MLB: The Defunct Saga - Bibliography Added

[SFGiants58]

NEW ORLEANS WHITE SOX – Golden Gambit

 

Much like the Denver White Sox, this was the result of numerous parties’ interest in Bill Veeck’s White Sox. In this case, it was Ohio’s DeBartolo family. Edward DeBartolo Sr. already owned the Pittsburgh Penguins and racetracks in multiple states, including Louisiana. It was his multi-state holdings that formed a red flag for baseball. After the announcement of the $20 million purchase plan, DeBartolo Sr. let slip that he might move the team to New Orleans (despite promising to keep the team in Chicago).¹ According to the Chicago Sun-Times in August 1980:

 

Quote

There is also the possibility the DeBartolos, after a decent interval here, may try to move the White Sox to New Orleans where there is a Superdome and where the family has vast holdings. Less than a month ago, Edward Sr. in an interview published in New Orleans, revealed this was the intention, a remark later denied by Edward Jr., who said his father didn't know what he was talking about.²

 

This bit of damage control was not a positive sign. Commissioner Bowie Kuhn publicly called it out for not being local, perhaps remembering the White Sox nearly leaving the lucrative Chicago market a few times by this point. By October, DeBartolo’s bid failed to gain the approval of the American League owners and failed 8-6 (two votes shy).³ Jerry Reinsdorf and Bill Farley would eventually buy the team, while the DeBartolo’s would never own a baseball team. But what if the purchase had gone through and the White Sox moved to the Superdome?

 

This is an adaptation of my Florida White Sox design, using the same font (Caniste Semibold) and “SOX” logo. Black and Old Gold are the colors, for a vintage Saints kind of look. The standard secondary logo also carries over.

 

The uniforms emphasize the cuff stripes and have contrast-colored NOB’s.

 

 

Alternates include a black “SOX” jersey (emphasizing white lettering) and a black/gold recolor of the 1959 home uniform.

 

 

 

The jacket uses a new “White Sox” wordmark (because I like using the full team name on the jacket for them).

 

 

It’s not that much of a departure from previous Sox designs, but it’s still a fun take on the team. Also, if one wants to see what Superdome baseball looked like:

 

 

It’s Kingdome-tier garbage, sadly.

 

Up next, the last few stragglers before the final set!

 

¹ Randy Minkoff, “Edward DeBartolo Sr.’s Bid to Purchase the Chicago White...,” UPI, October 24, 1980, https://www.upi.com/Archives/1980/10/24/Edward-DeBartolo-Srs-bid-to-purchase-the-Chicago-White/9801341208000/.

 

² Chicago Sun-Times, “White Sox Latest Addition to DeBartolo Fold,” The Vidette, August 25, 1980.

 

³ Minkoff, “Edward DeBartolo Sr.’s Bid to Purchase the Chicago White...”

 

[sky1324]

Loving that NOLA Sox (NoSox?) set! I'm a sucker for the Saints' old colors and it works great on the home and road here. Not feeling the black alt as much because of the back seat gold takes but it works as an alternate. Looking forward to the last few sets of the series!

[coco1997]

When I first read about the NOLA White Sox possibility, I almost immediately began thinking about how you might design them if you decided to include them in this project. The funny thing is, my ideas wound up being VERY close to what you came up with (exact same shade of gold and very similar color balance) save for a few small differences:

 

- I thought it would work to resurrect Chicago's 1936-38 jersey logo but in Saints' old gold:

 

 

I also would keep the 1976-81 team's Tuscan style numbers in gold with black trim:

 

I thought of using triple headspoon and sleeve piping (a la the New Orleans Pelicans) like this...

 

...and the road set would have a radially arched "NEW ORLEANS" in Tuscan style lettering. 

As much as I LOVE your NOLA White Sox concept, I think these tweaks would help differentiate the design a bit more from your previous relocated Sox proposals while maintaining your same basic idea. Fantastic work as always!

[raz]

How about a gold "White Sox" alt? I like how the words look on the jacket. 

[MilSox]

I know you were trying to get a little more creative than just swapping out the silver elements on their current unis with gold (brass?) ones, but I honesty think that's all that's needed here. Maybe just replace the current emblems with your NOLA-ified ones since they look just as good.

[coco1997]

On 12/17/2021 at 12:47 PM, QCS said:

Not feeling the black alt as much because of the back seat gold takes but it works as an alternate.

An easy fix for this would be to make the numbers and monogram on the alt gold with white trim.

[SFGiants58]

On 12/17/2021 at 1:27 PM, coco1997 said:

When I first read about the NOLA White Sox possibility, I almost immediately began thinking about how you might design them if you decided to include them in this project. The funny thing is, my ideas wound up being VERY close to what you came up with (exact same shade of gold and very similar color balance) save for a few small differences:

 

- I thought it would work to resurrect Chicago's 1936-38 jersey logo but in Saints' old gold:

 

 

I also would keep the 1976-81 team's Tuscan style numbers in gold with black trim:

 

I thought of using triple headspoon and sleeve piping (a la the New Orleans Pelicans) like this...

 

...and the road set would have a radially arched "NEW ORLEANS" in Tuscan style lettering. 

As much as I LOVE your NOLA White Sox concept, I think these tweaks would help differentiate the design a bit more from your previous relocated Sox proposals while maintaining your same basic idea. Fantastic work as always!

On 12/17/2021 at 2:24 PM, ralphz said:

How about a gold "White Sox" alt? I like how the words look on the jacket. 

On 12/18/2021 at 5:45 PM, NicDB said:

I know you were trying to get a little more creative than just swapping out the silver elements on their current unis with gold (brass?) ones, but I honesty think that's all that's needed here. Maybe just replace the current emblems with your NOLA-ified ones since they look just as good.

On 12/17/2021 at 11:47 AM, QCS said:

Loving that NOLA Sox (NoSox?) set! I'm a sucker for the Saints' old colors and it works great on the home and road here. Not feeling the black alt as much because of the back seat gold takes but it works as an alternate. Looking forward to the last few sets of the series!

10 hours ago, coco1997 said:

An easy fix for this would be to make the numbers and monogram on the alt gold with white trim.

 

Thanks folks! I've got some experiments with your ideas, which I found really worked within the color scheme. First up, @coco1997's more Tuscan-oriented design:

 

 

 

I've also got @NicDB's Blackletter design, @ralphz's gold jersey, and @QCS's black jersey.

 

(Image with incorrect numbers here)

 

Good suggestions all around, folks!

 

Up next, the final few "fun" designs, including the last of the Athletics.

 

[coco1997]

YES! The Tuscan style, ‘36-38 logo NOLA Sox are perfect! Exactly what I wanted. And good call to flip the colors on the piping and go black-gold-black; that’s definitely an improvement. Can I bug you to go all the way and whip up a black alt in that style as well?

[SFGiants58]

31 minutes ago, coco1997 said:

YES! The Tuscan style, ‘36-38 logo NOLA Sox are perfect! Exactly what I wanted. And good call to flip the colors on the piping and go black-gold-black; that’s definitely an improvement. Can I bug you to go all the way and whip up a black alt in that style as well?

 

Thanks and sure thing!

 

 

 

I included both colorations, because I wasn't sure which one worked best (I prefer gold with white outlines).

[coco1997]

8 hours ago, SFGiants58 said:

 

Thanks and sure thing!

 

 

 

I included both colorations, because I wasn't sure which one worked best (I prefer gold with white outlines).

Thanks! I can’t decide which coloration I prefer, either. The white numbers and logos feel more “White Sox,” but the other version makes better use of the gold. They both look great.

[raz]

Looks nice, thanks for listening! 

[mcrosby]

I'd love to see a "NOLA" or "Nola" in the style of the diagonal "Sox" logo. 

[SFGiants58]

3 hours ago, mcrosby said:

I'd love to see a "NOLA" or "Nola" in the style of the diagonal "Sox" logo. 

You betcha!

 

I should use this font if I do a Pelicans or Saints concept.

[mcrosby]

I had meant  interlocking letters, but this looks pretty great too. 

[SFGiants58]

7 hours ago, mcrosby said:

I had meant  interlocking letters, but this looks pretty great too. 

 

Ah, that makes sense. It's good, but I don't think it looks as good as the separate letters.

 

 

[sky1324]

Yeah, I think four letters is too much for an interlocking logo.

[SFGiants58]

Yeah, the interlock is a bit more messy with four letters. Still, I'd say it was a worthy experiment.

 

TORONTO GIANTS addendum - Righting a Render

 

 

When Marc Craig published his article, "Baseball weaves history into its uniforms — even for the Toronto Giants," the one thing that stuck out to me was the description of a potential Toronto Giants uniform that was different from the well-known "TG" image:

 

 

 

Rather, it was more of an evolution of the Giants' 1973-76 set (classic lettering and orange outlined in black).

 

 

To quote the article:

 

Quote

“There was never much thought given to being creative or Canadian,” recalled Richard Walker, the designer who was tasked with adapting a traditional look. The Giants’ familiar orange and black wordmark, which had origins dating back to the team’s years in New York, was modified slightly so that the letters “G” and “S” were enlarged. That created a natural space above for the addition of the word “Toronto.” The orange cap insignia, formerly an interlocking “SF” arranged diagonally, was changed to a “TG.”¹

 

The article also included a render, which can charitably be called "rough."

 

 

The 1983-93 template and number font are exceptionally anachronistic, while the "TG" looks downright haphazard. Also, the arching on "Toronto" seems like it was done on individual letters as opposed to a single line of text. I'm sure there is a better way to render this design, one that is more accurate to the original concepts.

 

I opted to use the Pantone values of the 1973-76 Giants (a paler orange than the current #fa4616 of the Giants), while also adjusting the '1977-82 cap logo (and my previous Toronto "G" reclamation) to be a diagonal "TG" - resembling the structure of the blue/green logo.

 

 

The uniforms use a recreation of the Giants' '73-'76 varsity block font, using the Bill Henderson guide as a reference.² The wordmarks use the original wordmark renders, alongside a modified Ocean Beach rendering of "Toronto."

 

 

While it's nice, I still prefer my more Canadian-looking design.

 

 

The maple leaf-T, despite being mildly similar to University of Toronto's design (except not at all), is still one of my favorite designs from this series.

 

I still have no idea about the blue/green Toronto Giants designs or where it came from originally. Was it a temporary design or a rejected prototype? Either way, it's time to make a few things from it in a pre-'97 Blue Jays style.

 

 

 

Those logos still look bad, but the colors are very good-looking.

 

Up next, the last of the A's.

 

¹ Marc Carig, “Baseball Weaves History into Its Uniforms — Even for the Toronto Giants,” The Athletic, April 27, 2020, https://archive.md/JYy3B.

 

² William F. Henderson, Game Worn Guide to MLB Jerseys: (1970–2017), Eighth (Philadelphia, PA: Aardvark Publishing, 2017), 3398.

[coco1997]

The blue and green works really nicely on the powder blue road set. Nice work!

[SFGiants58]

ALASKA, HAWAII, AND MONTRÉAL ATHLETICS - Because why the f--k not?

 

This is my little LOLJK idea because given the 20 proposed relocations and 2 actual relocations of the A's, it wouldn't be surprising if this stupidity happened. It allowed me to have a little fun, especially with the color side of things.

 

Alaska Athletics - trees and the sun

 

I wanted to revisit the Forest Green/Sky Blue/Athletic Gold color scheme for this one, while incorporating the forest motif. For a bit of fun, I emphasized yellow-gold on this design. The "apostrophe s" goes away, because of the city and team name having the same initial.

 

 

Hawaii Athletics - Colorfully Classy

 

Using a modified version of my Los Angeles Athletics design, I incorporated the colors and symbols of the Kanaka Maoli - the "native Hawaiian flag" (it is deeply apocryphal and arguably a controversial symbol). It also might be controversial to spell Hawaii as Hawai'i, but I prefer the latter.

 

 

Montréal Athletics - reskin kin

 

This one is a simple recolor of the elephant, new "Montréal" and "Athlétisme" (an appropriate French translation) scripts, and the template of the alternate Expos concepts. There's no "apostrophe s" due to the language laws in Quebec.

 

 

While I like all three of them, I do prefer the Hawaii design. It was a good experiment in balancing colors and doing a cool heraldic design. Now, that leads me to the final Athletics concept I ever want to do for a long time - the compilations of primary logos. road wordmarks, and blackletter insignias!

 

(I tweaked the Milwaukee A’s logo to remove the visible knee.)

 

 

One can see how I got so frustrated with doing concepts about this team throughout the series.

 

Up next, the story and first design of the final concept in The Defunct Saga!

 

[Dalcowboyfan92]

50 minutes ago, SFGiants58 said:

ALASKA, HAWAII, AND MONTRÉAL ATHLETICS - Because why the f--k not?

 

Charlie O. rises from the grave and reveals that this was his plan all along, Austin guys.

 

The ultimate Charlie O. Finley move. Nobody saw it coming; not even Charlie.