Milwaukee Brewers 2020 Logo/Uniforms

[itsmb8]

2 hours ago, Ice_Cap said:

Spoiler

 

To expand on this...

I like a lot of the ideas on display, but nothing gels together. I'm sure someone will call these "nitpicks," but whatever. It's a public message board.

 

I don't like the navy. Someone keeps trying to compare this to the Astros' rebrand, and no. The Astros' original look the current identity references used navy. The Brewers are trying to reference a uniform set that used athletic gold and royal blue, but they've shifted the royal to navy. It's a downgrade. It looks bland in the Brewers' case. The royal the set does feature is used so sparingly that it adds nothing. (A)

 

The updated ball in glove isn't that great, and the one update that would have made it nicer (the barley baseball) wasn't included. I was never the biggest ball in glove fan, but it's been robbed of all of its charm. And maybe it's just me, but the new navy ball in glove on a navy hat looks REALLY bland. The gold-panelled alternate cap is worse in that it's just ugly. (B)

 

The road alternate script is atrocious. I've seen plenty of bad handwriting in my day, but I've never seen writing that transforms from serifed text to cursive script at the horizontal division. (C)

 

The uniforms lack some unifying factors. The pinstriped homes lack cuff piping. The road greys have it. The alternate cream homes have it, but it's a different pattern than the road greys. The road navy alternate has it in (I think) the style of the road greys, but the colours aren't altered so it functionally looks like a third distinct style of sleeve piping. (D)

 

The utter lack of uniformity across all elements. I touched on this above, but it's a problem that covers both jerseys and logos. The jerseys feature a terrible "Milwaukee" script on the road alternate and block "MILWAUKEE" text on the road primary. That doesn't match. The above-mentioned sleeve piping doesn't match. The logos are all over the place. The primary is completely unnecessary. The beer barrel man, as nice as he is, doesn't appear on anything, making him unnecessary. The ball in glove logos feature a baseball that's distinct from the stand-alone barley baseball. The Wisconsin alternate is....also there?

Logo-wise the team is all over the place. They really only need two, maybe three, logos. (E)

 

All in all? It's better than what they had, but it's far from perfect. It seems like the team was divided on whether they wanted to go with the inaugural beer barrel man/block M identity or the latter ball in glove identity. Someone should have taken charge with a decision one way or the other, but instead we got an identity with too many disparate elements all fighting for space.

 

Everything looks fine on its own, but the whole set isn't coming together for me. Probably because it's made out of elements from different identities with no real effort to make it a cohesive package.

 

 

 

 

As I can see, it doesnt look like youre a Brewers fan, so ill explain the reasoning of these design elements, if you dont already know the history.

 

A)  Everyone knew they were gonna go with navy and athletic gold.  Royal and yellow, to me, is just way too 80s, and if they were gonna use royal and yellow people would just hate on anything unless it was exactly what they had in the 80s.  That would never happen, because its now the 2020s.  The royal is there just to nod to the original inspiration, the "OG Brewers look."

 

B ) Almost everyone prefers the OG BiG too, but they have shown their reasoning to the change, and although i too hated it at first, its still the BiG and doesnt look that different.  I would say something about your comment of not liking the logo itself, but it would just start a mini-argument so I'll refrain.

 

C) I agree here, but theres still a lot of people that like it I guess.  Although I have a feeling that jersey wont last too long...

 

D) Every uniform is supposed to be different, because each is trying to take elements from different eras.  The home cream is taking inspiration from the Pilots look with the cream color.  The road gray is taking inspiration from the most recent look with the sleeve piping.  The pinstripe jersey is obviously taking inspiration from the 80s home jersey.  And the navy road alt jersey is taking inspiration from the Motre Bame look with the placket piping.  Also, the sleeve piping on the navy jersey matches what the M-wheat navy jerseys used too.

 

E)  Again, they're trying to make each part of the rebrand pay homage to each of the past looks to appease ALL fans.  It's honestly the Brewer Way at this point.  And personally, I would argue each logo complements one another well, aside from the barleyball.  But at the same time, the barleyball is a direct nickname logo, so that logo is somewhat needed too.

 

Basically a lot of the criticism I see from people is that the rebrand is all over the place and doesnt stick to one specific thing, but thats kinda the point.  They wanted to throw it back to ALL of their past brandings while trying to keep it all cohesive enough.  But the jerseys are just a different story because they (most likely) wanted a different look for each so fans would all like at least one of them.

 

 

 

 

[tp49]

7 minutes ago, itsmb8 said:

 

E)  Again, they're trying to make each part of the rebrand pay homage to each of the past looks to appease ALL fans.  It's honestly the Brewer Way at this point.  And personally, I would argue each logo complements one another well, aside from the barleyball.  But at the same time, the barleyball is a direct nickname logo, so that logo is somewhat needed too.

Most of the time when you try to appease everyone you end up pleasing no one that might be part of the problem here.

[itsmb8]

1 hour ago, tp49 said:

Most of the time when you try to appease everyone you end up pleasing no one that might be part of the problem here.

 

Luckily the rebrand has been extremely well received then.  Well, except on here 

[Gothamite]

4 hours ago, itsmb8 said:

As I can see, it doesnt look like youre a Brewers fan, so ill explain the reasoning of these design elements, if you dont already know the history.

 

Again we’re reduced to questioning qualifications.

 

I am a Brewers fan. I’ve written hundreds of thousands of words about the history. I’ve even worked with the Brewers on throwback events in the past, including pitches for the 2020 season. Utter modesty forbids me to list my full CV, but I’ll put it up against anybody’s.  So kindly don’t Brewsplain us, good sir.

 

@Ice_Cap is perfectly correct - the new uniform set is disjointed and confused. It’s a whole bunch of disparate elements without a real cohesion. We all understand that they’re trying to be many things at once. But as often happens in the case, that means they aren’t doing the biggest things well.

 

Of course this is being well-received; look what it’s replacing. Virtually anything would have been an improvement. But some of us were hoping they could clear a slightly higher bar in the process than “somewhat less terrible”.  

[OnWis97]

Good story about the original BiG

 

https://www.jsonline.com/story/sports/mlb/brewers/2019/11/18/eau-claire-art-student-made-milwaukee-brewers-ball-glove-logo/4202151002/?fbclid=IwAR3yDTVqAuXWPqqep3wjNlavPp7cB2fKyRnIG6RkFsdMgO3nVRTXLhRPdQs

 

[MilSox]

6 hours ago, Gothamite said:

 

Again we’re reduced to questioning qualifications.

 

I am a Brewers fan. I’ve written hundreds of thousands of words about the history. I’ve even worked with the Brewers on throwback events in the past, including pitches for the 2020 season. Utter modesty forbids me to list my full CV, but I’ll put it up against anybody’s.  So kindly don’t Brewsplain us, good sir.

 

@Ice_Cap is perfectly correct - the new uniform set is disjointed and confused. It’s a whole bunch of disparate elements without a real cohesion. We all understand that they’re trying to be many things at once. But as often happens in the case, that means they aren’t doing the biggest things well.

 

Of course this is being well-received; look what it’s replacing. Virtually anything would have been an improvement. But some of us were hoping they could clear a slightly higher bar in the process than “somewhat less terrible”.  

See, this is why you're getting so much push back. "Somewhat less terrible" would be if they trotted out those god awful "Cheers" scripts again, but minus the drop shadows.

Even those of us with reservations about the Brewers rebrand can admit they got more right than they didn't.  That alone takes this safely out of "terrible" territory.

[shstpt1]

I wonder how the hat would have looked had the embroidery style been more like the BP hats, where the outline would have been the raised embroidery and the rest of the logo remained relatively flat. I feel like that would definitely help it stand out against the background a little better, which is one of my biggest complaints to this set

[Gothamite]

1 hour ago, NicDB said:

See, this is why you're getting so much push back. "Somewhat less terrible" would be if they trotted out those god awful "Cheers" scripts again, but minus the drop shadows.

Even those of us with reservations about the Brewers rebrand can admit they got more right than they didn't.  That alone takes this safely out of "terrible" territory.

 

Eh, I don't mind the pushback.   

 

From my own perspective, the wasted opportunity makes a thoroughly mediocre set something more akin to terrible.  Just because they're replacing gods-awful doesn't make them any better.

 

They're close to a really good set.  So very close.  But yet far enough in enough ways that the cumulative effect is quite far from it.  They don't just need a tweak or two, they need easily a half-dozen at least.

[IceCap]

18 hours ago, itsmb8 said:

As I can see, it doesnt look like youre a Brewers fan

An outsider's perspective is often helpful Regardless, @Gothamite agrees and he is a Brewers fan so you know. I don't think I'm out to lunch on this one.

 

18 hours ago, itsmb8 said:

A)  Everyone knew they were gonna go with navy and athletic gold.  Royal and yellow, to me, is just way too 80s, and if they were gonna use royal and yellow people would just hate on anything unless it was exactly what they had in the 80s.  That would never happen, because its now the 2020s.  The royal is there just to nod to the original inspiration, the "OG Brewers look."

I don't buy that royal blue and athletic gold would be "too 80s." The trend to darken and mute colours started in the very late 80s, picked up steam in the 90s, and was full-blown by the 2000s. Since then? The "we need to darken our colours" fad has fallen by the wayside and teams are now experimenting with bright, vibrant colours again. I don't buy for a second that royal blue and athletic gold would look dated in 2020. Hell, it's the LA Rams' best look! If anything the Brewers' insistence on holding onto navy makes them look dated, as it still looks like they're slaves to late 90s/early 00s design trends.

 

18 hours ago, itsmb8 said:

B ) Almost everyone prefers the OG BiG too, but they have shown their reasoning to the change, and although i too hated it at first, its still the BiG and doesnt look that different. 

I don't give one ounce of credence to design-speak when it comes to justifying anything. Sure, they gave their reasons, but that doesn't make the reasoning good.

 

18 hours ago, itsmb8 said:

D) Every uniform is supposed to be different, because each is trying to take elements from different eras...
E)  Again, they're trying to make each part of the rebrand pay homage to each of the past looks to appease ALL fans...
Basically a lot of the criticism I see from people is that the rebrand is all over the place and doesnt stick to one specific thing, but thats kinda the point. 

So the point is that nothing matches? No, sorry.
"We intentionally created a muddled, crowded identity with too many competing elements on purpose" doesn't make that approach good. It's a jumbled mess of elements that all work on their own but have no cohesion.

[MilSox]

I’ve alluded to this before, but now I feel particularly compelled to speak in defense of the Brewers logo set. I get why people have a distaste for the practice of taking logos from different eras, giving them a common colorway, and calling that an identity package. Thanks especially to NBA teams abusing it for so long.

But the BiG, Barrell Man, and the Wisconsin outline patch all have more than enough historical cache to justify being part of this or any future Brewers identity package. Is it the conveniently streamlined identity that many feel they should strive for? Definitely not. But given the eccentric history of the Milwaukee Brewers name, why wouldn’t they have an equally eccentric mix of identifying marks? Especially when all of those marks are either from the time before modern sports merchandising, or when merchandising was still in its infancy.

[Discrim]

On 11/21/2019 at 10:50 PM, Ice_Cap said:

 

The uniforms lack some unifying factors. The pinstriped homes lack cuff piping.

To be fair, AFAIK the last pinstriped jersey in the majors that had cuffs or piping of any sort was the 93 Cubs.

[Gothamite]

1 hour ago, NicDB said:

I’ve alluded to this before, but now I feel particularly compelled to speak in defense of the Brewers logo set. I get why people have a distaste for the practice of taking logos from different eras, giving them a common colorway, and calling that an identity package.

 

I don’t mind that they’re mixing and matching from different eras. At all. I do mind that they haven’t found a cohesive through-line to tie it all together.

 

The uniforms don’t look like they were designed together. Even using the road piping on the home jerseys would go a long way towards making the uniform set look like a uniform set. 

[WavePunter]

1 hour ago, Gothamite said:

 

I don’t mind that they’re mixing and matching from different eras. At all. I do mind that they haven’t found a cohesive through-line to tie it all together.

 

The uniforms don’t look like they were designed together. Even using the road piping on the home jerseys would go a long way towards making the uniform set look like a uniform set. 

While i agree with the logo discussion, i can’t say I’m 100% on board with the uniform issue.. none of these jerseys will be worn together, so they don’t need to match.. apart from the pinstripe set, each jersey features gold trim with navy on each side.. that’s pretty cohesive for 75% of the unveiled set.. as for the base identity, i like it.. the haphazard random logos i can take or leave, but the set wouldn’t be different in any measurable way if everything was sane apart from the logo package’s cohesiveness (since it basically only affects sleeve logos)

[Marlins93]

23 hours ago, Ice_Cap said:

I don't buy that royal blue and athletic gold would be "too 80s." The trend to darken and mute colours started in the very late 80s, picked up steam in the 90s, and was full-blown by the 2000s. Since then? The "we need to darken our colours" fad has fallen by the wayside and teams are now experimenting with bright, vibrant colours again. I don't buy for a second that royal blue and athletic gold would look dated in 2020. Hell, it's the LA Rams' best look! If anything the Brewers' insistence on holding onto navy makes them look dated, as it still looks like they're slaves to late 90s/early 00s design trends.

 

These are all fair points.

 

While there is nothing inherently "too 80s" about royal blue and gold, I find the combination of those colors with the design of the 78-89 wordmark itself to be a painfully dated look. I felt this way in the 90s and feel the same way now. I understand that it is cherished among Brewers fans, but darkening the blue and modernizing the font of the wordmark are needed adjustments for the set to work in 2020.

 

I have mixed thoughts about the changes made to the BiG but aside from that, I believe that this new set is easily the best the Brewers have ever looked.

[packerfan21396]

Sorry to interrupt this argument discussion, but watching the Admirals game, and the Milwaukee Admirals (AHL, Nashville, owned by a group including Brewers owner Mark Attanasio) added the new Brewers 50 patch to replace the navy and yellow old ball-in-glove they had before today:

 

Pretty awesome that there's been so many 50 year anniversaries in Milwaukee sports around the same time with Green Bay's 100th on top of it all.

 

Also, fittingly, they won the game 5-0.

[_DietDrPepper_]

5 hours ago, NicDB said:

I’ve alluded to this before, but now I feel particularly compelled to speak in defense of the Brewers logo set. I get why people have a distaste for the practice of taking logos from different eras, giving them a common colorway, and calling that an identity package. Thanks especially to NBA teams abusing it for so long.

But the BiG, Barrell Man, and the Wisconsin outline patch all have more than enough historical cache to justify being part of this or any future Brewers identity package. Is it the conveniently streamlined identity that many feel they should strive for? Definitely not. But given the eccentric history of the Milwaukee Brewers name, why wouldn’t they have an equally eccentric mix of identifying marks? Especially when all of those marks are either from the time before modern sports merchandising, or when merchandising was still in its infancy.

There’s no problem with them mix and matching identities, I really like their new look, I think they just took from some really bad identities. The navy and yellow looks good, so does the new wordmarks. I think the primary logo is a huge downgrade and the cap design is as well. Both the yellow panel and all navy. The Wisconsin logo is a downgrade, the wheat-ball isn’t the best either. Clearly the best logo they introduced is the barrelman. It should be on all the sleeves. The mismatching sleeve stripes are annoying, put the road version on the cream uniform. Also get rid of the pinstripe, it’s not near as good as the cream, and it’s pointless. 
The navy uniform is good, I like the script and I’m glad they didn’t overuse it. It’s good but it’s not as good as the home and away wordmarks.

[IceCap]

56 minutes ago, Marlins93 said:

but darkening the blue and modernizing the font of the wordmark are needed adjustments for the set to work in 2020.

That's all well and good, but it doesn't explain why the modernized wordmark can't be in royal blue and athletic gold. 

 

2 hours ago, WavePunter said:

none of these jerseys will be worn together, so they don’t need to match

If that's the case than why strive for continuity between any uniform set in any sport? 

[Marlins93]

1 minute ago, Ice_Cap said:

That's all well and good, but it doesn't explain why the modernized wordmark can't be in royal blue and athletic gold. 

I don't think that the design changes to the font are conspicuous enough to make royal blue and gold combination not look dated and stale. It's a modernized wordmark, but the adjustments are still quite subtle in some respects--basically just adding serifs.

 

Has anyone done a mock up yet of the new wordmark with royal blue instead of navy?

 

I also want to point out that I love the addition of the cream uniform and I can't imagine that working with true blue. That's the strongest part of the rebrand.

[IceCap]

4 hours ago, Discrimihater said:

To be fair, AFAIK the last pinstriped jersey in the majors that had cuffs or piping of any sort was the 93 Cubs.

That's why I don't hold it against the pinstriped set. The other three, however, have practically three different sets of striping/piping. There's no reason that has to be the case. 

 

4 minutes ago, Marlins93 said:

I don't think that the design changes to the font are conspicuous enough to make royal blue and gold combination not look dated and stale.

I guess my response is that I don't find royal blue and athletic gold to be dated or stale. Not even in combination with the Brewers' wordmark. 

 

If anything the navy looks stale to me because it reminds me of 2000s-era design trends that everyone has seemingly moved on from. 

[Sec19Row53]

15 minutes ago, Ice_Cap said:

 

If that's the case than why strive for continuity between any uniform set in any sport? 

I don't know why that is a hang up for people. The 1970s Vikings didn't match, and that was their best look, home and road, ever.