The hits just keep on coming with MLB’s uniform debacle and the league continues digging a deeper and deeper hole for itself. Over the past week, baseball fans have endured several new eyesores.
In a spring training road game, the St. Louis Cardinals took the field wearing jerseys and pants in mismatched shades of gray, giving them only 48 to go before we learn Paul Goldschmidt’s safeword. (We already know it’s not “boosted.”)
A few days prior during photo day, an image of San Francisco infielder Casey Schmitt in his skintight new uniform made fans wonder, “When did the Giants hire Robert Mapplethorpe?”
But far and away the most embarrassing story of this sartorial catastrophe has been the revelation that MLB’s new uniform pants are more transparent than Rob Manfred has ever been in his life.
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This spring, baseball social media has been filled with images of players involuntarily rocking see-through pants from Seattle’s Cal Raleigh to Cleveland’s Scott Barlow to even Shohei Ohtani.
Apparently most of his jersey fabric has also been deferred to 2034.
Baseball uniforms have traditionally been a massive point of pride for fans. Legendary designs like the Dodgers or Red Sox are the best jerseys in all of sports—nothing from the NFL or NBA can compare.
To see baseball jerseys get cheapened by a league and uniform company dedicated to cutting corners at every opportunity is an abomination. Then to have that become the game’s biggest story during what should be one of the most positive times on the baseball calendar is a massive black eye.
As Outsports’ resident baseball gay, I’d like to think that I’m not just about complaining when the people who run my favorite sport screw it up. I also want to be there to offer solutions to help make MLB a better league and I think I’ve got one here.
To change the narrative around baseball’s horrible new uniforms, MLB just needs to do two things — and ordering a hasty redesign isn’t even one of them.
First, as punishment for inflicting translucent trousers on all of us, the league needs to kick Nike and Fanatics to the curb. Good riddance to bad rubbish.
Then Rob Manfred needs to announce that that MLB has signed a deal with its new uniform designer…
Andrew Christian.
If baseball players are going to take the field in see-through pants, own it and partner with the label that owns the term “Stretch Mesh.”
Because of the nature of the game’s actions, many baseball players already have the physical qualifications necessary for Andrew Christian models.
For instance, it’s an upset that Spencer Strider or Walker Buehler’s thighs don’t have the AC logo above them already. And there’s a very good reason Raleigh’s nickname is “Big Dumper.”
Hell, I would lose all my credentials as a journalist if I wrote a story about baseball players giving Andrew Christian vibes and didn’t mention Nick Castellanos.
The jockstrap endorsement alone makes this a perfect idea — to the point where several AC models are already striking the classic baseball “cup adjustment” pose.
Castellanos, incidentally, was unsparing in his disdain for the new jerseys, telling Sports Illustrated’s Stephanie Apstein, “It’s crazy that my son’s travel team at 10U has better quality uniforms than the Philadelphia Phillies.”
This is the most natural way for the game to save face. Plus an Andrew Christian partnership would revolutionize the industry. If MLB makes this a reality, for the first time in sports history, Budweiser wouldn’t be the only sponsor making fans thirsty.
