By the time Major League Baseball and the MLB Players’ Association gave the go-ahead to slap advertising patches on jerseys, the modern consumer had long since accepted defeat.
Brand bombardment is simply a way of life, and any notion that the big league uniform was too hallowed a space for corporate encroachment was almost laughable.
Yet that doesn’t mean fans have to like it.
Each rollout of a jersey patch brings with it some level of protest, and the visceral social media reaction to major league uniforms looking a little too much like European soccer kits can be seen on a nightly basis.
For now, 23 of 30 teams have taken the extra cash that comes with uniform partnerships, the annual revenue bump ranging from a few million dollars to enough to pay a No. 1 starter. And it’s probably just a matter of time before the Rockies, Nationals, Rays, Twins, White Sox, Mariners and Athletics (wherever they may be) make it a clean 30 for 30.
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But not all patches are created equal. Some brands might be quicker to offend the sensibilities. And while results may vary by consumer, USA TODAY Sports attempts to cut through the cloth and rank the 23 jersey ads, from worst to least offensive:
The Yankees might have you believe that they are built different, simply because they ban unkempt facial hair and for whatever reason have yet to roll out a City Connect fit, and don’t besmirch the back of their jerseys with player names. Well, like anyone else, they simply have a price. And that’s reportedly $25 million annually for this insurance outfit to slap a patch on the pinstripes. Kind of a disappointment, in that you’d think the Yankees could at least procure a top-shelf national #brand for this deal.
A real full-circle moment here: Cleveland was unknowingly the birthplace of the modern environmental movement when the Cuyahoga River caught fire yet again in 1969. Now, its hometown ballclub is prominently sponsored by a corporation that ranks among the top 20 polluters in the nation and ran a stealth operation to roll back emissions standards. Alas, at least nothing can muddy Emmanuel Clase’s reliably clean ninth innings.
We get it: A bunch of rich dudes own the team. It’s great that Guggenheim Partners controls more than $300 billion in assets and that CEO/Dodgers owner Mark Walter has a net worth estimated north of $6 billion. We’re told they can afford to purchase good ballplayers. Yet tossing the brand, such as it is, on a jersey patch only serves to remind fans they are simply watching a proxy war between wealth managers and private equity bros.
The Atlanta-based “concrete and cementious products manufacturer” has a five-year deal and is “proud to have our hometown team wear our iconic yellow bag QUIKRETE logo on their sleeve,” said Will Magill, CEO of QUIKRETE. Yet folks watch ballgames to relax. The “iconic yellow bag” simply reminds the viewer that they’re probably ditching a home repair or improvement project to watch a frivolous sporting event. It could have been worse: Home Depot’s headquarters is about three miles from Truist Park.
At first glance, this looks like a great marriage: Baseball, hot dogs, apple pie and the iconic brand of General Motors. In reality, it’s a result of Bay Area Tech Brain run amok. It’s easy to forget that the Giants slapped Chevy on their sleeve after one failed season with Cruise, which bills itself as the “leading driverless ridehail service.” This ill-fated partneship began with a video featuring manager Gabe Kapler and closer Camilo Doval, who are both out of those jobs, and it only got worse. Cruise’s CEO resigned after one of its robotaxis dragged a pedestrian 20 feet and state officials accused Cruise of withholding key information. GM is the parent company of both Chevrolet and Cruise.
Remember Enron Field, the original name of the Astros’ ballpark before the energy company’s shameful collapse? Well, its bones reside, somewhat, within the Rangers’ jersey. Kelcy Warren, Energy Transfer’s co-founder, former CEO and now executive chairman of the board of directors, purchased thousands of miles of pipelines after Enron’s demise, building an energy behemoth. Energy Transfer now has a $54 billion market cap and a piece of the Rangers’ threads.
Billed as “Philadelphia’s hometown health insurer for more than 85 years,” and “proud to have our brand cemented in Phillies history.” Yet we are once again asking why health-care providers are in the promotion and brand-building business rather than, you know, curtailing the cost of getting sick.
Yeah, you can’t fit all that on a patch so “Oxy” adorns the sleeve, just like its significant signage around Minute Maid Park. It is Texas and it is oil, perhaps the most inevitable marriage, or, as Astros vice president Jeff Stewart put it: “We’re proud of our longstanding relationship with Oxy and are grateful for their shared commitment to both community and our fans.” The extra revenue will help offset the sunk cost into Jose Abreu, at least.
Sure, it seems benign enough. Yet the Cubs-Motorola partnership was announced two years after the Padres struck a deal with Motorola for MLB’s first jersey patch. You’d think the iconic Cubs brand wouldn’t take a back seat to the Padres, but it checks out when you take a look at the National League standings. The agreement also includes the “motorola razr room,” located next to the Cubs’ team store, and the intentional lower-case spelling will surely convince Gen Zers to ditch their iPhones.
The Canadian commercial banking division of TD Bank is a typically drab and relatively benign sponsor. But those patches? The green stands out, way too much, on all the Blue Jays’ jerseys, be it the home whites, the powder or darker blues.
The Marlins join forces with “the most trusted brand in smart home and small business security,” and hey, even with the pitch clock ensuring a faster game, you don’t wanna worry too much about your home getting ransacked while watching Roddery Muñoz toe the rubber: “The partnership will showcase the commitment from ADT and the Marlins in a shared belief that everyone deserves to feel safe. The two local organizations will identify areas at loanDepot park to use ADT’s industry-leading smart security products to help keep fans, players, and visitors safe at home when they visit the ballpark.”
In a scattershot manner to which Mets fans have grown accustomed, the patch rollout was quickly revised when observers noted the patch resembled “Phillies colors.” Whatever. The newer patch is more aesthetically pleasing, anyway. The Mets-hospital collab will include a “branded seventh-inning stretch” to promote active lifestyles and on-field recognition of health care workers. Meanwhile, newborns birthed at New York Presbyterian will receive Mets onesies. Cute!
A St. Louis-based financial services holding company, “one of the nation’s leading full-service wealth-management and investment banking firms.” Says they “are delighted that baseball fans across the country will see our logo tastefully integrated into the Cardinals’ iconic uniform.”
In part, says Northwestern CEO John Schlifske, because “We’re spending $1 billion downtown on our campus. But ultimately, to attract employees to Milwaukee, we need to be a big league city, so having the Brewers here is a huge part of that overall package when you live and work and play in Milwaukee.”
Billed as a “leading global technology distributor and solutions provider headquartered in Arizona.” It’s not hard to imagine their logo affixed to the polo shirt of a business traveler waiting to board a Southwest flight at Sky Harbor.
Why do the Padres rank so far ahead of the Cubs? They were there first, for one. Motorola will also serve as the presenting partner of the Padres Hall of Fame. As sports partnerships go, telecommunications is in San Diego’s blood, as it was Qualcomm which yanked the name off Jack Murphy Stadium more than a quarter-century ago and the two corporations, in their frequent collaborations, “share passion for disrupting the status quo.”
FBM on the sleeve, it’s a company founded just a few miles from Angel Stadium and “a leading distributor of building materials and construction products such as gypsum wallboards, metal framing, door and window frames, ceiling tile, drywall, insulation, suspended ceiling systems, fasteners and stucco.” Too bad they can’t add “functional ownership" to the mix.
The Baltimore-based company is now the “exclusive investment and wealth management sponsor of the team.” In a nod to the times, the iconic Baltimore Sun sign on the Camden Yards scoreboard disappeared in 2023, and now T. Rowe Price is in its place. Could be a plot point for a fictional Season 6 of The Wire.
The 10-year partnership “brings together two resilient, respected, and successful Massachusetts brands rooted in their shared values of interdependence and commitment to their customers.” And it’s true: We’re firmly in the home stretch of rankings where each #brand has at least a nominal regional tie.
To give you an idea of the scale of these deals, Sports Business Journal reports that the Reds are getting $5 million annually, a fifth of the Yankees’ haul. Kroger is hardly a Ma and Pa store – the grocery conglomerate is in 35 states and always fiending to add more – but it is Cincinnati-based.
A godsend for highway warriors, you wonder how many lives QuikTrip has saved caffeinating motorists for the long slog across Kansas. The Royals agree: “How do we find a partner with the same values and beliefs, acts with the same heart and grit, who shares that same integrity from generation to generation?” asked Royals executive vice president, chief commercial and community impact officer Sarah Tourville in announcing the partnership.
A Reds-Tigers World Series would have more than just I-75 running through it – two of the Midwest’s food giants would each have fabric in the game. Meijer already had a sponsorship with the Red Wings and the Tigers saw fit to match “two of the most iconic brands in the state, creating millions of memories for fans and families each year,” said executive vice president and chief operating officer Ryan Gustafson.
Yes. Hell, yes. If nothing else, America is loosely binded by a series of full-service gas station/convenience mart/fast food conglomerates, and nothing says Western Pennsylvania quite like Sheetz. “If you take our market area and the Pirates’ fanbase and overlay those two, you’d be hard pressed to find many gaps,” Sheetz president & CEO Travis Sheetz said.
It’s true: The state that may determine our next president is cleaved almost perfectly in half, Sheetz to the west, Wawa to the east. The Phillies blew it by ignoring Wawa, home of Schwarber-fest, no less. The Pirates understood the assignment and aced it.
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