Missives of a Baseball Milquetoast

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1940 Tokyo Kyojin (Giants) - Ebbets Field Flannels retro

Since last week's post the time zones in baseball have been out of whack considering Spring Training was in full in effect for all 30 teams but then the regular season began with the Los Angeles Dodgers and Chicago Cubs facing off for a two-game series in Tokyo the following Tuesday. Before the series, both teams played and lost an exhibition matchup against the Hanshin Tigers ( previously known as the Osaka Tigers) and both won exhibition games against the Yomiuri Giants who were known as the the Tokyo Kyojin when they began play as an independent team before becoming one of the four inaugural members of the Japanese Baseball League in 1936. Sadly for me and all San Francisco Giants fans out there, the Dodgers won both games and will have an undefeated record for about a week! And now that the teams are back in the States, they're about to switch back into Spring Training mode to play more exhibition games this coming weekend. All that back-and-forth...

Orlando Rays (1997)

Apologies for starting this week's post with a math lesson, but it's Pi Day so I must mention the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter is referred to by the Greek letter “π” and has an irrational number value, which means it continues on into infinity. However, I am assigning it a rational number value of 3.1415926535 to save space here. Mathematics enthusiasts have celebrated that wacky number on March 14 (also written as 3/14) every year since 1988 as Pi Day which provides enough pretext for eating copious amounts of pie, whether they be sweet, savory or even both. The last time March 14 fell on a Friday was in 2014 and unfortunately I did not have the idea then to dedicate a post to it like I did this year! The only pie-related baseball caps I am aware of are the Lehigh Valley IronPigs "Shoofly" alternate or the Portland SeaDogs "Whoopie Pie" identity and I am not jazzed enough about either one to make a special purchase for this post so ...

2015-18 Nashville Sounds-“Music City”

It seems like just a year or two ago that I wrote about one of the all-time favorites in my collection which is the 1991 Nashville Sounds cap although in reality that was just over ten years ago. Even more baffling is I've written about four other Sounds caps since then with today's Fresh Fitted Friday selection being the "Music City" variant from the 2015 rebrand. Three of those four caps were from that rebrand with this "Music City" alternate being what will likely be my final entry from that epic set by Brandiose . I never imagined back in 2015 that a "Made in U.S.A." tag would someday become a thing of the past on New Era caps but I'm still holding onto the hope that the manufacturing of these timeless hats comes back stateside. The hit of red on the MILB batterman over a mostly black cap is fitting for a team from Nashville, which in my mind is a town synonymous with Johnny Cash, aka The Man in Black, who has an entire museum dedicate...

Crowned (by Clinker Leif for The Clink Room)

You might have expected the first week of spring training games to bring news of a particular player or team about to have a breakout season but the biggest story in the baseball world since my last post is the New York Yankees are now allowing players to sport "well-groomed beards" which is a major shift away from their stringent facial hair policy of nearly 50 years. While I am personally not fond of the effort needed to maintain a beard or long hair, I can appreciate how some players enjoy expressing their unique sense of style through their grooming methods so from that aspect, the rule was needlessly restrictive. This is especially true for players who perform at a high level and also treat their teammates and coaches with respect. At the same time, I appreciate then-owner George Steinbrenner initiating this practice because certain players were not putting their "best foot forward" at work. Pushback is to be expected but ...

St. Lucie Mets “Mr. St. Lucie” (New Era Buffalo Exclusive)

My pre-jitters of the pre-season have subsided with the first game of the 2025 Spring Training is in the books as the Chicago Cubs beat the Los Angeles Dodgers to the score of 12-4. I look forward to more Dodgers losses as well as the first San Francisco Giants win that I hope comes in their first Spring Training game of the year which is this Saturday against the Texas Rangers. The Giants made some respectable off-season moves but thankfully nothing so crazy where my expectations are too outsized. While I'm neither a Yankees nor Mets fan, as a New Yorker I have to say things are always better when our teams play well, which unfortunately neither did against the Dodgers in last year's postseason. Now is not the time to hark back to the past though as the best recovery from the Yankees Game 5 embarrassment in the 2024 World Series is to win their Spring Training opener against the Tampa Bay Rays today. I would like to see them ride that energy all the way to another ...

Inland Empire 66ers of San Bernardino "Cherubs" (New Era Buffalo Exclusive)

After spending dozen years writing entries in this blog there are not many "firsts" that come along so when I realized that I had not yet done a proper Valentine's Day post for Fresh Fitted Friday , I knew right away that I should bring out the Inland Empire 66ers of San Bernardino "Cherubs" by the inimitable DJ Mach at the flagship New Era store in Buffalo, NY. The metallic threading here is the most recognizable difference between the 66ers "Cherub" cap design and the Buffalo-exclusive that I'm featuring today. I love how it makes the Tiffany—or Tuscan, depending on your preference of terms—font pop here. The team issued "Cherub" also lacks the side-stitched arrows DJ Mach included which is much appreciated as they are synonymous with Cupid in classical mythology. The "Genuine Merchandise" tag is something that I started seeing on MILB caps that I've purchased over the last few years, most notably starting with the 1982 D...