Tuesday, February 02, 2010

2010 Spring Training Caps Look Even Worse Than Before

Remember the Dodgers' bizarre Spring Training / Batting Practice caps (unveiled in 2007), and how the little semicircles of light gray on the sides made one look as if he had Reed Richards-like graying temples?

Well, New Era decided to update their BP cap designs. And now, we get extra piping!

And Cubs fans--who must have a thing for piping--are dancing in the streets with excitement over these new-styled caps:

"I love the BP hats because they're fresh and different," said Stancil, 38, the sports information director of Union College. "I always look forward to when a new line of BP hats come out because it's interesting to see the design of the hat, like with the piping around the front of the hat and on the bill as well as what logo is used for each team. My favorite team is the Cubs, and I love the white 'C' on the hat mainly because you don't see that anywhere else on Cubbie merchandise.

Why the change? According to New Era, it's all about locating the dazzle fabric juuuuuuust right:

"The new BP caps continue to be a combination of great style and great performance," said Gerry Matos, New Era senior vice president of marketing. "This year's cap moves the dazzle fabric gusset from the prior BP cap to the rear, which serves to better highlight the MLB silhouette batter logo. And we've added piping as an accenting visor treatment.

"Overall, we think it's a great looking cap that will appeal to an even broader audience than the prior version."

For $27, they damn well had better get the dazzle fabric placement right. But I'll leave it to you readers to discuss the merits of placement options in the comment thread.

13 comments:

Fred's Brim said...

don't WANT

i want them to come back with the Dodger hats with green under the brim

Alex Cora said...

At least they weren't Beadazzled!

Mr. LA Sports Czar said...

The trick is to shut your eyes around St. Patrick's Day when they sport the - gag - green hats.

MR.F said...

No LA sports team should EVER wear green.

Casey Lombardo said...

I think these are an obvious improvement on the "gray semi-circles" design, but they're still pretty retarded. They should do the Spring Training hats with the trucker mesh backs and maybe a stylish braid across the base of the front!

Kyle Baker said...

As a collector of fine Dodgers hats, I have to say this one is marginally better than last year's BP cap, but that one set an extremely low benchmark to begin with. Do they not have some sort of fasion person they run these through before making the buy? (Karina, this is a job for you!) And why must all BP caps look pretty much retarded? Can they not come up with an alternative enough version of the regular caps, so they just have to get all zany with the piping? And if so, they should just reconsider the idea of the BP cap in the first place.

Of the 14 billion Dodgers caps I seem to have, this will not be one of them.

MeanieBreanie said...

From a woman's perspective, these are just plain ugly! I don't know if you could even claim that they are "marginally" better than last year's version. Who is responsible for making these decisions? They obviously acted without seeking an outside opinion. Had this been up for election on SoSG it probably would have been one of the first to go.

Wesley Vento said...

Need. Actual. Baseball. News.

Kyle Baker said...

Meanie-

As I said, "[the 2009 one] set an extremely low benchmark to begin with."

Unknown said...

Dodger Deer Stalker batting practice hat anyone!?!? Seems like the obvious next step :)

Mr. LA Sports Czar said...

I'm with HLACK

MR.F said...

It's a racing stripe. Now they just need fins for aerodynamics and it'll be a winner.

Jason said...

It does bear some resemblance to a ridiculously over-pruned chin-strap beard which just ups the ugly factory through the roof.