Happy St. Stupid Apparel's Day!

A brief history of this special day:

Over fifteen hundred years ago, on an island in the North Atlantic, St. Stupid Apparel rounded up all the team colored merchandise and drove it into the sea. He then replaced all the items with stuff you could only wear one day out of the year (without looking like an asshat).

For more recent developments in St. Stupid Apparel's Day, please visit Simon On Sports. He has extensively chronicled these recent crimes against team branding and aesthetics. You can even vote on the most egregious!

Now go sneak out of work and grab a Guinness. And bring your green hat.

Asshats

In honor of the fact that Real Time with Bill Maher starts up again tomorrow night, I've got a New Rule:

New Rule: Team apparel can only be sold in team colors.

The above items are useful for exactly one day per year, which doesn't even fall during the baseball season. Have at it, Sox fans! Grab yourself a pair of those pajama pants, one of those hideous green shirts, and wave that "lucky" banner while you are jumping off the Prudential Center.

I'm not just picking on the Sox. Check out all of these acts against God:

If are wearing one of those right now, please ex-out of your browser and never read this blog again.

Are you a Mets fan but want to wear a Yankees hat for some odd fucking reason? Maybe you are a Yankees fan who just adores the combination of blue an orange. A lifelong David Cone/Doc Gooden/Darryl Strawberry fan?

No? Are you a straight gangsta from Oakland who ain't afraid to show some love for da Yanks? Or a colorblind nerd from New York attending Berkley?
Then you must like the Braves, Cubs or Pirates, and are dying to wear their colors on the hat of the most hated franchise in all of baseball, right?

Can someone please explain how buying a team's hat with another team's colors on it makes even one small bit of sense? Do you like both teams? Do you wear it only when the two teams play each other? What takes precedence, the logo or the colors?

Look, I understand the financial reasons a team has to bastardize their logo by sewing it onto a million different hats. More unique items translate into more sales. There are some very stupid people out there who probably want a Yankees hat to go with every outfit they own and are not ashamed to look like a complete and utter douchebag while doing it.

But here is a short message to those dummies and others who have bought branded merchandise in non-official team colors:

You are suckers.

At a certain point the following conversation happened somewhere in the MLB offices:

Executive: Our merchandise sales are stagnating, gentlemen. What can we do about it?

Sales guy #1: Well, we could make it cheaper, sir...

Executive: You're fired.

Sales guy #2: We could try to increase our global distrib-

Executive: Great idea! Just kidding, you're a moron. Next?

Sales guy #3: Well, we could make stuff in different colors...

Executive: Brilliant! We'll put out a never ending stream of new colors and some idiots are bound to buy them!

In closing: Don't be a sheep. If you don't like your team's official colors, don't buy the merchandise. If you are worried about the colors of your team's hat and whether or not they match with the rest of your clothing, rest assured that people will notice how ugly you are long before the fact that your hat clashes with your stupid jacket.

Kevin Youkilis: Titan Of The Food Industry

Uh, how come no one told us about this? Is it because Red Sox Nation issued a gag order?

A simple Google search of our blog's anti-namesake turned up the fact that Kevin Youkilis endorses B&M Baked Beans. And you thought Jonathan Papelbon's "Auto 125" commercial was embarrassing... I'm not a branding expert, but would probably advise against a sloppy brown food product being sold under the letters "B" & "M"

Dude, you couldn't hold out for Bush's?

Oh, I forgot, they already have a spokesman (he knows the secret recipe)...


That's right Youk. In the prestigious upper echelon of baked bean spokeslifeforms, it's you and a dog named Duke! Youk and Duke. Well done. It's only a matter of time until the economy catches up to B&M, Bush's buys them out, and you two doing ads together. I can see it now...


That's not all, though...

Longball Cellars also offers Jorge Cabernet and Abreu's Finest among other terrible wine/baseball name puns including Jose's CaberReyes, Tom's Cabernet Glavingnon, Brain Schneider's Schardonnay, and Tim Wakefield's CaberKnuckle.

Youk's Hot Sauce was developed by his brother Scott, a chef at Maverick's Restaurant in San Francisco, thusly: "Some chilies were on their way out, so we roasted them, added vinegar and called it a hot sauce". He added "Yeaaaaaah brraaaah, it's gnarly."

You can get a bottle of that so-called hot sauce for the incredibly low price of $10 +S&H, or $25 +S&H complete with an autograph from the man himself. Or actually you can't, because they are sold out. Is this guy fackin' maaahketahble, ah what?

And last but not least, Yooouuuuk has an energy drink called "SlumpBuster", a not-so-thinly-veiled reference to the first girl you sleep with after not getting any for a while.

In sports, at work or in your social life, everyone has been in a slump. You've tried everything, and then... along comes a SlumpBuster... and all is right with the world. SlumpBuster Energy Drink.

Classy as the day is long, that Kevin Youkilis. Go out and get yourself a SlumpBuster... and after you're done, smash the can on your forehead and throw it out your car window, asshole.

Mets To Play 2009 Season At Javits Center

This is the worst logo I've ever seen.

Could it be less specific? I thought it was for this inauguration... And titling it on it's side in no way compensates for how incredibly bland it is.

Wilpons, please... take notes.

Important things to include in a logo promoting your sports team's first season at a new facility:

1. Team name
2. Stadium name
3. Something distinctive about your team. Which I believe is, um, the whole point of a "logo".

Maybe you could have included that stupid apple that you moved over from Shea. Or, I don't know, ANYTHING? Perhaps a nod to the crippled financial institution that is going to sponsor the joint? Even Mets fans aren't stupid enough to buy a shirt with that logo on it.