Much like the FIU Baseball team recently revealed football alternate-based uniforms, so too has the US Navy with their own baseball alternates. And upon which football uniform did Navy base their new hardball unis? Why, their Jolly Rogers uniforms which the team wore in last season’s Army-Navy game.
And like the football team, the Navy created a well-produced hype video to show off the newly designed duds.
Here’s to victory! Here’s to the bones🏴☠️#GoNavy | #FearTheBones pic.twitter.com/BQbk6KhbZN
— Navy Baseball (@NavyBaseball) February 26, 2025
While the uniforms are fairly straightforward, like the football team, they come with some storytelling, which we’ll get to shortly. But let’s take a look at the uniforms as they stand.
CAP/HELMET
The cap is solid white, featuring a skull and crossbones logo on the front, and “NAVY” at the back. A small “J/R” logo (for Jolly Rogers) appears on the side of the cap. But like football, the helmet is the real star.
The helmet is white, designed to mimic the helmets worn by pilots of their fighter jets, with “NAVY” in solid blue letters across the front, while a skull and bones logo is placed in a pennant shaped decal on the side. There is also a very football-esque helmet stripe running across the top, with player number and “Fear the Bones” located where the neck bumper would be on a football lid. The navy and gold striping features white chevrons.
JERSEY
The white jersey features a navy blue yoke, which extends to full blue raglan sleeves. Each sleeve contains a white skull and crossbones, while the sleeves feature thick stripes of gold, navy and white, matching the helmet striping.
“NAVY” is splayed across the chest in a sans-serif font, straight pattern. Front number is below “NAVY” also in a navy blue block font. The jerseys are pullover, with a very thick wishbone collar in navy blue with a thinner gold stripe.
The rear of the jersey features another “J/R” logo in place of a NOB, with large navy blue numbers beneath.
Unfortunately, the full pants were never shown in the video or stills, but they will be white with the same striping pattern as on the helmets and on the sleeves.
STORYTELLING
No uniform unveiling would be complete without a bit of storytelling. Here is how the Navy describes it, with allusions to what the various elements represent:
Additional photos (as well as some shown above) can be seen here:
I like these uniforms in general, and I laud the designers for trying to take a football uniform and incorporating it onto a baseball template. I’m not a big fan of yokes and pullovers, and the wishbone collar is a design element that is very difficult to pull off, but the Navy makes it all look pretty good together. It’s almost jarring to see a baseball helmet with a thick center stripe, but since it matches the design and width of that found on the sleeves and pants legs, it works. It’s definitely not a traditional baseball uniform, but the out-of-the-box thinking is welcome. I certainly wouldn’t want to see this on the field every day, but as a seldom-worn alternate, it’s fantastic.
The team has not indicated when or how often these will be worn.
What are your thoughts?
I’m very much a traditionalist, but I think it’s fun to occasionally see teams play with the space on baseball helmets. Especially colleges, who are perhaps less steeped in tradition than the pros.
If there’s anyone who thinks wishbone-style collar (UA, Nike or otherwise), enhances the look of a jersey, please let me know. I truly don’t think that person exists. They look terrible in basketball and even worse in baseball.
Either choose pullover or button down; the in-between is hideous
On field baseball hats/ helmets never look right with a word mark across the front. Stick to letters (a single letter or initials) or a logo. Again, UA seems to ignore the adage that less is more in uniform design and takes the idea of storytelling to unnecessary levels.
Excuse me as I go out to yell at clouds!
I agree. I really don’t see why they couldn’t have duplicated the skull-and-crossbones logo on the front of the cap. Or just done a single N for Navy! Instead they wrote out a full word, that is also printed in full on their chest anyway!
Does anyone else think that the navy using pirate symbology is just way off?
Oh, I don’t know; to catch a pirate, you have to *think* like a pirate.
In addition to Jolly Roger flight squadron, the US Navy actually also allows the USS Kidd (an Arleigh Burke-Class Aegis Destroyer) to fly the Jolly Roger flag. It’s tradition.
Don’t look too closely into the Navy’s sacred traditions of John Paul Jones. He was a “privateer”.
are we the baddies?
Top tier reference
Any idea if the hats will be available online? The instagram feed shows they will be available at the stadium store and included a navy version.
Navy always seem to put interesting details in their sports uniforms without having to dabble with camo. I like this uniform, especially the hat and the thick stripes with the chevrons. This collar is not as much as a letdown as is the collar of that new Mets jersey. Somehow all of it seem to fit together, which is what an uniform should do.
I didn’t even know they played baseball.