Featured Columnist IVApril 28, 2024
Jim McIsaac/Getty Images
Major League Baseball heard the complaints about the new jerseys this season and reportedly plans to change things.
ESPN’s Jeff Passan reported Sunday that the MLB Players Association distributed a memo to its players revealing the league will make a number of changes, including bringing back larger lettering on the back of the jerseys and addressing the new jersey’s tendency to collect too much sweat.
What’s more, the plan is to fix the pants, which Passan noted were “widely panned this spring for being see-through.”
The changes will go in place by the start of the 2025 season at the latest.
The memo also did not hesitate to place blame.
While Fanatics has been widely scorned for the jerseys, Passan reported the union actually absolved the company. Instead, it said “this has been entirely a Nike issue. At its core, what has happened here is that Nike was innovating something that didn’t need to be innovated.”
It continued in its criticism of Nike.
“We cautioned Nike against various changes when they previewed them in 2022, particularly regarding pants. MLB had been, and has been, aware of our concerns as well. Unfortunately, until recently Nike’s position has essentially boiled down to—’nothing to see here, Players will need to adjust.'”
Nike agreed to a 10-year, $1 billion deal with MLB to become the league’s official uniform supplier in 2019.
The rollout certainly turned heads in spring training, especially when it became clear that tucked-in jerseys could be seen through the pants:
Seattle Mariners @Mariners
Cal’s got jokes 😆 pic.twitter.com/rhrDgl6x8h
Andre Knott @DreKnott
Scott Barlow welcome to Cleveland pic.twitter.com/fmGVQBJESR
It also led to plenty of jokes and criticism:
Emma Baccellieri @emmabaccellieri
A surefire way to get everyone sharing photos from MLB picture days: Pants you can see through pic.twitter.com/pttUWdXozU
Chris Towers is the Riley Greene Preservation Soc @CTowersCBS
The new MLB pants are NSFW. Someone’s gonna get fired for watching @PitchingNinja highlights at work. https://t.co/he8csvIT6G
Payton🧦 @SoxBearPayton
Kinda crazy the MLB has been around for like 120 years and they messed up… pants
Bobby Mullins @TheBobbyMullins
These are absolute trash. Pure garbage. I fully admit to being a jersey snob, but when these things reach the point where we are now, it is completely acceptable to expect more.
I am not particularly fond of the last few years of replica jerseys produced by MLB/Nike/Fanatics.
Nathaniel Meyersohn of CNN reported on the situation in February and noted that Nike designed the jerseys and Fanatics manufactured them.
Yet, as Meyersohn explained, much of the ire was directed at Fanatics with fans displeased with how much control the company has over the sports apparel industry thanks to deals with the NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL and other leagues.
“They’re designed to be performance wear as opposed to what’s been traditionally worn, so they are going to be different,” Commissioner Rob Manfred said at the time. “I think after people wear them a little bit, they’re going to be really popular.”
Alas, they have not become really popular and are instead lined up to be changed in the coming months.
