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Showing posts with the label California League

San Jose Giants - 2013 California League All-Star Game

Unless something changes between now and next week, the last cap in this recent tour throughout the California league is going to be this San Jose Giants cap which features a patch commemorating San Jose hosting the 2013 California League All-Star Game. Side-patch mania is at another one of its peaks with cap collectors currently and while I'm not personally seeking out these newfangled releases, my thing will always be vintage caps of Giants affiliates that feature truly special patches such as this week's  Fresh Fitted Friday  selection. This patch ranks right after the 2007 MLB All-Star Game patch as far as I'm concerned. I love the Giants wordmark logo featured prominently on top of what looks like the In-N-Out logo and bonus points for the text specifying that the exhibition game was played between the Carolina League and California League. I'm only just now popping tags on this one so forgive me for the sticker shock here but wow... a Made In China cap retailed

2020 Rancho Cucamonga "Temblores"

I've enjoyed welcoming the first signs of Fall here in New York lately as the days get shorter and the air becomes increasingly more brisk however it's important to think of our friends on the West Coast who receive no quarter as wildfires continue to rage across those states.  Natural disasters are a possibility no matter where you live but in the five years I spent in the Bay Area, my greatest fear—besides my irrational phobia of getting eaten alive by a shark— was being helpless in the middle of a major earthquake/fire type scenario.  I'm overcome with sadness for those affected by these current happenings, especially since  I never experienced any of those things firsthand. In truth, I have a hard time even thinking about those situations so it goes without saying I'm not going to be rewatching Jaws or sitting through any sort of disaster movie sometime soon.  Hats are a different story with me for some reason!  I've had my eye on a certain (not telling you whic

1999-Present Lake Elsinore Storm Home Cap

I'm getting close to putting down the landing gear on this six-month long  Viaje  (Spanish for "Road Trip")  of west coast MILB teams and there is not a better California League cap to bring it on home on than the Lake Elsinore home cap, which the team has worn consistently since 1999. This is one of the most popular logos in all of minor league baseball, but I'm personally not as into it. The eyes remind me of those "No Fear" shirts from the early 1990s which are only fondly remembered by those who enjoyed wearing toxic masculinity on a t-shirt back then. I'm unable to pin down a year for this cap because it was acquired secondhand a few years ago through a bulk purchase that I occasionally refer to as the Great eBay Haul, or just the eBay Haul if I'm feeling modest. Also, the team has worn this logo since the beginning of time. The price sticker on this "low-profile" style cap reads $28 so it would seem whoever owned this cap before me

2015 Stockton Ports

This week's Stockton Ports hat is similar to last week's High Desert Mavericks cap in that they are both California League caps that I was completely certain I had already featured but alas, had not. I  wish I had a cool backstory here but to be completely honest, I don't even remember when I purchased it.  I tried digging through my emails for a confirmation for more details and the closest I got was one from 2015 for a purchase for "STO NE AU ROAD 5950 CAP RYL/SCARLET-HAT" which isn't too descriptive but  "STO" seems to be an appropriate abbreviation for "Stockton" and  the colorway listed checks out for the  Ports "road" cap. The Ports road cap is my favorite of all the versions they currently wear. I love the anchor's hook piercing the baseball and the colorway surrounding the "P" reminds me of the Peninsula Pilots , which, as I've mentioned before is one of my all-time favorite cap logos. Made in U.S.A. qua

1991-2016 High Desert Mavericks - Fresh Fitted Friday!!!!

I've got another old-fangled cap for this week's edition of Fresh Fitted Friday but please note this High Desert Mavericks post is actually evocative in multiple regards. The first is in the traditional sense as this week's hat is almost thirty years old however the second aspect has more to do with metaphotographical attributes since the photos themselves are almost seven years old! I unearthed these relics-depicting-relics during a recent reorganization effort of my photo library and the timing couldn't have been more perfect as I felt like this tour through the California League needed at least one more contribution of the vintage variety.  As a San Francisco Giants fan, Bruce Bochy's career path is of great interest to me so I'd like to highlight the fact that the future Hall-Of-Fame manager was at the helm during the Mavericks' inaugural season in 1991. This was Bochy's third managerial assignment but his first was one I discussed in a Spokane Ind

1993-94 Central Valley Rockies

After two weeks of retro versions of most short-lived––yet iconic––logo designs of the early 1990's, it's finally time to feature a true vintage cap from that era with this Central Valley Rockies hat which could be from either 1993 or 1994 as that was the last year of the team's existence. Behold! I can't think of any other time that a Rockies farm team employed teal on a cap whose logo was repurposed from the big league club. Fun fact: the V is for Visalia, which was where the team called home for those two seasons. Because the Central Valley Rockies were only around for two years, the only name associated with the team that clicks with me is Paul Zuvella (the happy smiley guy shown above) who managed during the inaugural season in 1993.   In the previous photo from the team's first season in 1993, you'll notice that Zuvella was wearing a cap with a grey undervisor. Because it's green on this week's cap, I'm thinking the team just must have had both

1992 Salinas Spurs (eCapcity Retro)

In accordance with adhering to the current theme of “defunct California League teams”, there’s really not a more logical successor to last week’s San Bernardino Spirit cap than the one the Salinas Spurs wore for just one season in 1992. Starting things off with an image of Dick Little wearing the famed Spurs hat in 1992 I was searching high and low for California League teams that featured a star in the logo but I settled on one that just featured an “S” with spurs attached. I picked this one up from eCapcity back in 2018. Unlike with my San Bernardino Spirit buying experience, I selected the right size this time. The green underbrim, no batterman and a tonal New Era flag that you barely notice all join forces to make this one of the better retro releases of the last few years This isn’t one that I own, but just for reference here is an image of a vintage Spurs cap from 1992 Update (8/19/2020): I had to add this image post hoc because it's important to show this combination of a g

San Bernardino Spirit (Hat Club Retro) - Fresh Fitted Friday!!!!

After a few weeks in MLB-appreciation land, I've decided to shift my attention back toward MILB. This week's San Bernardino Spirit retro that I picked up from Hat Club in 2019 is  the perfect cap to segue into yet another caravan of caps from West Coast teams and not just because it  fulfills the "star" theme requirement seen in the previous three posts. The main connection this cap shares with last week's Seattle Mariners cap is that it was one of the first logos worn by the generation of Mariners who were drafted right after the upside down trident drifted off to sea for good in 1987. It me, the guy who bought a 7 1/8 and not a 7 3/8 or 7 1/2 like I normally wear. All good though as my Hat Jack has been working overtime this past year trying to stretch it out to my size. I hope Hat Club decides to retro this cap again one day because I'm not even close to forgiving myself for ordering the wrong size here. Plus, this hat is so tight I'm about to pass out

1994 San Jose Giants Cap - Fresh Fitted Friday!!!!

Ok now, I know these entries are named "Fresh Fitted Friday" but sometimes it's important not to overlook the virtue of the non-fitted cap. While I am not suggesting the likelihood of entry titles like "Sweet Snapback Saturday" or anything of the sort, I do feel that certain cap logos just seem to look better on snapbacks. When I moved to New York City in 2010, I noticed then that much of the city's cap culture had started paying attention to snapbacks. I tried to stay away from that trend as much as possible but some caps represent your favorite team so well that, when they come your way it's hard to turn them down. Such was the case when I came across this vintage San Jose Giants cap. I've found that I'm not the only San Francisco Giants fan in town as I see plenty of standard SF Giants caps out and about, so I am looking forward to wearing this San Jose Giants snapback. I especially like the way the orange visor sets off with the gree

1995 Stockton Ports Cap - Fresh Fitted Friday!!!!

It seems like lately I haven't been able to come up with an answer to this very simple question: what is it that makes a minor league ballcap interesting? In the past I argued that a minor league team's cap logo is inherently more interesting if it has very little resemblance to that of its parent club.  Yet, I've also recently applauded caps that make an interesting allusion to their parent clubs while maintaining a local sensibility in the logo. The latter is certainly the case with this Stockton Ports cap: An item of note is that the Stockton Ports have long-believed that the  Ernest Thayer poem "Casey at the Bat" was based on their team. While that might or might not be true, I like that they believe it enough to use an image of a Mudville Nine batter-man, who himself is wearing a pillbox cap with an M on it. I love meta-caps! As for the production year on this cap, there is no evidence of it before the 1994 season. It's not often-see