Good morning, Uni Watchers. It’s Friday — we made it!
It’s still a very quiet period for any major uniform news; hopefully that will change soon. But what is on its surface minor uni news lends credence to the possibility that MLB will soon be expanding to 32 teams.
An ownership group called “Music City Baseball,” who are attempting to land an MLB franchise for the Music City to be called the “Nashville Stars,” have unveiled their logo and color scheme via their official cap.
MLB underwent its first expansion in 1961, and has since expanded several more times (1962, 1969, 1977, 1993 and 1998). The last expansion, almost 30 years ago, raised the number of major league squads to 30. It’s an awkward number, and originally teams were divided into 16- and 14-team leagues, but the number now sits at 15 apiece. Obviously interleague baseball is here to stay, but when the leagues split into two leagues with 15 teams, it meant that every day at least one interleague game must be played. Expanding to 32 teams has always made more sense, as two 16-team leagues (divided into four four-team divisions) could also make for much more interesting pennant races, and depending on whether there is any realignment, could spark some new rivalries (I can foresee a complete geographic realignment where say the Mets, Yankees, Red Sox and Phillies are all in the same division — but that’s a discussion for another day).
With the announcement of their new logo and cap release, the Nashville Stars are perhaps signaling their intent to become MLB’s 31st team. Here’s how Fox Sports on Twitter shared the announcement:
The logo is simple but solid: an interlocking “NS” in white on the solid black cap, and the same logo in black on a white crown/black brim cap.
A new era is calling…📞
Nashville Stars @NewEraCap coming 3/3.#Nashville #newera #neweracap #newerahat pic.twitter.com/ryVSwK1WhW
— Nashville Stars ⚾️ (@NashvilleStars) March 1, 2025
“Nashville Stars,” you may be thinking, “Why does that name ring a bell?” Well, the Nashville Stars were a semi-pro and minor league Negro league baseball team established in the 1930s before being disbanded in the 1950s.
But the Music City Baseball group is hoping not just to bring baseball back to Nashville, but as part of their pitch, have partnered with the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum to provide a license and sharing agreement of the “Nashville Stars.” The two will also engage in social media cooperation, revenue sharing, and museum space in the ballpark to be.
Back in 2019, Music City Baseball LLC, an investment group led by John Loar and Alberto Gonzales, announced their plans to revive the Nashville Stars in an effort to either become an MLB expansion team or lure an existing team to the city. They partnered with NLBM in 2020 and have been pursing the effort jointly since that time. Perhaps with the Tampa Bay Rays homeless (and playing in the Yankees’ minor league/spring training Steinbrenner Field for at least this season), they sense an opportunity to try to lure the Rays to Nashville should plans for a new stadium in Tampa or St. Pete fall through. While the Athletics are still on track to move to Vegas, perhaps Nashville could be a viable alternative. Either way, the release of a cap and logo probably signals they’re going to be serious contenders for one of the next two MLB franchises, whenever that time may be.
Obviously, releasing a logo and cap — even if it were assured Nashville will be getting an MLB team — doesn’t mean it will be a finished product. But it’s a good looking logo and with the NLBM partnership, I’m rooting for Nashville to get a franchise. And it’s certainly far too early to be discussing uniforms (although maybe I could hold a future “Nashville Stars” uniform design contest if you guys are interested), but with the lineage upon which Nashville would be drawing, perhaps their future uniforms could be inspired by their Negro League predecessors.
What are your thoughts on the new logo and caps? And what are your thoughts on expansion? Should MLB expand to 32 teams? Where would you put Nashville in terms of cities most likely for expansion? And finally, if Music City is selected, and the Nashville Stars is the name for the new team, should they dig into their roots and create modern uniforms evocative of the previous Nashville ball clubs? (On a side note, I’ve met NLBM prexy Bob Kendrick — as I believe a number of you readers may have — and he’s the sweetest guy and a fantastic ambassador for Negro League baseball, so that’s certainly one reason I’m hopeful the Music City/Nashville Stars expansion is one of those chosen.)
[My sincere thanks to Susan Freeman for her assistance with this article!]
I really hope we don’t get geographic alignment. The current format is solid, though eliminating the DH in the NL would be most welcome.
Why should 1 sport have 2 different sets of rules? I was agnostic on the DH itself, but very much in favor of 1 set of rules. Either no DH for either, or DH for either. I understand why they want DH all around. Tradition for tradition’s sake is stupid. Additionally, many MLB traditions aren’t actually that traditional. Altering baseball to suit fan tastes, and technological innovations is about as old as the game itself. It’s always changing. DH only came about in the early 70s. It’s what most of the fans want, just no the stubborn “traditionalists,” so I get why MLB went that route.
“I can foresee a complete geographic realignment where say the Mets, Yankees, Red Sox and Phillies…”
Yeah, no. Geographic realignment may happen within the league, but multiple teams flipping between the AL & NL will *never* happen.
I’m not so sure. League identities have almost disappeared, sadly. I miss the days of the leagues being entirely separate, with limited interleague trades and a real NL-AL rivalry. But that’s never coming back.
It happened in the NFL, you know — when the NFL and AFL merged, the Browns, Steelers, and Colts flipped from the old NFL to the new AFC, purely for balance. 15-year-old me (a Browns fan) thought that was unfathomable too.
Sadly, there’s little reason to have a Nati. nal Leage and an America League. They are not distinct in any real way, and that’s a shame. As a kid, I was an American League fan, and my brother liked the National League – not that we hated the other league, but there was a difference.
But honestly, what’s the point of them now? Why not just make it a Western Conference and an Eastern Conference? (This is a serious questions. I’m not saying I want this – I do not! – but what is the benefit of have two of each division?)
It’s so simple, but this has the look of one of THOSE designs. A design that will have a BIG fashion moment like the tarheels, hornets, or KC monarchs. You’ll see them everywhere for a while.
Not sure what to think of the Stars logo. Can we get several paragraphs of corporate storytelling from the team to over-explain it?
The logo looks too much like a dollar sign to me. I don’t dislike it, but that’s what I keep seeing. Also, I hope the black/white color scheme is meant to be “generic.” We already have a black and white team with the Chicago White Sox.
I’d like to see an MLB team adopt sky blue and yellow colors (think Los Angeles Chargers or the Carmelo Anthony era Denver Nuggets). Gold and black would be another welcomed color palate (think New Orleans Saints). We certainly don’t need another blue/red team.
Dollar sign is what I see as well
I didn’t pick up on that at first but now I can’t unsee it. It went from a decent enough logo to one I completely dislike.
I saw that too, but I like money.
~sky blue and yellow colors~
you’d love the tampa bay rays
Saw a dollar sign instantly, and I’ll never be able to unsee it.
I could see a very simple uniform – maybe just NASHVILLE arched across the front of the home and away uniforms, maybe in the font the Mets are currently using for their City Connect uniforms.
I think this would look fabulous in black, with a gold accent.
Simplicity. Elegance. There’s enough splash with the City Connect uniforms.
GTGFTS – May 5, 2011, Comerica Field Detroit, Tigers 6, Yankees 3 16th birthday of Tiger Mascot PAWS, Rick Porcello goes 7 strong innings to beat a Jeter-less Yankees for the third straight day. Tigers scored 6 runs on 4 hits.
Raleigh first
Charlotte > Raleigh
Fight!
Please.
Montreal before either nashville, or portland, or raleigh or any of these other places with smaller markets.
Expand? There’s isn’t enough pitching for the teams we have now. Not that it matters. All about billionaire owners filling their pockets with expansion fees.
Maybe they will lure the Rays to Nashville……..
Baseball desperately needs a shake up and expansion which will allow new fans and new players can only be a good thing.
Other than the need for a little color (because the White Sox already have the black/white unis), it’s pretty solid. As for my color preference, I’d love to see a blue & kelly green scheme.
Always disliked the name Nashville Stars since they started calling their group that but this logo is better than i imagined it would come out
The logo isn’t awful, and while I appreciate honoring the Negro Leagues, Stars is far too similar in both name and possible logos to the Astros. And I really hope they don’t go with a simple black and white color scheme, as it will both be derivative of the White Sox, but also fall into the boring trend of baseball teams having the same muted colors.
I’d prefer they bring the Sounds name up from the minor league, you can do a lot with music iconography for logos, and make the team yellow and indigo similar to the Nashville flag colors.
Its too much like when Brooklyn Nets switched to black and white. We have a minor league team in the Sounds, farm team of the Milwaukee Brewers. We have a color scheme of Blue & Gold for Nashville and that happens to match the Brewers color scheme. Why not do something completely different to stand out?
I propose the Nashville Troubadours, a nod to Music City.
I think it would be nice if they could have a star somewhere in their logo since it is their nickname; I also think a little color would make it pop…
Three are already enough names shared between the 4 major sports (ignoring MLS & us of “FC”, I reckon there are 6: Panthers, Giants, Cardinals, Kings, Rangers, Jets) without adding another one.
In this age of wacky Minor League teams and alter egos, Nashville is the sort of fun place to bring a little of that into the Majors (not suggesting they go so far as to buy the Savannah Bananas – but the Predators embracing of yellow was a good way of standing out in the NHL.)
So a name already in use in the major sports by Dallas and a really boring colour scheme feels like a missed opportunity. (It may be “clean” and linked to history, but we seem to be drowning in those traits at the moment).
But as a Brit, I’d have to advocate for an expansion to London – if it makes money for MLB, can’t rule it out…
There are 6 teams who averaged less than 50% capacity last year, and 7 teams who have averaged fewer than 20,000 per game. It doesn’t seem that there is enough demand to expand further, in a long-term vision. Yes the team will draw when it’s new, but if the team is really bad for 5 years, are people going to pay to sit in 98 degree heat with 95% humidity all Summer when there is so much else to do in Nashville?
link
So much else to do in Nashville? Like what? What’s happening there that isn’t happening in any other MLB city?
A ton of live music. You can go to the tourist area / broadway any night of the week and listen to pretty solid music at a multitude of bars within walking distance. I highly recommend visiting.
you should check out nashville
The low attendance is probably because MLB hasn’t really moved teams in almost 30 years. Populations shift and teams need to move to keep up with that. That’s why we will never see a second team in the Bay Area just like we won’t see a second team in Philly. There are a lot of cities that have grown a lot: Charlotte, Vegas, Sacramento, Nashville, Orlando, and more.
Why not move teams that aren’t performing to those places? It’s clear that the smaller two team markets are each losing one (Bay Area and Chicago), but why not move Cincinnati, Pittsburgh and Kansas City too? Those are places that aren’t exactly booming. Faux traditionalists may hate it, but there is nothing more traditional than relocation.
Brutal, brutal take.
If you split the Chicagoland area (roughly 10M people) in half, both halves are still in the top ten largest cities in the country. But you want to move the White Sox (I’m assuming) to Orlando? Which has 300k people? And is located in a *state* that doesn’t support either team currently located there?
Wooooooooooooooof.
Your math is a little crooked.
You quote Chicagoland (the region) at 10M but then restrict Orlando to the city population. Chicago (city limits) has fewer than 3M. Half of 2.7M is 1.35M. Still big but your argument loses something when you resort to dishonest numbers.
How dare you put up a comment that makes sense!
I think they misspelled “SOX”.
I’ve never been a fan of interleague play, and the two leagues did fine for many years with different numbers of teams (12 in the NL, 14 in the AL). Moving the Astros to the AL instead of moving the Brewers back to the AL never made sense either. And does anyone remember “contraction”? People in the Twin Cities and Montréal probably do.
The long and short of it is that MLB has made a real mess of things since the mid-’90s, so maybe the solution is to scrap the whole thing and start over, but I think the starting point has to be that the legacy (pre-1969) NL teams stay in the NL (or in the case of the Astros, go back), the legacy AL teams stay in the AL, and all the 1969-and-later expansion teams get divvied up between the two to even things out. If they want to add two new expansion teams they should only do that if it means eliminating interleague play, with 16 teams (and four divisions) in each league; if interleague play is here to stay, then no expansion, keep it at 15/15 and three divisions.
How about this (assuming Nashville and either Charlotte or New Orleans as expansion sites):
NL East: Mets, Phillies, Nationals, Pirates
NL North: Cubs, Cardinals, Brewers, Reds
NL South: Braves, Marlins, Astros, Charlotte/New Orleans
NL West; Dodgers, Giants, Padres, Rockies
AL East: Yankees, Red Sox, Orioles, Guardians
AL North: Tigers, Twins, White Sox, Blue Jays
AL South: Royals, Rays, Rangers, Nashville
AL West: Angels, A’s, Mariners, Diamondbacks
Trying to think of other potential expansion sites but drawing a blank. Montréal, not gonna happen. Buffalo, maybe, but seems unlikely. Portland, no; San Antonio, no; Jacksonville, no. San Juan, Puerto Rico… intriguing. But no. Oakland or Sacramento… not for a very long while.
Just curious. Why not Portland, Jay?
Portland’s population is a little over 630,000. Other than the final year of the nomadic USFL Breakers 40 years past, the city has never had a major outdoor sports franchise. It’s not a hard “no”; I just don’t see it.
The population of the city of Portland is 652,000. The population of the metro area is 2.5 million.
The population of the city of Nashville is 690,000. The population of the metro area is 2.0 million.
The population of the city of New Orleans is 384,000. The population of the metro area is 966,000.
OK, but Nashville and New Orleans have NFL teams, the latter for almost 60 years, which means they have supported and can support the major “outdoor” sports (baseball and football) whose arenas (be they indoor or outdoor) have 2-3 times the capacity of “indoor” (basketball and hockey) arenas. Portland doesn’t even have a Triple-A MiLB team anymore (then again, neither does New Orleans).
Look, I have nothing against Portland. And from what I gather the weather there is nice in the summer. Upon further consideration I hereby rescind the “Portland, no” remark in my earlier comment and withdraw New Orleans and Charlotte. In which case I’d realign the leagues as follows:
NL East: Mets, Phillies, Nationals, Pirates
NL North: Cubs, Cardinals, Brewers, Reds
NL South: Braves, Marlins, Astros, Rockies
NL West; Dodgers, Giants, Padres, Diamondbacks
AL East: Yankees, Red Sox, Orioles, Guardians
AL North: Tigers, Twins, White Sox, Blue Jays
AL South: Royals, Rays, Rangers, Nashville
AL West: Angels, A’s, Mariners, Portland
Phil,
I have nothing against Portland, but don’t see it as a serious MLB city. They’ve had and lost too many minor league teams.
These current minor league teams originated in Portland:
Tri City Dust Devils
El Paso Chihuahuas
Salt Lake City Bees
Las Vegas Aviators
If Nashville gets a team, Charlotte will not. New Orleans isn’t really even in the picture. It’s going to be Nashville & Salt Lake City, barring the very remote change that MLB lets the Rays move to Nashville. In that scenario, its Salt Lake City and Portland. They won’t put 2 new teams in the Southeast.
In all likelihood though, the Rays will either move over to Tampa proper, or maybe re-lo to Orlando. But they won’t leave central Florida.
It won’t be SLC, which lost out to Sacramento to temporarily host the A’s. It’ll be Sacramento and/or Vegas. Sac has been trying to get a second pro team for a while — SLC has 3 and is smaller.
SLC lost out to Sacramento for one reason only: the only way the A’s could keep their tv money was to keep playing in California. SLC is a much better option than Sacramento.
Agree that I prefer separate leagues that only met during the All Star game (which made that special) and having DH only in the AL. I doubt we go back to that, but it would be my preference.
As far as realignment, Nashville seems like it is going to happen for a lot of reasons. Salt Lake City is pushing for a team big time, but with the market size and them adding an NHL team I doubt they make the cut. From what I read it seems like Portland or Charlotte are the most likely other two options. Will probably come down to the pitches both teams make, Seems like you need more baseball in the South and Charlotte’s population is growing more than Portland, but you can counter that with maybe MLB decides it only needs to add one team in the south and it is an either/or thing between Nashville and Charlotte?
Figuring Nashville and Portland get the nods here is how I would realign:
AL East: Baltimore, Boston, New York, Toronto
AL North: Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Minnesota
AL Central: Colorado, Houston, Kansas City, Texas
AL West: Anaheim, Las Vegas, Portland, Seattle
NL East: New York, Philly, Pittsburgh, Washington
NL South: Atlanta, Miami, Nashville, Tampa
NL Central: Chicago, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, St Louis
NL West: Arizona, Los Angeles, San Diego, San Fran
If they did both Nashville and Charlotte it would look pretty similar except:
AL West: ANA, COL, LV, SEA
AL South: HOU, KC, NSH, TEX
NL South: ATL, CHA, MIA, TB
New Orleans is not more likely than Portland or Sacramento
The name Stars seems to generic and they need to add some color. Black and White? No thanks.
I live about 2 1/2 hours south of there. For me to go to a MLB game, I have to go to Atlanta or St Louis. That’s about a 6 hour drive for me. Have been to Atlanta a couple times when the Cubs were in town. Would make a much easier drive to Nashville. BTW, the Nashville Sounds have one of the greatest scoreboards I have ever seen.
link
I think that a contrasting “star” shape would be cool behind the NS logo, but I guess that would look to much like the Astros…
I think it would be silly to bring a team into anywhere that is considered “Braves Country.” So much of the South identifies with the Braves, I think it would be hard for a team in Nashville or New Orleans or Raleigh to excite fans.
That’s what they said when the Nats popped up. It was Orioles territory. Worked out just fine.
But then again, I hate the Braves.
Is it just me or are the N and the S different fonts? If so, then I have to hate it out of pure desire for consistency. Also, the White Sox and Yankees are already the white and black/dark blue teams, so I think they should have chosen different colors for that reason and made their own look and find other ways to pay homage to the Negro League Stars.
Expansion would happen for the sole purpose of owners getting expansion fees and it would dilute the product on the field.
Seeing as how Nashville is building a new football stadium that the population was lied to about the need for, I don’t see how the citizens would want to pay for another sports facility that can’t offer half the lies used the Titans used. The only people that would benefit in this situation are the owners, unless their own funds to build a ballpark.
The Titans stadium thing is wild. Somehow it was going to cost more to renovate the old stadium than build a new one? I believe I read they claimed it required actual structural renovations, which seemed absurd given the age of the stadium. Of course it all had to do with the existing stadium not having the right configuration for all the high end seats and suites, not that it was not structurally sound or necessarily a bad environment for the average fan.
And I could sort of understand their nonsense once I saw they were going with a roof, assuming it was to get Superbowls there, but the capacity is so small they won’t get Superbowls. The whole thing was even more of a scam than most publicly funded stadiums.
The Bills owner said that about their stadium, and it was a lie and they didn’t release the details about how they came to that and overinflated the details they did provide to try and make it seem like a new stadium was cheaper. I didn’t hear that about Nissan Stadium though. Whatever needs repaired would be cheaper than what they’re saying.
Sorry, I don’t need to bring the tone of the article and comments down, I’m just sick of billions of dollars going to private sport teams and the public never getting their share back.
Been to quite a few Titans game. The current Nissan Stadium has never impressed me. Just very plain.
When they changed the field to artificial turf, I figured it would be around for a while though. Especially as bad as the natural grass field was late in the season. As far as the new stadium goes….. I can see where they now have the possibility of hosting a variety of different events other than football/concerts. A Final Four or a WrestleMania would probably bring in quite a bit of revenue. But, as with most professional sports teams, they all want the latest and greatest venues. That’s why I’m shocked that Fenway, Wrigley and Dodger Stadium are still around.
GTGFTU – Hate to do this after doing GTGFTS but… July 28, 2019 Great American Ball Park Cincinnati. Reds 3 Rockies 2. Reds broke out their 1967 throwbacks during a season in which they showcased uniforms from their 150 year history. Personal Note, these are my personal favorite Reds uniforms, wish they weren’t just a 1 year wonder. Probably will not use again because they were just before the “Big Red Machine” era.
Notes on the Nashville Stars: 1 Why not Nashville “Sounds”? 2. The Rays situation is now wide open IMO, hope they don’t move there (or anywhere else) and they sell to a local group.
I’m not a fan of baseball teams having both the team name and city name in the hat logo (like the Rockies). Pick one or the other.
Counterpoint: The “MB” Ball In Glove Brewers logo is the best in baseball. The “HW” Hartford Whalers logo was the best in all of North American sports.
Meh, I know they’re a baseball team, I don’t need their logo to be a piece of equipment. Same with half the NBA teams especially the Pistons, Knicks, and Nets (although some like the Heat’s work, but that’s the exception that proves the rule).
And I should also mention while I’m on this tangent that the Ducks logo works because it’s a modified older piece of equipment that stopped being used long before the team was founded so I’m fine with Mascot/logo equipment things like wildwing and Mr Met.
…and the Montréal Expos logo (an “M” incorporating “l” “e” “b” for “les expos baseball”) was/is one of the best of all time.
I am a baseball purist as well, but I don’t get the aversion to the posts about inter-league play. It is about the fans getting the opportunity to see all of the players. Why would you isolate half your teams from your fan base? How many times do want to see the Marlins?
I would champion a 4-team, 4-division format with a balanced scheduled that rewards teams for winning their division.
Separating the leagues made the World Series that much more special.
I wonder if there was a big to-do in the 1920s or ’30s about fans in Pittsburgh and Cincinnati not being able to see Babe Ruth, or fans in Detroit or Cleveland not seeing Rogers Hornsby. Although it’s true that in those days there were more cities with two teams (Boston, Philly, St. Louis), today everyone can see all of the top players on TV, and players jump leagues left-and-right sometimes in the prime of their careers (see, e.g.: Soto, Juan; Ohtani, Shohei) so they eventually make it to every ballpark. I mean, I get that there are people in Denver who would like to see Aaron Judge play in-person but I’m just not sure of how big a deal that is in 2025.
On a related note, I’ve always thought the NFL should eliminate interconference play, especially if each team isn’t playing every other team in its own conference. The Jets shouldn’t be playing the Falcons if they’re not playing the Broncos.
For the 32nd team, I’d like to see Oakland get a team again, but if not then Portland.
Why would they add another team in a smaller Bay Area city? it makes no sense. San Jose and Sacramento (although not Bay Area) are both larger and would get one first.
Good luck to Nashville. I have no ill will toward any city except one. And frankly, if there had been expansion to 32 in a timely manner I might not have ill will toward Vegas. I’ve broken my streak of reading Uni Watch every morning twice due to lede articles on the West Sacramento A*******s. These owners are a legally protected cartel and do not care about any city or fan. If Nashville pays $2-3 billion ransom up front, they get a team. If not, they don’t. F John Fisher. Nice logo, btw.
Agreed
My opinion. Maybe wait until you have actually secured a franchise before unveiling a uniform and team name. Even if Nashville gets a team and goes with the Stars name, is it likely this would be the actual look that would hit the field. This has an Atlantic Schooners vibe to it until the team is actually secured.
White Sox Fan here – My first thought: “Paging Mr. Reinsdorf, please pick-up the white courtesy phone.”
And…This makes me sad.
There’s nothing outright wrong with the logo and the colors here but I find them a little bland. If you’re gonna be the Nashville Stars, why not incorporate a star into the logo? I’m also not crazy about a team’s sole colors being black and white. I say this knowing that a lot of sports unis are overly designed these days, but I’m looking for a happy medium here I guess.
Bring back the Montréal Expos!
** why does that name sound familiar?? Could it possibly be the 6 season country music reality show called Nashville Star? Not a fan of the name but I like the idea of being the other black/white MLB team being right here in the Muzak City. Keep it simple.
And Possum Holler Possums has not yet been taken..
You don’t get a hat unless you have a team. Total jinx move.
I find it hard to believe that MLB would let an expansion team adopt a name they can’t trademark. And, honestly, there have to be better options. Negro Leagues tie-in or not, it’s pretty boring, and the same goes for the monogram. The last I heard about this endeavor, the ownership group wanted free land downtown near the river, and that was a hard no from the city. The city offered up free land in North Nashville, and the team is not interested. Would be wild if they actually used (or expanded) the ballpark they just built in Nashville, but that’s “not how it works.”
if mlb expands to 32 teams, why does everyone assume it’ll be 8 divisions of 4 teams? i’d much rather see 4 divisions of 8 teams. make winning your division mean something
Call it a conspiracy theory, but that black/white color scheme along with the logo scream to me that they’re trying to lure the White Sox over all other teams. Reinsdorf has telegraphed such a move with his toxic protestations to the entire Chicagoland metro area. To be clear, such a move would be a total abomination and cause me to never spend one thin dime at a major league park ever again. Just saying…. The Rays or A’s would be the obvious contenders to move to “trendy Southern town du jour that doesn’t really care about baseball”, like MLB has been telling us they want to do for 25 years….. Also, no pushback at all from the NHL’s Dallas Stars about this?
Great comments above.
I see Salt Lake City getting the second team given the demographics and growth rate. It still has a reputation for being small and the middle of nowhere, but I think MLB will be looking not just what is there now but also 30 years from now. Plus they have an excellent potential owners group and local government support. Time will tell however.
As for the concept. I’d give it a B+/A-. Love the cap design and harkback to the negro leagues. But I’d want them to differentiate colors from the White Sox. It’s just hard to do that with black and white (less different shades options than with blue for example). They may need a third color to do it.
I don’t think people realize how small SLC is, its metro area is half the size of Sacramento which people don’t think is a serious candidate. It also has way more sports teams which means the corporate sponsor money is being stretched thin compared to Portland and Sacramento.
Add in the Provo-Orem metro area though, which is essentially runs contiguous with SLC, and it eclipses Sacramento.
Okay, you add in the whole Combined statistical area and it ties Sacramento, add in the same for Sacramento (such as Stockton and Vacaville) and Sac is still larger by a lot.
MLB has far too many interlocking initial logos for them to pull this off. But I doubt this would be their final logo/cap insignia, if they do end up being granted a franchise. For the purpose of news headlines and an initial placeholder identity, it is unequivocally a baseball hat.
Team colors are Black and white…how charmingly dirtbag
When it comes to expansion, it will be one team in the East, one in the West. I think Nashville has the East locked up, with Charlotte as the dark horse. Out West, it’s a race between Portland and SLC.
That makes sense but what about the Rays? I assume Charlotte would be in play there. And if Nashville gets the Rays, then Charlotte could be a favorite (rather than the dark horse) for an expansion team.
Once again, I’ll float my realignment idea that returns the NL & AL to roughly their original territories, and that adds two additional regional LEAGUES:
NL: Cubs, Reds, Brewers, Mets, Phillies, Pirates, Cardinals, Blue Jays
AL: Orioles, Red Sox, White Sox, Guardians, Tigers, Royals, Twins, Yankees
Southern League: Braves, Marlins, Astros, Stars, Rays, Rangers, Nationals, [probably Charlotte]
Western League: Diamondbacks, Rockies, Athletics, Angels, Dodgers, Padres, Giants, Mariners
The two hats of polar opposite colors reminds me of the the Yankees and Dodgers when they had to wear those god-awful black and white unis. Just totally uninspired. The logo isn’t too bad but the name Stars is too bland, thereby rendering the logo moot I suppose.
I don’t think MLB is in a position to expand anyway what with having two of their teams playing in milb stadiums this season. TB has had too much going on with their stadium situation and they consistently lead the league in low attendance. I could definitely foresee them moving to Nashville but obviously having to ditch the name. Nashville Outlaws anyone?
Anyone else bothered by the lower right portion of the “N” not having a serif? That really annoys me, but I guess I’m easily annoyed.
Interesting comments. However, SLC is a lock to get a ballclub. Now, feel free to comment on some of those other potential future outposts.
Appreciate honoring the Negro Leagues but what a boring identity. The logo looks like a dollar sign. Move Tampa or Oakland there.
If Manfred sucks, as many claim, then, NO to Nashville until the Expos return to Montreal.
I said SLC is a lock. Etch it in stone.
We’re still doing “prexy” in our writing? Why?! Shortening “president” to fit a headline in Variety is one thing but the paragraph is all yours. It isn’t cute. It’s cloying. Sorry.
I’m hoping that the caps are just black and white as a placeholder because they haven’t decided the actual team colors yet. They did the same thing at San Diego FC events a couple years ago. This logo could look a lot better with different colors