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A Uni Watch Look at the 2024 Home Run Derby

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Good Tuesday morning, Uni Watchers. I hope everyone had a pleasant Monday.

Before we get into last evening’s Home Run Derby (HRD), I want to let everyone know that a very special guest will be re-joining Uni Watch later this morning, in the 9:00ish hour, and you won’t want to miss it. So please be sure to check back here then.

Now then.

As has been the custom for the past several years, HRD participants have been wearing their regular home uniforms, with special All-Star Game caps. Needless to say, each and every participant looked better last night than their respective American and National League teams will tonight. Not every HRD hopeful wore his team’s ASG workout caps, but several did. I actually kinda liked those.

Here’s KC’s Bobby Witt:

You’ll note Witt was wearing a weird set of socks (a sort of brownish-green pair of Stance socks, with sort of a floral print design). He wasn’t alone. The Cleveland Guardians’ Jose Ramirez was also sporting them. These are apparently supposed to resemble cowboy boots (or cowboy boot design — YMMV).

Here’s a closer look:

The remaining participants were basically all low-cuffed, although Atlanta’s Marcell Ozuna had his pants tailored in 1990s style, showing off what looked like dark blue socks. Is this a clue as to the socks the NL will wear tonight?

Several players had special bats for the Derby, such as the Baltimore Orioles’ Gunnar Henderson.

If teams have a logo patch, it was worn on their rearward facing sleeve, while normal team ads were removed from their front-facing sleeve. Those were replaced by sponsor ads specific to the Derby.

Here’s a closer look at that ad, if you’re interested.

I mentioned I liked the caps, but I was surprised that the striping pattern on Texas’ cap was reversed (red/white/blue vs. blue/white/red) from the sleeve stripe colors.

Non-Derby participants, such as players and the HRD participants’ pitchers (and the bullpen catchers tapped for HRD duty) all wore uniforms with their teams’ regular ad patches (if applicable).

Not every baseball was a standard “white” one — a special magenta and white bonus ball was thrown. This was, of course, a nod to the game’s advertiser.

Prior to the big league Derby, there was also a High School HRD held last night. Players wore a uniform that closely resembled the Texas Rangers’ City Connect uni. Those who went high-cuffed wore red(!) socks, a look I rather enjoyed.

Those who wore caps for the High School HRD wore the Rangers’ CC caps (and pants), but they had custom cream jerseys which simply read “High School Home Run Derby.” The jerseys were pullovers. Those jerseys were not quite ad-free, as the patch featured a small ad for a credit card company.

As is now pretty much de rigueur, every player wore a custom belt.

We still don’t know what pants either league will be wearing with their “AMERICAN LEAGUE” and “NATIONAL LEAGUE” jerseys tonight, but we did get a first look at the ASG jersey on actual people — in this case several kids who gathered around the players during breaks in the action. I believe — although I still can’t quite tell for sure — the jersey the National League will wear is midnight blue (although it could be black). Guess we’ll find out soon enough.

Here’s a good look at the underbrim of the Dodgers ASG cap. Note the sublimated star pattern.

There was an entire circle of cameras set up surrounding the batter’s box, just on the grass outside the circular dirt at home plate.

Like last year, kids in the outfield hoping to shag some non-dingers were wearing billboards for the event’s advertiser.

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I think that’s it. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately, depending upon your perspective), I missed most of the HRD as I was at my Monday Night Curling league. If there were any other uni-notable details that I missed, feel free to post them in the comments. Thanks!

 

 
  
 

Reminder: Big Uni Design Competition -- ONLY TWO DAYS REMAIN!

In case you missed it, the University of Hawai’i and Uni Watch are partnering on a Women’s Basketball uniform design competition.

All the details are here.

Submissions will be accepted through Wednesday, July 17.

The Grand Prize winner will receive a cash prize of $1,500, roundtrip airfare for one to Honolulu, and accommodations, for the basketball game slated for January 25, where the winning design will be worn and showcased to hundreds of thousands of fans worldwide.

 

 

Guess the Game from the Scoreboard

Guess The Game…

…From The Scoreboard

Today’s scoreboard comes from Rory Granger.

The premise of the game (GTGFTS) is simple: I’ll post a scoreboard and you guys simply identify the game depicted. In the past, I don’t know if I’ve ever completely stumped you (some are easier than others).

Here’s the Scoreboard. In the comments below, try to identify the game (date and location, as well as final score). If anything noteworthy occurred during the game, please add that in (and if you were AT the game, well bonus points for you!):

Please continue sending these in! You’re welcome to send me any scoreboard photos (with answers please), and I’ll keep running them.

 

 

Guess the Game from the Uniform


Based on the suggestion of long-time reader/contributor Jimmy Corcoran, we’ve introduced a new “game” on Uni Watch, which is similar to the popular “Guess the Game from the Scoreboard” (GTGFTS), only this one asked readers to identify the game based on the uniforms worn by teams.

Like GTGFTS, readers will be asked to guess the date, location and final score of the game from the clues provided in the photo. Sometimes the game should be somewhat easy to ascertain, while in other instances, it might be quite difficult. There will usually be a visual clue (something odd or unique to one or both of the uniforms) that will make a positive identification of one and only one game possible. Other times, there may be something significant about the game in question, like the last time a particular uniform was ever worn (one of Jimmy’s original suggestions). It’s up to YOU to figure out the game and date.

Today’s GTGFTU comes from Jordan Smitten.

Good luck and please post your guess/answer in the comments below.

 

 

And finally...

…that’s all for the early lede. I will have another article or two later, but as I mentioned at the top, you’ll definitely want to check back in the 9am-ish hour, as we’ll have a very special guest post.

Everyone have a great Tuesday (and enjoy the MLB All-Star Game tonight — I’m cautiously optimistic that the uniforms won’t completely suck, but we’ll find out in about a dozen hours or so). I’ll catch everyone back here tomorrow morning with a full ASG recap and more!

Until then…

Peace,

PH

Comments (19)

    Jeez, what’s worse…the pajama look or those gawdawful socks?? Can it be that damn hard to wear a decent uniform? Apparently so.

    That company just needs to stop with that bullshittery they’re doing with all these stylized socks. They should stop trying to be the focal point of the uniform.

    Those horrendous brown Stance socks have been showing up in my Instagram feed for about a week or so, with little to no explanation in the caption. Ugly and unnecessary!

    I don’t hate this year’s ASG caps for most teams, but perhaps ironically, the one I do despise is the Giants cap. Most other teams’ caps look pretty good.

    The navy socks that, noted human garbage stain, Ozuna is wearing are just Atlanta’s standard color of sock.

    RE: Rangers AS cap. It appears the format for the cap is the team’s primary color on the bottom stripe, secondary color on the top stripe. I know the Rangers have had a blue or red identity crisis throughout their history, but I think this season they are a blue team, so the cap’s stripe colors make sense.

    Some of the custom bats were pretty cool. Alec Bohm’s had what I think are poker chips with his teammates’ numbers on them, in the font that the Phils use for their uniform numbers.
    The Rangers’ CC set would be a little less heinous with red socks

    GTGFTS

    17 Jul 1988 apparently right after Israel Sanchez strikes out Rich Gedman looking to end the sixth inning.

    From the original image caption:
    Royal’s (sic) left fielder Bo Jackson takes refuge from the near 110-degree heat and the Red Sox by ducking behind the scoreboard on Fenway Park’s Green Monster wall for a drink of water and a towel, borrowed from the scoreboard crew. The Red Sox defeated the Royals 10-8 to sweep their four game series.

    Is there any correlation between that anthem “singer” and the National League all star jersey? If you dress bad, you do a bad job. That anthem performance mirrored what that horrible jersey would sound like.

    ***PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT***
    Did you listen to the National Anthem for the home run derby last night?
    Go get your hearing checked.
    Damage may have been done.

    I didn’t see any of the Derby but I can imagine it must have been a thrill for those high school players to be there. Might have been a once in a lifetime event for them.

    I know that in the day and age of YouTube shorts no one can bare to sit through anything longer than 15 seconds, but having the batter on the clock just isn’t as good as it used to be. I know they changed the format a little and added the non-timed bonus this year, but that’s just one step in the right direction. Just eliminate the clock already. As a Dodgers fan I’m glad Teoscar won, but some of the best derbies came pre-clock: Griffey, Thome, Hamilton, etc.

    As for those cowboy boot socks, when I saw Witt introduced, I first thought he was bringing the amateurish football bare-legged look to MLB. Yuck.

    All Star caps suck. Anthem singer checked herself into rehab. Highlight was at least they wore home jerseys.

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