Major League Baseball this morning announced a new long-term partnership with Stance as the official on-field sock of the league.
The deal begins with players wearing Stance socks at the 2016 All-Star festivities in San Diego featuring the All-Star Game logo right on the sock itself and will continue throughout the remainder of the season and into 2017. The in-game socks for regular season play in 2016 will remain your standard MLB sock fare, solid colours and basic stripe designs. In 2017, however, things could get a little more interesting as “a more comprehensive lineup of styles will be making its debut”.
“There is nothing as prolific as the Major League Baseball uniform and we have been eyeing it for years as a potential canvas for the unique style Stance can bring,” Stance’s EVP of Business Development, Clarke Miyasaki said in the press release. “It’s extremely rare for any brand to have such an impactful and unique opportunity, so we can’t wait to work with the league to bring an incredible performance sock to the best players in the world.”
As mentioned, players will wear special sock designs for the All-Star Game, beginning with the Home Run Derby the night before. Those socks will be brown, orange, and yellow with the All-Star Game wordmark to match with the retro-Padres-themed jerseys and caps for the event:
For the actual Mid-Summer Classic players, who will be wearing their usual home (AL) or road (NL) uniforms for the game, will wear special “National” or “American” League designs, each will have the 2016 All-Star Game logo on the side, the AL sock blue with many yellow stripes and the NL black with white stripes. Both will have the league name at the heel.
You may recall Stance for their wildly sock-sessful line of NBA hosiery introduced recently which led to special sock designs not only for each team but also for special holidays such as Martin Luther King Day and Veteran’s Day. So, y’know, I’m just saying we’ll probably see some camo socks next Memorial Day.
MLB and Stance had been partnered up prior to this deal, but only for retail. This agreement extends that to the on-field product. This doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll suddenly start seeing designs like those examples above on the field any time soon, but it’s now certainly technologically possible to do so, and as I alluded to a paragraph back, this is definitely something we’ll be seeing as part of MLB’s special holiday uniform sets one day.
I’m curious to see where this goes in terms of your standard uniform sets, for example a team like the Arizona Diamondbacks could now extend their gradient down the sock to the top of the shoe. The New York Yankees? No need to stop the pinstripes where the pants end, go all the way!
Whether you like the idea or not, we can at least all agree that it gives all of us sports uniform nuts yet another part of the baseball uniform to talk about. That’s a shoe-in.
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