Orioles unveil standard hideous alternate holiday jerseys for charity

What’s even better than one day of gaudy American flag-laden baseball uniforms? To Major League Baseball, the answer is four days worth of wearing gaudy American flag-laden baseball uniforms.

This guiding principle has informed the year’s “special event” uniforms, all of which will be worn for multiple days. The Orioles will therefore be wearing jerseys for both Mother’s Day and Father’s Day for two days each, and around Memorial Day weekend and the Fourth of July, they’ll wear special uniforms for several days, getting both home and road out of the jerseys.

There is, at least, the fig leaf of auctioning off the jerseys for charitable causes, but the creep of the jerseys to multiple days is another sign that MLB is taking this stuff to ridiculous extremes and no one has the power to stop them.

Here’s the assortment of Orioles holiday uniforms:

There’s just no way to make any of these uniforms look good or natural. There is no way to combine the American flag and the Cartoon Bird on a red hat and have them look any good together.

At least this year, the Orioles won’t be wearing Father’s Day blue in a game against the Blue Jays.

All in all, the Mother’s Day uniforms will be worn on both May 13 and the actual Mother’s Day, May 14. Father’s Day uniforms will be worn on June 17 and the actual Father’s Day, June 18.

Memorial Day uniforms will be worn May 27-29, with road jerseys on the 27th and 28th and home jerseys on the 29th. Fourth of July jerseys will appear on July 2 at home as well as July 3 and 4 on the road. Other websites indicate that the Independence Day jerseys will be used on July 1 as well, although the Orioles graphic does not say so above.

In addition to the uniforms, there are also league-mandated sock choices for the holidays, which you can see outlined by Chris Creamer’s Sports Logos.

What’s different, other than the jerseys being worn for multiple days? Creamer notes that for the Memorial Day uniform set, camouflage has been de-emphasized compared to the past. The camo pattern will only be present on the bill of the caps and on the socks, and is not on the jersey at all.

The caps generally have a “heathered” pattern, which I will fully admit I am not sophisticated enough to understand how that’s different from the usual caps.

There will also be special baseballs with different-colored stitches for each particular special event.

You can get a look at how the All-Star jerseys and caps will appear for the Orioles players who happen to make the team. Here’s hoping for another team with a handful of worthy All-Stars. They aren’t much better.