I couldn’t sleep last night, so I did what any normal person would do. I came downstairs and looked at old baseball pictures online.
I was looking for something in particular, but as I tend to do, I fell down other rabbit holes. I discovered a team wearing quilted baseball pants. This obviously stood out to me since no one can think about anything besides the current baseball pants fiasco. Then, I ran across several other pictures of players wearing quilted pants. One thing led to another, and rather than spam my Bluesky timeline with random pictures, I thought I’d take a look at the fashion trends that popped out to me during my insomnia research.
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Let’s start with the pants that started this whole thing.
Pretty Sure This Is What They Mean by Hot Pants
There’s a lot I enjoy about this picture; the sensual posing, the dog in the back row, but I as I was taking all that in I noticed the pants. They are thick and quilted! That makes sense. Baseball season starts in the spring, when it’s often still cold and definitely still wet, and it ends during the dark, chilling days of fall.
Once I saw those, I couldn’t unsee them. They popped up in many more photos including:
You in Your Autumn Sweater
If it’s cold enough for your legs to need quilted pants, you may also need something up top to keep warm. Enter, of course, the fantastic baseball sweaters of yore.
If a sweater isn’t warm enough, might I suggest a jacket?
Black is Black, I Want These Uniforms Back, It’s Gray it’s Gray, Since They Went Away
There was a lot of teeth gnashing last year over the Mariners and their black City Connect pants. People were very upset by them! I thought they were great. Black baseball pants were not invented as a publicity stunt to sell more jerseys, it turns out.
You Say “Horizontal”, I say “Vertical”, You say “Why?”, And I Say “Because It Looks Cool and Different”
I first ran across this uniform look when I was researching shipyard baseball in Seattle in 1918. I wasn’t sure what to make of it, but it was pretty popular around WWI. There may be a reason it died out, but I like that it’s so different and what is fashion if not taking chances?
We Never Go Out of Style
Here’s a few final looks that didn’t fit neatly into any category.
We’re going to end with a look at my favorite baseball team of all time, the Merry Widows Baseball Club, ca. 1908:
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I love these all so, so much! Especially the Merry Widows baseball club (makes me think of that one Kate Chopin story about the woman so excited to live her life once her husband is dead (so she thinks)
I haven’t investigated this team, which, sadly, I can’t figure out how to share a picture of here, but I do love their name. They were from Port Ludlow… The Unknowns.
I love these all so, so much! Especially the Merry Widows baseball club (makes me think of that one Kate Chopin story about the woman so excited to live her life once her husband is dead (so she thinks)
I haven’t investigated this team, which, sadly, I can’t figure out how to share a picture of here, but I do love their name. They were from Port Ludlow… The Unknowns.