Philadelphia Phillies celebrate the city’s rich heritage with City Connect uniforms
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Anthony Gharib, ESPN
The Philadelphia Phillies unveiled their City Connect uniforms Friday — a modern look that’s intended to celebrate the city’s rich history, while appealing to a younger audience.
The reveal is the first in a line of nine Major League Baseball teams that will have a new City Connect uniform this season. It will debut on the field on April 12.
“We are excited and honored to be the first team this season to officially unveil our City Connect uniform, which features a new modern design that represents being ‘unapologetically Philly’ and celebrates our city’s rich history, ” said Phillies vice president of business affairs Howard Smith in a news release.
The structured process of the Phillies’ design began in 2021 with an emphasis on a look that is tailored to younger fans. The choice of when the uniforms will be worn on-field this season — every Friday home game — is specifically meant for days/times when more younger fans will be able to attend, Smith told ESPN.
“It’s about getting younger as a sport,” Smith said. “We’ve got a lot of 20-somethings in that clubhouse. So it’s kind of part of the target we’re going after, they’re sitting down in the clubhouse. And to see their excitement through the process was gratifying.”
The uniform includes multiple nods to Philadelphia’s roots, a key component of each City Connect uniform. The blue and yellow colors are directly related to the colors of the city’s flag, the oldest and only one that’s gone unchanged in the United States.
Philadelphia’s skyline is depicted on the inside of the uniform’s collar in a bright blue shade, meant to represent what Philadelphia is at its core — “a blue-collar big city with a small-town feel,” according to the news release.
The pattern of “Philly” across the chest is similar to text found on historical documents written in the city and includes a nod to the cracks within the Liberty Bell.
It wouldn’t be a Philadelphia uniform without paying homage to the “City of Brotherly Love” moniker, which appears as a sleeve patch integrated with the word “Love.” There’s an etching pattern on the interior referencing the illustration from literature common around the time of the revolution. Baseball laces are also woven in this detail with the intention of representing the Phillies’ place in the city’s DNA.
According to Smith, John Middleton, the principal owner of the Phillies, was very direct that the process had to be organizationally driven and was important that everyone was on the same page with the design. First and foremost, the players — some of whom were involved in the process — had to like the direction.
“We started with the clubhouse and showed them the designs and [it was] very, very well received,” Smith said.
Smith described the look as “sort of like a mini history lesson.”
“Given the fact that we got to go in Year 3 [of the City Connect series] and see how some of the really successful clubs did it, both in the NBA and Major League Baseball, we knew that just rolling out another red, white and blue jersey wasn’t the answer,” he said. “It had to be distinctive, it had to be different and it had to stand for something and there had to be, like I said, there had to be that connectivity.”
Chicago Cubs outfielder Cody Bellinger has a fractured right rib and has been placed on the 10-day injured list, manager Craig Counsell told 670 The Score on Wednesday.
Bellinger, a two-time All-Star selection, collided with the center-field wall during Tuesday’s game while tracking a fly ball hit by Houston‘s Yainer Diaz that went for a double and scored Kyle Tucker. He left the game an inning later.
In a corresponding move, the Cubs called up Pete Crow-Armstrong, their top prospect.
Bellinger, in the midst of a seven-game hitting streak, is batting .226 with five home runs and 17 RBIs this season.
Crow-Armstrong, 22, made his MLB debut last September and went 0-for-14 with three walks. He’s batting .203 with two home runs, five doubles and seven RBIs at Triple-A Iowa this season.
Field Level Media contributed to this report.
St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Jordan Walker has been demoted to the minor leagues after a slow start to the season.
The Cardinals announced before Wednesday afternoon’s game against the Arizona Diamondbacks that Walker and left-handed pitcher Zack Thompson were optioned to Triple-A Memphis. Infielder Jose Fermin and left-hander John King were recalled from Memphis in corresponding moves.
Walker, 21, is batting .155 with no home runs, 4 RBIs and a .497 OPS in 20 games this season, his second with the Cardinals. The former top prospect had been mired in a 3-for-27 slump over his past 11 games.
The 6-foot-6 Walker is one of several players struggling offensively for the Cardinals (10-14), who entered Wednesday with just 16 homers as a team — second worst in the majors behind only the Chicago White Sox — and rank in the bottom five in MLB in most major categories, including batting average (.218), runs (82), slugging percentage (.336) and OPS (.637).
Walker entered 2023 as a consensus top-five overall prospect and delivered a solid rookie season, batting .276 with 16 homers, 51 RBIs and a .787 OPS.
The San Francisco Giants scratched left-hander Blake Snell from his scheduled start Wednesday and placed the two-time Cy Young Award winner on the 15-day injured list with a left adductor strain.
Right-hander Landen Roupp was recalled from Triple-A Sacramento by the Giants, who tabbed right-hander Ryan Walker (2-2, 3.46 ERA) to make his first start of the season Wednesday against the visiting New York Mets.
Walker, 28, worked a scoreless inning of relief in San Francisco’s 5-2 win over New York on Monday.
Snell, 31, is 0-3 with an 11.57 ERA in three starts. He has yet to recapture the form that allowed him to secure his second Cy Young Award while pitching for the San Diego Padres in 2023.
Snell owns a 71-58 record with a 3.30 ERA in 194 career games (all starts) with the Tampa Bay Rays, Padres and Giants.
Roupp, 25, has registered a 4.35 ERA without recording a decision in eight relief appearances this season with San Francisco.
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