The MLB BP project

[crkraider22]

i understand what patsox is trying to say but i have to say he is wrong. i love this series and i cannot wait for the rest! I am supprised at how well some of these are working out in my eyes. One this though, you have crazy modern jerseys so, why stick to normal classic pants, why not put saome crazy stuff on the pants, mabey even expand away from the white and grey limitations. I know they are currently thr game pants but i still think out of anyone you are the one who could pull it off with style.

rays: i really like the white numbers and NOB, i like that light on light view. The template is great but you could do so much on the pants with that pattern

jays: thats blue is great; but again you could do cool stuff on the pants with it, but the tamplate as randome as it seems i think works

o's: this one i think it the best, i love the way you put the orange on there

sox: this one is the weak one of the bunch imo, i dont like the template or the b on the front. not trying to be mean it just dosnt work for me

yanks: I think this could really work, i know many people do not like it, i saw a fation jersey like it one and i really liked it . but i don't think this fits with the BP series, this should be a straight up alternate.

great work

grade A-

Ok thanks. I think I'm gonna put a wordmark on the Red Sox. I think I might start over on the Yankees, even though you like it, but i don't really like it myself, so I'm gonna go back to square 1. About the pants, I might do some experimentation, but don't expect me to do that regularly.

sounds good, i really wish i could find a pic of that fation jersey i was talking about, cuz it looked good

Jake22:Define fation please......

Rays: Like the striping, flows well with the R in the workmark, maybe find some numbers that can do that as well.

Blue Jays: Would love to see the graphite design. With what you have now, incorporate some more graphite into it, as well as some black like how you have the numbers

Red Sox: Looks good, maybe re-do the sleeve piping to go around the entire sleeve, or move it up higher.

Orioles: I like the how the piping flows from the arms to the sides. I would like to see more orange on here though. The hat is awesome, where can I get one?

Yankees: The weak link, but I love the old-school feel that I get from this. Since you are going to step one may I suggest not using the hat logo, but this. I would like to see how you would use the red to compliment the logo.

General thoughts: Since you are un-templating the jerseys, why not do more hats out-of-the-box like you did the Orioles and lose the current side panel on every BP hat they have now. Also, I'm assuming these would be for all games home & road, and I don't think that all teams carry their white pants everywhere, but I could be wrong. I guess what I'm saying is that it would be nice to see how these would look with the away pants. As the series continues, it would be interesting to see how you determine colors and give each team an identity as compared to others with similar schemes (Indians, Twins, Red Sox, Angels, etc...)

Overall this is another great series from you Elliott, congrats once again and I can't wait for the rest.

[JayJaxon]

elliott, I don't have enough time to go over every set at the moment, but I do wanna say great job, and I would just keep doing what you are doing here. I like the fact that you are taking the 'cookie cutter' image out of the MLB. I look forward to seeing more.

[bohob]

I love the idea of unique templates. It's a great premise. The Rays and Orioles look great. The Jays, I think you have the wrong shade of blue. The Red Sox one seems a little arbitrary with the use of piping and I think the Yanks could work if you use a darker color for the pinstripes. I think if you tone them down it will work quite well.

There is one key point I disagree with though. Baseball has plenty of room for change, not just with the BP jerseys, but with all uniform sets. I've been playing around with baseball lately and I think there are tons of ideas that are just waiting to be used, ideas based on the history of the game that are ready for another chance.

[vicfurth]

Oh, way to steal the baseball creativity thunder. I kid, of course. Perhaps I should be trying some more envelope-pushing stuff myself, since that you've already made a bigger splash in one day than I have in a month. On to the concepts!

Tampa: I really like the striping you used on the sleeves, but the lighter blue looks a little too much so, I think. I would also have tried removing the sunburst and working with a number font that's a bit closer to the script. Overall, I like it though.

Toronto: The piping may be a bit too random. I like the idea, but as it stands, it looks like random dashes as opposed to actual piping. Color distribution is really nice, though. This one is second-best.

Boston: My favorite of the bunch. I had actually been experimenting with cut-off piping similar to this. Great minds think alike, I suppose.

Baltimore: This would have been my favorite, but a couple elements knocked it down a few notches. I'm not too keen on the white-fronted hat. I understand the idea, but it breaks up a good flow you had with the orange and black. I do like the orange sleeve paneling though.

New York: I remember a white pinstripe concept I did in my project for Wisconsin (it copied the sweater the badger was wearing). Something with the execution here is bugging me a bit, though. The script and number get lost in the white pinstripes.

Overall, I'd give it a B. Can't wait to see the rest.

[Riot!]

While these designs are pretty crazy for baseball standards. You got to love the creativity. Great job Elliott

[BJBerthiaume]

My God, elliot, these are some of the best concepts I've ever seen on these boards! For BP jerseys, these totally work. Out of the box is perfect for warmup unis, and I'm sure these would actually contribute greatly to merchandise sales. That Tampa Bay jersey is so beautiful!!! OMG, I can't even express how awesome these are. I love every single one of them. Can't wait to see what you come up for for the Twins. This is a truly awesome thread.

[pcgd]

Pretty cool...I just found it interesting that you left stripes OFF the Red Sox stirrups despite the fact they were one of the last two teams that still had them (Cardinals being the other one)

Anyway, good work on the rest. Am I missing some weird hatred with elliot from patsox? Has this been brewing or what?

[gingerbreadmann]

I'm not going to take sides here, and I don't mean anything bad, but I really don't like this. Now if you can do something completely new and make it work, awesome, I would love to see it. Tradition is never everything. So on that note, I want to say that I just don't understand what you're doing here. You have some wild new template, put it together with a vintage cap, stirrups, and proclaim victory for creativity. In this case, I think you're going overboard to prove to the world that you are being creative and you are being innovative, just for the sake of it itself. I hate to say it, but that doesn't cut it for me. It looks like you really want to think outside the box on this one. That's great, but I still think you have the same underlying goals as usual when creating these: Create an effective, visually pleasing set of uniforms that has a method to its madness so that it all flows and lends itself to the field. While I think the Orioles' uniform looks nice and I have always loved the hat, I have no idea why you used them together. They share no main look and don't look like they were made to go together. For all these teams, I just feel that you could substitute any team for any design here and it wouldn't have an effect. then, just slap on a random cap that you like while keeping the semi-circle constant for some reason, white pants, and astonishingly simple socks. And then you edit the logos and naming style and call it a day. I understand these are supposedly for BP and you are trying to be creative, but it kind of reminds me of Mr. Potato Head how everything is so interchangeable and random.

For these to be successful, I think you need to decide on a style and how you want to use the logos for each team, and design something more complete based off of that. Make it look like you had a goal for each particular team that all your modern designs contributed to, and make everything consistently contribute to it. Right now, the kind of modern stuff that you use doesn't look horrible, no, but makes absolutely no sense. What in the world are the tiger stripes on the Jays trying to do and how do they do that in their current state? Why do you use the sawed-off stripes for the Red Sox? How would the Rays' shoulder thingy look on the field? Wouldn't those pinstripes look like they're from the 1800s? Why use the old bird logo?

Let me just reiterate that I am all for modern designs, but if they have no purpose, I don't want to see it. Maybe there some meaning behind these that I'm missing, but based off your short descriptions and the designs themselves, it feels more like you were playing around in Illustrator and wanted to show off some experiments you thought looked cool. Then sell it as a "creative journey." But I still maintain that even if its purpose is purely aesthetic, every single element in your designs should have a distinct (not necessarily concrete, but distinct) reason for being there in the exact place, shape, or form that it is.

You know none of this is personal, and maybe I am overstating some parts a bit, but I feel I need to in this case to make a point. I really think you need to go back to the drawing board on this one. Even the ones that look nice and even though the feedback is mostly positive.

I hope you understand what I have been saying.

[siegel0572]

Great work as usual elliot. I do have a couple of comments though. I don't like the high/low location of the logo and number on the Boston jersey. IMO it looks strange seeing them on different levels. My other comment is that I'm not a big fan of the pinstripes on the Yankees jersey. The white stripes are a distraction to me. I think a solid jersey for them is better. The others are great looking. I look foreward to the next division.

[w00tness]

I'm sorry, but this is baseball. Swooshy templates and crazy designs do not belong in this sport...and the Yankees would NEVER go for that design. It's time to start rethinking this.

I disagree. I'm not a big fan of the New York uniforms, but I definitely like the other ones. They're all fun and modern, without being overdone - while, of course, still being simple. I love this project, and can't wait to see the other ones. There's no reason why an MLB club couldn't use these during Spring Training.

[elliott]

I'm not going to take sides here, and I don't mean anything bad, but I really don't like this. Now if you can do something completely new and make it work, awesome, I would love to see it. Tradition is never everything. So on that note, I want to say that I just don't understand what you're doing here. You have some wild new template, put it together with a vintage cap, stirrups, and proclaim victory for creativity. In this case, I think you're going overboard to prove to the world that you are being creative and you are being innovative, just for the sake of it itself. I hate to say it, but that doesn't cut it for me. It looks like you really want to think outside the box on this one. That's great, but I still think you have the same underlying goals as usual when creating these: Create an effective, visually pleasing set of uniforms that has a method to its madness so that it all flows and lends itself to the field. While I think the Orioles' uniform looks nice and I have always loved the hat, I have no idea why you used them together. They share no main look and don't look like they were made to go together. For all these teams, I just feel that you could substitute any team for any design here and it wouldn't have an effect. then, just slap on a random cap that you like while keeping the semi-circle constant for some reason, white pants, and astonishingly simple socks. And then you edit the logos and naming style and call it a day. I understand these are supposedly for BP and you are trying to be creative, but it kind of reminds me of Mr. Potato Head how everything is so interchangeable and random.

For these to be successful, I think you need to decide on a style and how you want to use the logos for each team, and design something more complete based off of that. Make it look like you had a goal for each particular team that all your modern designs contributed to, and make everything consistently contribute to it. Right now, the kind of modern stuff that you use doesn't look horrible, no, but makes absolutely no sense. What in the world are the tiger stripes on the Jays trying to do and how do they do that in their current state? Why do you use the sawed-off stripes for the Red Sox? How would the Rays' shoulder thingy look on the field? Wouldn't those pinstripes look like they're from the 1800s? Why use the old bird logo?

Let me just reiterate that I am all for modern designs, but if they have no purpose, I don't want to see it. Maybe there some meaning behind these that I'm missing, but based off your short descriptions and the designs themselves, it feels more like you were playing around in Illustrator and wanted to show off some experiments you thought looked cool. Then sell it as a "creative journey." But I still maintain that even if its purpose is purely aesthetic, every single element in your designs should have a distinct (not necessarily concrete, but distinct) reason for being there in the exact place, shape, or form that it is.

You know none of this is personal, and maybe I am overstating some parts a bit, but I feel I need to in this case to make a point. I really think you need to go back to the drawing board on this one. Even the ones that look nice and even though the feedback is mostly positive.

I hope you understand what I have been saying.

Allright GBM, I have a lot of respect for you on the boards, but here I will have to respectively disagree with you.

Just breaking down a few of the things you said here. First of all, I never really proclaimed a victory for creativity, if I give that impression then I apologize, but I merely stated that I'm trying to be creative. I'm not claiming that because I bring out some stuff you guys have never seen before then it is automatically a good series, and creativity trumps all, because that would be naive. I've seen some pretty creative designs on the board that have also been terrible. So, if I declare a total win for this series from the get-go that would be stupid, and it appears that you think I am doing that, but I think you are exaggerating.

The one thing I agree with you on is the lack of thinking these through. I agree with you that the Orioles doesn't look thought out, same with Red Sox and Yankees. For the Rays I thought that since they are a newer team I could do something crazier, and for the Jays I tried to make the slashes sort of be like feathers or wings or something, I don't know exactly, but for those latter two I did think it through more. I specifically went with the numbers and wordmark on the Jays to make it stand out, and I did the same thing on the cap and wordmark for the Rays, trying to make it pop. The other two I admit are not thought out. I will work on that.

Now your whole point about the designs having a "purpose", to sum up your argument in one word; I think I disagree there. I see your point, but then you come up with the issue of what are the point of modern designs in any sport? What I mean is, you could switch two templates in just about any sport, and maybe the teams would still look equally good, take the Hawks and Grizzlies, for just a random example, they both use pretty modern, albeit different, templates but you could do the old switch-a-roo, and recolor, and maybe they would both still look good. You could say the same thing with the Sabres and Ducks, two templates that came into being at the same time.

So I'll connect that with your next point, saying that each and every element should have a distinct reason for being there. Do the Patriots have a specific reason for having the piping on the side not match the pants, and do the Penguins have a reason for the gold patch of color with white piping on their pants? I think then you get into nitpicking territory. Truth of the matter is, many designs through out professional sports have a design just to make it look good, or just to look cool. In essence, that's what I'm trying to do here. As w00tness says, BP jerseys are really fun and modern, and they aren't actually worn in games. So, I'm trying to have a little fun here with modern templates that might look cool, too, I may not have a reason for every single piece of piping that I add, I'm just trying to create good-looking designs that are new ideas, too.

I'm not going to stop doing this series. I'm going to try to think things through a little more. You may not like what I'm doing here, but so far the like-hate ratio has been about 10-1, and I feel that statistic is important. If everyone told me to stop, I would. But that isn't happening, so I will continue.

We could have this argument all day. As TI says, "Everbody's entitled to an opinion, they like Escalades everybody got one".

[TalktoChuck]

While these do look pretty good, and are creative. I also agree with GBM. The way these are designed lend themselves to a very random look. As the striping seems to have no reason. The yankees is the only on I see that the striping makes sense for that team. The Blue Jays have what looks like a tiger strip or maybe a claw mark. Why did you use that striping for the Blue Jays? Do you see what I mean? They look great but don't exactly make sense. There's no rhyme or reason as to why that team has that striping compared to another team.

[dgthree]

I see nothing wrong and really love these. Keep going!

[gingerbreadmann]

Glad you took it nicely Elliott. Now brace yourself.

I will use multiple quotes for brevity.

Allright GBM, I have a lot of respect for you on the boards, but here I will have to respectively disagree with you.

Just breaking down a few of the things you said here. First of all, I never really proclaimed a victory for creativity, if I give that impression then I apologize, but I merely stated that I'm trying to be creative. I'm not claiming that because I bring out some stuff you guys have never seen before then it is automatically a good series, and creativity trumps all, because that would be naive. I've seen some pretty creative designs on the board that have also been terrible. So, if I declare a total win for this series from the get-go that would be stupid, and it appears that you think I am doing that, but I think you are exaggerating.

Well this is one of the times I was exaggerating, yes. Just the way you brushed "traditional" aside in favor of creativity in some of your posts, it struck me a little. I didn't mean that part literally, but how you used the words stood out to me. Plus, this really isn't one of my main points so I will just say this once, but I think you can really be creative AND traditional at once. You don't have to get rid of one to specifically support the other.

The one thing I agree with you on is the lack of thinking these through. I agree with you that the Orioles doesn't look thought out, same with Red Sox and Yankees. For the Rays I thought that since they are a newer team I could do something crazier, and for the Jays I tried to make the slashes sort of be like feathers or wings or something, I don't know exactly, but for those latter two I did think it through more. I specifically went with the numbers and wordmark on the Jays to make it stand out, and I did the same thing on the cap and wordmark for the Rays, trying to make it pop. The other two I admit are not thought out. I will work on that.

I agree here obviously. The bolded part is kind of my main point. I understand the new/crazier point, but why did you come up with that specific crazy design? For the Jays, doesn't that seem kind of unfinished? I'm having trouble being cohesive here, but the idea of having a point/purpose and kind of settling I will touch on much more below.

Now your whole point about the designs having a "purpose", to sum up your argument in one word; I think I disagree there. I see your point, but then you come up with the issue of what are the point of modern designs in any sport? What I mean is, you could switch two templates in just about any sport, and maybe the teams would still look equally good, take the Hawks and Grizzlies, for just a random example, they both use pretty modern, albeit different, templates but you could do the old switch-a-roo, and recolor, and maybe they would both still look good. You could say the same thing with the Sabres and Ducks, two templates that came into being at the same time.

Well I think you are wrong here. It doesn't have to be an obvious purpose. But in the end, you make concepts so that the team looks good, right? Even if that's the purpose. It doesn't have to be so that the uniforms actually have to look like Orioles or anything. This was actually something I thought about. I'm not going to argue against modern designs in any sport, or you doing modern designs, at all. I think a lot of people don't like a lot of the modern designs because they're random crap thrown together and only used for the sake of being different. I think, in the midst of my wild blabbering, this is one of the things I want to emphasize most. Sometimes a design is good just because it looks plain cool, and there's nothing wrong with that. I think your Rays design has some promise after looking at it again. What I'm saying, though, is that you should strive to not be the Sabres and Ducks. I think you should pick some attractive design and really, really build off of that. The consistency is something that is really missing with your concepts. Why do you keep the little swerve on the side of all the caps? Tie each uniform together from top to bottom, and make them unique from each other. You are really stressing creativity here, so why not go all out? Make it so the design doesn't work as well if it's switched with another team -- I think success at that level is something you should strive for, especially with the modern emphasis. I disagree with you saying the Hawks and Griz could be switched and work, maybe the Griz design would, but I think the Hawks' design works so well because it works the wordmark and number into the design and is consistent with them for the most part. It's not perfect of course, but I think that's part of the reason it's so well-received. I couldn't imagine that design working with the Lakers or Grizzlies or almost any NBA team. That makes it even better. I think I have answered the question about why having a purpose doesn't deter all modern design. And I still believe that every design should have some sort of purpose. Your bolded part above shows you had some sort of purpose for both the Rays and Jays, even though they were almost completely different. If you can think of a way to have that stripe on the Jays' uniform accomplish something for the design as a whole, I think it would work better. Right now, it's just dead weight to me. Like excessive piping in the NHL or NFL, per se, it is almost completely useless in it's current form. You yourself don't know for sure, so why is it even there? It detracts from the design. The Rays' design at least looks cool. The two swooshes go together well, and even tie in with the bottom of the "R" in "Rays." Sometimes these things are subtler than others, but I really think it's inescapable. But also, it's something you can and should use to your advantage, even though it isn't obvious. See what I mean?

So I'll connect that with your next point, saying that each and every element should have a distinct reason for being there. Do the Patriots have a specific reason for having the piping on the side not match the pants, and do the Penguins have a reason for the gold patch of color with white piping on their pants? I think then you get into nitpicking territory. Truth of the matter is, many designs through out professional sports have a design just to make it look good, or just to look cool. In essence, that's what I'm trying to do here. As w00tness says, BP jerseys are really fun and modern, and they aren't actually worn in games. So, I'm trying to have a little fun here with modern templates that might look cool, too, I may not have a reason for every single piece of piping that I add, I'm just trying to create good-looking designs that are new ideas, too.

After reading this, I think a lot of what I just said agrees with you. I didn't even intend it that way, but I almost said exactly what you say here. I think you are agreeing with me too, you just don't know it. I HATE the Patriots' pants, so while they are a major sports team's design, why would you strive to equal them? You can do better! They don't have a reason for that, and many people here hate them. It's not nitpicking, even though you have gotten good feedback. Sure, BP jerseys aren't game jerseys but that' no excuse to just use it as a sandbox where you can design something completely random and just call it a BP jersey and say it doesn't matter. (FTR, I am absolutely not saying that's what you did.) I am all for something being there just to look cool, and I said that above and I didn't mean to sound otherwise earlier. But I still think you should design something without just telling yourself that it will be a BP jersey so it doesn't matter. Design it to really work, then the rest will fall into place. If you add a piece of piping to make it look good, then that's absolutely justified. But what if it looks crappy and doesn't do anything else? I just think you're settling here. You could really tie together a whole set and I think the payoff would be great. You obviously see that pro sports jerseys have those minor flaws, then why just condone them in your own work? I don't see the point, even if you are just having fun, if you bring it all together, it would look so much better.

I'm not going to stop doing this series. I'm going to try to think things through a little more. You may not like what I'm doing here, but so far the like-hate ratio has been about 10-1, and I feel that statistic is important. If everyone told me to stop, I would. But that isn't happening, so I will continue.

Please don't stop. I hope that's not how I came off. I understand how you feel, and I can't think of a way to say this without sounding like an ass, but I don't think you should operate completely based off of people's reactions. We all appreciate how you are doing something new and creative. However, I just don't think you're doing the best you can. I have really enjoyed your other series and I think this just falls short in its current form. And there's nothing wrong with that. I just think the positive C+C gives a little bit of a false sense of security to you, and you have used it as evidence a few times in this thread. It's great to see some creative spark plugs go off around here, but I bet if we polled everyone who loved them (most of them said only a sentence or two), asking them to examine each entire set more closely, there would be things that they think could be really improved. And especially if you went back and revised each one with some of the ideas that I mentioned above and you mentioned yourself, then re-posted I can almost guarantee that people would say the revised ones blow these away. You are extremely talented, elliott, and the most important thing is how YOU feel about them. Can you look at yourself in a mirror and honestly say that these are the best you could have done? Maybe I'm overreacting a bit from the quality of your other concepts. I really want to like this series and (as unselfishly as I possibly can put this) I don't want to see each set come out like this. Because I think this could be something really, really good, and all I want to do is step in and try to raise that point, because I can tell that you know it too. If you just want to have this as a doodle type of series, that's fine and I'm sorry for wasting your time. But I stand by everything that I said, whether it is coherent or not as much.

Please don't hate me. I want to drive home the fact that I am not trying to attack you. I may have sounded harsh in a few places, but I am trying to be as positive as possible with what I'm saying. Just some really, really deep C&C. Sorry if I offended you anywhere, it truly wasn't meant that way. It's your right to do whatever you want with these concepts, and that's something I didn't forget.

[erlovepuck]

I think these look good but I would actually prefer to see the hanging sox on the Red Sox one especially given that they are trying to really push that logo as the primary for the team. I am very much looking forward to your next installment but just have a question regarding the template (meaning the actual template you are using to display your design) you are doing. Given that your idea is to not have all the BPs based on a single color-by-number type template have you considered varying the jersey styles, ie. some full button jerseys, some v-necks, some one or two button pullovers? I know there was a time probable in the mid to late 90s before the templated BPs took over that the league was split between these different styles of BP jerseys.

[elliott]

(Very deep insight into life, reduced for size)

Ok, that was very well said, and I'm glad that you took 10 minutes out of your life for my sake . I'm glad you made some of your points more clear, I can agree with you in some respects. I still disagree about having each part of the design be a specific purpose, maybe for an actual redesign of a league, but I think that BP jerseys are such a minor part of a baseball set that it's okay to just do something wack. Still, I will try to blend everything that you said with what I want to do personally, I'm not gonna do "MLB BP Redesign, As Told by GBM" but I will take everything you said into consideration when I am working on my future designs. I already had a few more teams done, but I'm gonna go back and rework some completely, and tweak others. I think I will lose the little swooshy thing on the hats though. Anyhow, thanks for your honest unbiased c+c, sometimes it's hard to get, and I appreciate the time you took to help.

[gingerbreadmann]

(Very deep insight into life, reduced for size)

Ok, that was very well said, and I'm glad that you took 10 minutes out of your life for my sake . I'm glad you made some of your points more clear, I can agree with you in some respects. I still disagree about having each part of the design be a specific purpose, maybe for an actual redesign of a league, but I think that BP jerseys are such a minor part of a baseball set that it's okay to just do something wack. Still, I will try to blend everything that you said with what I want to do personally, I'm not gonna do "MLB BP Redesign, As Told by GBM" but I will take everything you said into consideration when I am working on my future designs. I already had a few more teams done, but I'm gonna go back and rework some completely, and tweak others. I think I will lose the little swooshy thing on the hats though. Anyhow, thanks for your honest unbiased c+c, sometimes it's hard to get, and I appreciate the time you took to help.

Dude, that took me like an hour.

Thanks man, I appreciate it. I guess we disagree about the importance of a BP jersey, maybe it's not so important but I just think you should almost treat it like one. Again, I realize this is completely your stuff, and that's why I added the last sentence or so. I couldn't come up with this stuff, and wanting to see it come out well is the reason I went off on such a big manifest. Really, I can't wait to see what you have, and thanks for how you handled it.

[jake22]

Jake22:Define fation please......

Fation - long day, an attempt at "Fashion"

[Bmac]

Elliot- Great job. Everything looks great. The Jays looks like its missing something. More black perhaps? I dunno.

And guys, can we please stop arguing? Elliot has some great concepts here.

[elliott]

Elliot- Great job. Everything looks great. The Jays looks like its missing something. More black perhaps? I dunno.

And guys, can we please stop arguing?

No one's arguing. GBM and I are merely having polite conversation with opinions that happen to differ.