Phillies City Connect Uniforms

With the unveiling of the Phillies “City Connect” uniforms the only thing I have to say is that there is a clear disconnect between the Nike executives who approved this jersey and the city of Philadelphia. These were undoubtedly made by the people who don’t get Philly. They see craziness without the loyalty. The lack of charm without the character. The outrage without the passion. These jerseys were produced out of corporate greed as a money grab scheme. Which we would all be fine with if the jerseys didn’t suck. If you are going to try to pull off a money grab scheme like this maybe design jerseys people actually want. These people asked themselves and each other: what does Philly care about and how do we put that on a uniform? They then proceeded to decide the colors of the city flag were the best way to go. I’m not sure a single fan wanted to see the colors of the city flag on a Phillies jersey. The Phillies arguably had the best collection of five uniforms in all of baseball. They were forced to ditch their red alternate uniforms for the city connect jerseys. In addition to a poor color scheme made even worse by the fact that it replaced a great uniform they decided to add a terrible font. The font is supposed to represent what was used on the Declaration of Independence paying homage to the great history of this city and country. The concept of this is cool in theory. However, it was also screwed up by being made into a cheap looking font on the front that barely resembles the Declaration while the jersey numbers on the back are somehow even worse. The jersey numbers look like they were drawn by someone learning to write for the very first time. And Trea Turner’s number 7 looks like a question mark more than any number I’ve ever seen which possibly pays homage to the fact that you wonder where the Phuck the Phillies talent goes for the first three months of the season. The fade from light blue into navy or as Nike puts it “light to dark” represents “Philly being unafraid to revolutionize, start anew and work hard to make change.” How a terrible color scheme represents being unafraid to make change I do not know. To say Nike is feeding us BS doesn’t seem to do it justice as I’m pretty sure they got the quote from an episode of my little pony. On the other hand, the Sixers have had great city connect uniforms. A combination of cool color schemes and paying tribute to legendary teams and players of the past and even the silhouette of the Boathouse Row. They achieved giving fans a new jersey to spend money on that looks good without straying too far from the great color scheme they have. The phillies have great colors currently, they have great alternate colors, and they have great throwback colors. Something very easily could have been done using a royal blue jersey, or a maroon throwback made modern, or even essentially the exact jersey they made now but red faded into black or white would be better. New colors based on a city flag only need to be used when your team's uniforms colors already suck. Save that for the Padres or Mets.  As for positives, the hat with the liberty bell is cool although it would still look better in another color. The Love park patch is a nice touch but it looks cheap thanks to the child labor and cheap materials provided by Fanatics. The city skyline logo is cool but it is only on the inside of the collar and I'm no fashion expert but I don’t think wearing jerseys inside out is going to be in style anytime soon. There were countless fan designs online that paid far better tribute to the city and Phillies organization while also looking way better. These jerseys would have achieved Nike’s goal of money grabbing. In the future maybe Nike will enlist the help of real fans or have a promotional design contest. Until then I hope these jerseys are only used to be burned. Unless we win a World Series in them in which case I will be forced to change my opinion but will still be forever haunted by the fact that a championship was won in such an awful jersey.