos vs. Oakland A's... 3 games only.

Florida Marlins vs. Montreal Expos, 2004

The Marlins and Expos are both in the NL East, so they played each other a ton between 2003-2005. Now, the Expos vs. the Tampa Bay Devil Rays... THAT would be a good choice.

I don't buy counterfeits because I am pretty particular about fonts, numbers, and materials. At the same time, if I did choose to buy them, I wouldn't feel bad about it in the least. The designers definitely deserve to be compensated, obviously, but when you have companies like Nike (as 9erssteve pointed out) paying their labor 25 cents an hour to sew $10 worth of fabric together, they deserve to be screwed. It isn't even about the base cost, because there's a price to be paid for quality, and I don't mind paying it, as I have around 20 authentic NHL jerseys, some of which are 20 years old. My problem lies with the labor.

Yes, they do have the authority to charge whatever they want for a jersey. In a lot of cases, the costs are going up while quality goes down (see: Edge 1.0). No problem...I can vote with my wallet and just not buy it. But seriously, people here get high and mighty about Nike not getting their money, but no one cares that they're paying a 10 year old Asian kid 10 cents an hour with no bathroom breaks to make them. So let's get off of the high horse. If you're going to be up in arms about Nike or Adidas not getting their money, you should also be pissed about their labor practices.

Where do you think the Chinese fakes are made?

Hint: it's not in Germany

What's more, companies can be pressured into improving the conditions of their factories and the integrity of their supply chain. Nike has not exactly turned their factories into day-spas... but they have done a lot more than you can expect of counterfeiters.

I think that the 1987 Topps set is the ultimate source for baseball "wrong uniforms."

...in reality...it would seem the Marlins have the most one year players of any franchise.

I'm going to guess that the Yankees would win that competition.

High costs are an excellent reason not to buy authentic jersey... but they are not a reason to buy fake jerseys. There are a plethora of options available for those reasonable enough not to spend $300 on a shirt.

1. Buy jerseys on sale. This doesn't help MUCH (10-20% usually) but there it is. Personally, I was able to get the new Marlins jerseys at 40% off about half-way through 2012.

2. Buy lower tier jerseys. It is an infinitely more authentic statement of fandom to wear a legitimate replica than a fake "authentic." I still have and wear some of my replicas.

3. Buy closeouts and second-hand jerseys. When teams trade players, change manufacturers or update their jerseys, they liquidate their existing backstock... which allows fans to get legitimate jerseys are more reasonable prices (I have a silver Patriots Alt that I paid ~$85 for). Authentic blank baseball jerseys can be had for ~$30.

4. Buy game used jerseys. If you're talking about jerseys from non-star players, you can actually get them cheaper than retail authentics (again, this is especially true in baseball).

Would lowering the price of jerseys cut down on counterfeiting? Probably not. Any feasible reduction would not likely attract any more customers who would otherwise buy fakes for ~$60. What would address some of the problems is making the process more dexterous. The NFL did not have Tim Tebow jerseys in 2011, so when his popularity peaked at the end of the 2011 season... every Bronco fan wore a fake because that's all that was available. The same is true of Colin Kaepernick in 2012.

I think that the ideal solution to counterfeiting would be re-introducing competition in the market. Let teams determine their own manufacturers (maybe restrict it to 2-3 authorized vendors)... so that you can have the manufacturers compete for your dollars. If Nike cannot make a Colin Kaepernick jersey before Adidas, then they lose out on that business. If Reebok's quality cannot match Nike's, they lose out on sales. If Adidas jerseys cost too much, then they lose out on sales to others.

i've also downloaded a few albums in my life, and downloaded a movie that i just as well could have rented...

I've thought about this a couple times before. Does it make someone a hypocrite to download music while chastising someone for buying a knockoff jerseys?

Short answer: No!

Long answer: Musician, both on major and independent levels, make the vast majority of the money from things other than music sales. They get so little money from stuff sold in stores or online. Merchandise sales, record sales at shows, and shows themselves bring in far more money. Hell, I know of several musicians/bands that tell their fans to download and if they want to help out the band, buy merch/tickets.

Do designers have the ability to go on tour and sell merch/tickets to make money? No.

I have a question. Do designers make royalties for the number of jerseys sold? And I so does it vary from company to company?

Designers are paid for their work. From that point, the team owns all the rights to the logo/jersey/wordmark.

Media is an experience. You watch the movie, play the video game, read the book, listen to the music. The only reason to have the disc (or purchase the iTunes license) is as a vehicle for acquiring the media. Copies of that media are functionally the same no matter how that copy is acquired. An iTunes mp3 is exactly the same as a ripped mp3 from a CD. There's no loss of authenticity when you copy it (because all versions of a CD/DVD are simply copies anyway).

We can get into the ethics of spending money to support orginizations, but it misses the point. My argument isn't morality, it's about authenticity.

A jersey is a phyiscal thing that either is authentic, or it is not. Either it was made by Nike (or Reebok or Majestic) or is was not. It either uses the official wordmarks, logos, number designs, or it does not. Even if a jersey was expertly crafted by invested artisans with high-quality materials (and let's face it, they are not), it will never have authenticity. If you don't want to pay for authentic jerseys (and let me stress, $300 for essentially a shirt IS insane), then you can still get authentic gear. They sell shirts and replica jerseys and caps an all sorts of other things you can wear that say "I'm a fan of [insert team here]."

The only thing that a fake jersey can do that a simple t-shirt cannot is say, "I am such a fan that I spent $300 on this jersey." Which is (of course) not true. That is the essence of being a phoney.