MLP: Major League Pandering

I’ve loved the game of baseball for most of my 57 years, but I have to say that MLB makes it more and more difficult to remain a fan.  They have become a league that panders, mostly to a jingoistic, right wing fan base.

Must I be reminded of the worst day in New York City history every 7th inning of  baseball game I attend?  What used to be a corny and quaint sing-along to Take Me Out to the Ball Game is now an enforced, falsely patriotic tribute to our soldiers.

Exhibit B are the army fatigue uniforms that the Padres wear every Sunday and that many other teams, the Mets included, don on special occasions, Memorial Day being one of them.  When I watch games on mlb.tv every other commercial serves as recruitment tool for the U.S. military.  Are baseball fans inherently warlike?

The most inane of all pandering is Jackie Robinson Day,  in which every player wears the Robinson’s number 42.  On that day you can’t tell the players even with a scorecard.  I love and appreciate Robinson but isn’t there a less confusing way to honor him?

On Mother’s Day I actually feel sorry for the players who are forced to wear pink uniforms and caps.  Come on, baseball.  I loved my Mom but I never felt the need to prove it by wearing a dress on Mother’s Day.

 

Those wacky baseball uniforms of the ’70s.

 Who besides me is nostalgic for this quirky period in baseball haberdashery?  Who can forget the banana-in-pajamas yellow of the Pittsburgh Pirates? 

  How about the seizure-inducing kaleidoscope that comprised the Houston Astros festival in orange?

 Even the seats of the Astrodome had this pattern!

And of course, the staple road uniform of at least 10 teams: powder-blue.   I was partial to the road uniforms of the St Louis Cardinals, which inexplicably had nothing to do with their home color, Cardinal red.

 How about those Whitesox, who for one game in the middle of the decade actually wore short pants!

I’m hoping that teams begin to break out of the  conservative period that we currently inhabit. Enough of this boring road grey.  I’m also tired of black jerseys that have nothing to do with the team colors. 

How about you?   What were, or are, or were your favorite uniforms?

Happy Memorial Day!