New Tribe Unis Still Need Tweaking

So the Indians announced some new additions a couple days ago, a move that won’t help the standings but may help sales. The Indians unveiled their new uniforms for 2011, and while they are getting mostly positive reviews, on the whole it seems a little half-assed.

Probably the most noticeable change is the dropping of the  grey road jersey with the script “Cleveland” lettering and replacing it with a block “Cleveland” and what seems to be a bit darker shade of grey. I wasn’t a fan of those uniforms in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s but this one is nicely done. Might have to pick one up. I do not know if they will have the players’ names on the back.

Also gone is the script “I” hats that I actually liked a lot, and it’s replaced by the block “C” hats that the team has been phasing in. Not bad, but I wish there was some kind of trim around the “C”.

Another major change is the home alternates (the cream jerseys with block “Indians” lettering) will now use a red cap with a block “C” design. While the Indians had used a red cap a couple of years ago with a block “C” that they used for holiday games (which, by the way, I LOVED and I definitely own one of those hats), these look awful, and it would be really easy to make them look sweet, just by adding a white trim around the “C”, because without that trim the “C” just gets lost in the background.

Chief Wahoo is still around, and he’s featured fairly prominently on the left sleeve of each uniform. I don’t think the Chief will ever be phased out, but I agree with Paul from The DiaTribe: a Chief Wahoo in his full batting stance from old Municipal Stadium would look absolutely awesome on the sleeve.

So all-in-all, these unis are fairly good (definitely not terrible by any means), but they don’t feel fully thought-out. A trim around the block “C”s on the caps would go a long way (assuming they don’t want to go balls out with the batting Wahoo). I’m also holding out final judgment until I see if the roadies have the players’ names on the back. I absolutely hate jerseys without names on the back, and not cause I don’t know the players. It just reminds me of the Yankees and Red Sox, and I want nothing to do with them.

But if the Tribe makes a little bit of tweaking, I may be buying a new hat and jersey sometime soon.