Missives of a Baseball Milquetoast

For the last post of 2017 I'm continuing the trend of showcasing a classic Class A Short Season cap while also paying tribute to my favorite band, Phish, who got their start  in Burlington, Vermont which is where t he Vermont Expos (now Lake Monsters) played.  The Vermont Expos of the New York-Penn League wore this logo from 1994 through 2005. Because there is no New Era flag it's safe to say this cap is from 1996 at the latest. The sweatband tags here have the mid-1990's flavor. Notice the size tag flapping in the wind! Can't believe for the second week in a row I've got a cap that's over 20 years old and hasn't had its tags popped. Ringing in the new year in style! This cap isn't for sale or trade however don't hesitate to reach out if there's something you like on the  Trading Block  and you are willing to  part  with any of the hats  on my  Wish List . Happy New Year y'all and a s always, thanks for coming back

I guess since BirdFest is over, it's finally time to  look at a cap that is not an Orioles affiliate. There is  however a connection between last week's Aberdeen IronBirds post  and the 2000 Utica Blue Sox hat that is this week's Fresh Fitted Friday selection.  We know Cal Ripken, Jr. owns the IronBirds but you might be surprised to learn the Utica Blue Sox was the team he bought and moved to Aberdeen. These sweatband tags are consistent with caps from 2000 and 2001 but this cap can't be older than 2001 since that was the team's last season in Utica.  The Carolina Blue MILB batterman here is top-not stuff. Utica doesn't host a minor league team anymore but they were lucky to have Miguel Cabrera play during the penultimate Blue Sox season in 2000. I hold Utica with the same reverence as other classic New York-Penn League locations such as Auburn, Batavia, Elmira, Vermont and Oneonta. While I've gotten my hands on a vintage c

Well, BirdFest sure  flew  by quickly didn't it? Are you proud of me for finally coming up with a name for the Orioles/Maryland-theme I've been running for the past month? And how about that sweet pun to lede this week's post! Nice, right? At any rate, this week's  Fresh Fitted Friday selection  is an Aberdeen IronBirds cap I got in 2013. I've been wanting to write about this one for a long time and now I finally have a reason as it's a Maryland-based team right down to the core. This is the current IronBirds logo. It was designed ahead of the 2013 season by Studio Simon which is a design firm based in Louisville, KY. Sweatband tags are more fun to look at on older caps but this one's cool because you see the "Made in U.S.A." peeking out below the center tag which is sadly far too uncommon these days. You also don't come across too many MILB batterman logos that are silver or grey so this is another neat thing about thi

For this week's edition of Fresh Fitted Friday, I figured I'd take a break from writing about caps from The Great eBay Haul that are too small for me to wear. Instead, I'm featuring a  Williamsport Crosscutters   snapback that I'm unlikely to wear simply because it's already falling apart and I haven't even worn it yet but to be fair, the sweatband is in good shape. The "crosscut saw" portion of this logo resembles fraying wool which plays well into the rugged lumberjack  design aspect. According to Paul Caputo's article,  Logging On: The Story Behind the Williamsport Crosscutters , the logo used until 2007 was hastily designed by a "local artist" when the team's affiliation switched from the Cubs to the Pirates in 1999. That artist was surely inspired by the other logos of hirsute bat wielders such as the Clinton LumberKings,   Butte Copper Kings and Stockton Ports . This Crosscutters logo also bears an uncanny resemblanc

Last week's Montreal Expos post was a little heavy but y'all know how I get when I get to talking about that dang team! While this week continues on the Expos trend, I wanted to showcase this ever-so-fun Vermont Expos snapback from the mid-1990's. That's Champ. He's the team's mascot and he's an undeniably happy little fella there isn't he? He couldn't get mad if he wanted to. Even if Jeffrey Loria wanted to drain the swamp (or lake) in which he lives. I was looking for a fitted version of this cap but it's a hard cap logo to find so I'm happy with the snapback version for now.  We've definitely seen this tag before and while it's not a giveaway for a specific year, the lack of the "New Era flag" tags tells me it's pre-1997. As far as I've been able to tell, the MILB batterman has  appeared on caps around 1994  at the earliest. You're seeing it from the inside here so you can appreciate the lo

It was lots of fun when last week's Fresh Fitted (er, snapback) made its debut at a ballgame but the first ever appearance for this week's cap will my friends' wedding! Well not at the wedding of course because that would be a violation of my household covenant but rest assured, it will be worn before and after the wedding ceremony.  When it came time to pick this week's cap  my preliminary desire was to a feature one with a letter combination of  "S" and "C"  in the logo as those are t he first initials of the bride and groom.  It turns out that my only cap that matches that qualification is a Shreveport Captains hat which I've already featured.  My fruitless search led to frustration. It seemed that I would have to stretch to find a cap relating to my friends when all of a sudden, I recalled that the groom went to SUNY Geneseo. That town doesn't have a professional team but Elmira is 90 miles away and it does: the Elmira Pioneer

When I wrote about my F t. Myers Miracle cap   a few months ago, I briefly mentioned  Jeffrey Loria ’s  role in moving the Montreal Expos to Washington , D.C. Well, this week's Fresh Fitted is a  Vermont Lake Monsters cap from  2009-2013 that I picked up  a little while back and it ties back to that story...at least partially, but we ’ ll get to that later.  This is a very unique cap design and I appreciate the white front panel here. This close-up shot kind of brings attention to the poor detail in the artwork. Does that even look like a baseball bat? Some standard inside sweatband tags...no big whoop. I definitely dig the green on the batterman patch. This is a nice touch. The reason I chose to bust this  hat out now is because the cap logo reminds me of the newly rebranded logo for the Norfolk Tides, which is my childhood hometown team.  I don’t wish to take the focus too far off the Lake Monsters but I should note that i mmediately after the up