Opening-day Twins uniforms

[winghaz]

The Twins should burn the uniforms they wore for opening day against the Mariners and never, ever, ever bring back that concept.

I understand the reason they wore those uniforms. They wanted to wear what the Twins wore when they first played at the Metrodome. Makes perfect sense.

Except that those uniforms represent some of the worst teams in Twins history. They should never go back to them. If they want to go retro, totally ignore the '70s and early '80s and go with the '60s look, with the emphasis on the blue along with pinstripes at home. The Twins were winners in the '60s and looked like winners, too.

[Bmac]

Sorry man, but I like them. My favorite part is the red cap. I would love to see that more often. It was kinda nice to see the Twins at home in white without pinstripes for a change.

[sacker12]

Yeah, that red cap was sweet. I got me a wool 5950 of that hat on clearance. Unfortunately, the thing is so darn tight that I don't wear it that often.

[cheo25]

Love them. Wish they were coming back on a full-time basis.

[vmd9]

pictures?

[huskeraddict]

[STL FANATIC]

The script is terrible. I love the idea of a more scripty (if you will) script, but the old one was never well drawn.

The rest of the uniform is fine, but nothing special.

[BBTV]

The script is terrible. I love the idea of a more scripty (if you will) script, but the old one was never well drawn.

The rest of the uniform is fine, but nothing special.

Right. The current one is too "perfect", but the throwback one is too sloppy. There needs to be a compromise.

[IceCap]

The only redeeming part of those throwbacks is the red cap.

[vikmurphy]

I like them I wish they were wearing the powder blues this year

[Joshawaggie]

They look better now than they did then (pullover era). That said, when they were the primaries, the Twins were crap. When they wore them yesterday, more crap.

[JQK]

I like 'em.

Looks like a baseball uniform should, doesn't have that almost machine-like "Twins" script which i do not like very much at all, and there's nothing glaringly wrong with it.

Not saying they should bring them back, but i don't understand the hate.

[M59]

This jersey, coupled with the current "script" would be perfect for the new stadium next season.

Down with pinstripes!

[cheo25]

This jersey, coupled with the current "script" would be perfect for the new stadium next season.

Down with pinstripes!

You're right, the throwbacks would fit the return to outdoor baseball in Minnesota.

[BallWonk]

This jersey, coupled with the current "script" would be perfect for the new stadium next season.

Down with pinstripes!

This I don't get. If one doesn't like pinstripes in general, then great, but I don't actually hear much carping about how the Yankees and the Cubs should ditch pinstripes. Yet the Twins franchise has as much history with pinstripes as either the Yanks or the Cubs. And every championship the franchise has ever won, or even competed for, has come in pinstripes. The only time this franchise consistently hasn't worn pinstripes since the 1910s was when the Twins wore the ugly pullovers on which this throwback is based.

Then again, I get a little riled up when I hear nostalgia for stuff that nobody actually liked at the time. Like the expansion Washington Senators, or the Cold War, or the McDLT. Or the non-pinstriped Twins uniforms. They were crappy uniforms for a crappy team and nobody liked these uniforms when the team actually wore them, and to the extent that the new throwbacks don't smell like week-old dog doo in August, it's because it's not a very accurate throwback. The Twins have fixed most of the fixable problems with the old unis. If you have to make this many changes, then the original probably isn't worth the bother to bring back at all. Shoulda made this a one-day throwback, not a season-long alternate.

Despite my better judgment, I am liking the cap. Works much better with these unis than with the blue alts. Also, the TC logo works (slightly) better than on the blue cap. I still think it's an almost painfully ugly ballcap, but putting that aside it does work as a cap pretty well here. It also makes it easy for me to envision a green cap with blue brim working even better for the Twins if they ever north-ified their color scheme.

[Epiphanic]

Then again, I get a little riled up when I hear nostalgia for stuff that nobody actually liked at the time.

It seems some people like the retro stuff because it's retro. Despite how ugly it is.

[gosioux76]

This jersey, coupled with the current "script" would be perfect for the new stadium next season.

Down with pinstripes!

This I don't get. If one doesn't like pinstripes in general, then great, but I don't actually hear much carping about how the Yankees and the Cubs should ditch pinstripes. Yet the Twins franchise has as much history with pinstripes as either the Yanks or the Cubs. And every championship the franchise has ever won, or even competed for, has come in pinstripes. The only time this franchise consistently hasn't worn pinstripes since the 1910s was when the Twins wore the ugly pullovers on which this throwback is based.

Then again, I get a little riled up when I hear nostalgia for stuff that nobody actually liked at the time. Like the expansion Washington Senators, or the Cold War, or the McDLT. Or the non-pinstriped Twins uniforms. They were crappy uniforms for a crappy team and nobody liked these uniforms when the team actually wore them, and to the extent that the new throwbacks don't smell like week-old dog doo in August, it's because it's not a very accurate throwback. The Twins have fixed most of the fixable problems with the old unis. If you have to make this many changes, then the original probably isn't worth the bother to bring back at all. Shoulda made this a one-day throwback, not a season-long alternate.

Despite my better judgment, I am liking the cap. Works much better with these unis than with the blue alts. Also, the TC logo works (slightly) better than on the blue cap. I still think it's an almost painfully ugly ballcap, but putting that aside it does work as a cap pretty well here. It also makes it easy for me to envision a green cap with blue brim working even better for the Twins if they ever north-ified their color scheme.

I agree with your logic on the pinstripes, but how can you use that same argument -- that they wore them while competing for championships -- while also advocating for a complete change in color scheme?

[leopard88]

The Twins have fixed most of the fixable problems with the old unis. If you have to make this many changes, then the original probably isn't worth the bother to bring back at all.

Agreed. It is one thing to change from pullover-and-elastic pants to buttons-and-belts, but keep everything else basically the same. However, the Twins also drastically reduced the size of the sleeve and pants stripes, to the point where it is almost hard to say that this uniform is really based on the original.

For the record, the sleeve stripes were one of my favorite part of the original version.

[BJBerthiaume]

Here is a compromise of sorts:

No red hat, though.

[BallWonk]

I agree with your logic on the pinstripes, but how can you use that same argument -- that they wore them while competing for championships -- while also advocating for a complete change in color scheme?

What, you expect my arguments against uniforms I don't like and my arguments for uniforms I do like not to contradict each other? Pfah! Consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, as Emmerson said, and to which I agree, unless my own argument happens to be the more consistent one, in which case consistency is what makes an argument beautiful.

On a slightly serious note, I think a team can make changes, even radical ones, that honor its better heritage. So if the Twins were to adopt a new color scheme, they could keep the pinstripes and the general form of the underlined home script and block road script to carry forward the key positive aspects of franchise identity into the new scheme.

(And on the retro thing, I'm usually in the like-it-because-it's-retro camp. My problem is that "retro" has started to mean the 1970s, not the 1960s or earlier. And while in many ways the 1970s might have been the height of American civilization, and if you aren't old enough to remember the Bicentennial more's the shame for you, nearly all baseball uniforms were ugly in the 1970s, and even those that weren't ugly were uglier than they had been or would soon be. With the lone exception of the Phillies. The 1970s were the absolute nadir of baseball uniform design, such that were I emperor, any marketing staffer from any team who suggested turning a '70s uniform into a modern-day alt would be arrested and beaten with a vintage "Whip Inflation Now" yardstick. Basketball and football, however, can throwback to the 1970s all they want.)