If you ask someone “who are the Browns?” they can likely come up with the obvious answer, the Cleveland Browns of the National Football League, one of the oldest teams around with a storied history.  But there was a time when the color brown was a bit more popular in sports nomenclature.

In Baseball there were the St. Louis Browns.  In fact there were numerous iterations of the St. Louis Browns: the future Cardinals and the future Orioles (both teams changed to birds, odd).  Such monochrome names really lend their legacies to that first professional baseball club, the Cincinnati Red Stockings.  As I wrote over here, teams in the earlier years of baseball didn’t really have much in the way of official names, but rather nicknames derived from uniform elements or some kind of regional connection.  The Reds had amassed a good deal of popularity in a barn storming tour in which they thoroughly dominated.  So in 1875 the Brown Stockings came about.  The team lasted for three seasons before going belly up.  There was a game fixing scandal with the Louisville Grays that sent both teams out of business. Read the full story

The world of sports is changing around us.  ESPN reports (I use the term loosely) constantly.  The major media outlets are accused of pandering.  If you want the real story on anything you have to go to the internet and the blogs.  But then of course they are accused of being based on conjecture and inherently critical and negative.  I for one don’t find anything terribly surprising about this.

Case in point, the recent Yankee spending spree this off season.  Sports outlets are cranking out their lists of winners in losers in all this.  I’m left a bit out of sorts in this whole situation because everyone is playing in the mud, there are no real winners.  It’s only a matter of time before they start posting their “What’s Wrong with Baseball” stories. Read the full story

The long strange journey of the Athletics before they came to Oakland saw one failed team turn into another.  A thirteen year experiment beginning in 1955 brought the first season of the Kansas City Athletics.  The former Philadelphia team, it’s reverential powerhouse days behind it, was broke and was purchased and moved by industrialist Arnold Johnson. 

Johnson is not remembered very favorably.  That is normal for owners who move teams, but what is not normal is that he isn’t remembered fondly in the city where he brought a team either.  His concern is said to have been more for profits than for the people of Kansas City.  The team brought with it much excitement and the A’s enjoyed record attendance in their first year.  Unfortunately they never saw anywhere near those kinds of numbers again. Read the full story

Teams move around.  It’s a shame (usually) but it’s a reality of the business.  But there’s this strange feeling like whatever you grow up watching, that’s the correct formation and anything different is weird.  As such, when I hear of the Philadelphia Athletics, I think that there’s no way that can be right.

First and foremost, Philly is a noted sports town.  As one of the few cities in America to host a team in every major sport, as well as a reputation for passion even in blundering awful times, the dedication of Philly fans can’t be questioned.  So when I hear of the Philadelphia Athletics, my first reaction is, “Philly lost a team?”

As I wrote in the playoff preview name explanation, the Philadelphia Phillies are the longest continuous team in baseball but who also had little success in championships (who just won a World Series, congrats to the winners).  Well the team that moved cities not once, but twice, was an absolute powerhouse, winning 9 pennants and 5 World Series from 1902 to 1931. Read the full story

In 2004 the Orioles, mired in losing following a huge drop off from the peak in 1997 that had built through the 90’s, signed big free agents Miguel Tejada and Javy Lopez.  A uniform change to go along with this commitment to winning ways took place.  A return to winning (beyond a strong period at the end of ‘04 and the beginning of ‘05) did not.

But anyway, as redundant as it may sound by now, no major changes took place, but the little details took a swing. The caps, as it were, stayed unchanged.  Orange brims at home, black on the road.  Indeed the road uniforms incurred no fundamental changes at all.

The big change came with the home uniforms, where the placket piping was removed and the script was once again changed from black on orange to orange on black.  Likewise for the number and name on the back of the uniform.  Everything else remained the same, the arm piping, the typeface.  The uniforms were nothing if not simple.  The ’04 jersey featured a 50 year anniversary patch, but all other patches were gone (despite the database showing otherwise). Read the full story