Episode 3: What’s on Tap for MLB 2021 Uniforms?
With pitchers and catchers reporting to spring training this week, Chris and Paul go over the upcoming uni changes for the 2021 MLB season, and also list some MLB uni updates they’d like to see. In non-MLB news, they also discuss the Vegas Golden Knights’ gold helmets and, in the first installment of what will be a regular feature, answer a question submitted by a listener. The audio player for the episode is at the bottom of this page.
Here are photos of some of the things discussed in this episode (for most of these photos, you can click to enlarge):
• Here’s a look at the Golden Knights’ new gold helmets which they recently started wearing with no advance fanfare or promotion:
• All MLB teams are using the same spring training cap designs that they used last year, except for Cleveland (de-emphasizing the word “Indians”) and the Padres (eliminating the logo that inadvertently looked like a swastika). Here’s a look at those two teams’ 2020 and 2021 designs:
• The Giants are adding player names to the back of their home jerseys, so we’ll no longer see scenes that look like this:
• The Dodgers gave us a peek at their new memorial patches for Tommy Lasorda and Don Sutton when they introduced new free agent signing Trevor Bauer:
• The Cardinals will be wearing a memorial patch for Bob Gibson. He died on Oct. 2, which was also the date when the Cardinals were eliminated from last year’s playoffs, so they didn’t get a chance to uni-memorialize him last season:
• In a similar situation, Whitey Ford died on Oct. 7. The Yankees wore a memorial “16” for him on Oct. 8 and were promptly eliminated from the playoffs in that game. They will almost certainly carry over the “16” to this season (but not the “HGS” patch that they wore last year for Hank Steinbrenner):
• The Braves will be wearing a 150th-anniversary patch on one sleeve and an All-Star Game patch on the other. They’ll also presumably be adding memorial patches for Henry Aaron, Phil Niekro, and possibly Don Sutton, although that hasn’t been announced yet:
• The Angels are adding a 60th-anniversary patch to their caps (but not to their jerseys):
• The Indians have announced that they’ll be changing their team name after this season, so 2021 will be the final year that we’ll see this chest insignia:
• There’s a lot of chatter about the Mets possibly bringing back their black jerseys for a game or two. A good time for that would be on the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, when the Mets will be hosting the Yankees (marking the first time the two New York teams have played each other on Sept. 11). The Mets will likely wear first responder caps as well.