With Spring Training finally here(!), what better time to take a good look at Major League Baseball’s logo package for the 2020 Spring Training session.
As has been a running theme now over the past several springs, the league is going with a road trip overall look with their Spring Training, Grapefruit League, and Cactus League logos in 2020, as well as for each of the individual team logos.
“Our Spring Training logos this year are representative of travel around the U.S., and more particularly, road trips,” said Anne Occi, MLB Vice President, Design Services.
The primary mark, seen below, maps out the United States (sorry Toronto) with a cactus plant in the Arizona area and two grapefruits just north of Florida. There’s a teal border in the southwest, an orange border in the southeast (representing the primary colours of the 2020 Cactus and Grapefruit Leagues respectively), and up across the north, we see a lime green border.
“The real energy of the logos comes from the vibrant colours that symbolize springtime and the return of baseball”, Occi added.
While that map logo up above is the primary logo for Spring Training, the wordmark logo below has been tabbed the “primary event logo”. It essentially strips away the map and other imagery on the logo leaving us with just the wordmark.
Above you’ll also see the individual Cactus and Grapefruit League logos which carry on the map theme seen in the primary logo with the use of the Arizona and Florida state maps.
Background art, which is used on signage, programs, tickets and other related design materials around Spring Training also featured several of these road trip ideas.
“For the background, we used a popular motif, a tone-on-tone repeat of emblems that are associated with being on the road”, Occi added. “That includes maps, sunglasses and travel mugs.”
Each team has two variations of their individual camp logos, the first designed as a map pin (or a “Google Maps logo”, if you’re under 25) — say you’re heading out on the road to see your boys this March, here’s how you’d ideally mark your map.
The pins are each team’s primary colour with the secondary colour used as trim colour inside the pinhead, the cap logo within that, below the city in which each team holds their camp.
The second set of team-specific logos are a series of license plate designs, the camp location up top where the state or province would normally reside, “Spring Training” scripted across the bottom, and even a validation sticker in either corner listing “AZ” for Arizona or “FL” for Florida in the left, and the year in the right. Each team’s wordmark logo across the middle.
A reminder of how Spring Training primary logos have looked in recent years compared to this year’s edition:
Pitchers and catchers have already reported, the first Spring games get underway next week with the premier matchup on the afternoon of Friday, February 21st.
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