Throwback Diamondbacks New Era

In my previous posts ranting about how the Arizona Diamondbacks and New Era caps botched their sale of "throwback" caps by making them grossly inaccurate, I did a lot of internet hunting to find myself some accurate reproductions of the cap I was looking for. I eventually found myself on Facebook and looking at a physical store's page located in Brooklyn, New York called Lee's Sneakers and sent them an e-mail, within 4 days I had negotiated my purchase and ordered their whole stock of the cap in my size of 7-1/8 :)


I think this cap turned out fantastic! It is an incredibly accurate representation of the original dbacks cap. About the only difference, is that the colour of the "A" is a little too light, but this can be explained due to New Era discontinuing that colour a few years back.

Now as expected, the caps are Made in China, which is a disappointment but something that really can't be avoided in this day and age when it comes to New Era caps, if it isn't On-Field is most likely won't be American. Another anomaly is that the cap isn't a Cooperstown Collection, but listed as just "Genuine Merchandise."

The back of the cap is also accurate due to its flat embroidery, at the start of the 2007 season New Era started giving the rear raised embroidery like they do with the front.

REPRODUCTION

ORIGINAL

The embroidery on the front also looks fantastic, it is an awesome reproduction of the original in every detail. As described above, the only difference is the colour of the "A", due to a discontinuation of the thread that was used originally.

REPRODUCTION

ORIGINAL

And here are the two caps next to each other, don't mind the colour difference too much between the shades of purple, the original cap could have been made from anywhere between 1998-2006.

Original vs. Reproduction

For any information on these caps or any other caps that you may be interested in purchasing, please contact Lee's Sneakers for any information.  I recommend that you Like him on Facebook and give a look at his pictures, there you can copy URLs and send them to Lee's Sneakers and they will be more than happy to mail you the caps and they also take PayPal. Now I'm just a young college student attending a university, but I can assure you that the caps are definitely worth the money should you decided to buy them! And with PayPal, your purchases are definitely insured better than the best car insurance you will ever buy!

New Era by far isn't a cheap baseball hat, they are the best quality baseball hats you can find, and they have a wide range of custom baseball hats too.

Please visit Lee's Sneakers at: http://www.facebook.com/leesneakers

E-mail them with any questions at: leesneakers@yahoo.com

Diamondbacks Throwback New Era Caps

All right, time to do some god damned ranting now...........

Last weekend, the Arizona Diamondbacks were having a throwback weekend back to when they wore Purple and Teal uniforms, they switched to Red, Beige, and Black back in 2007. The Diamondbacks New Era caps haven't been produced in purple since 2006 so no non-custom order caps have been produced since then.

With the upcoming throwback weekend, we all knew that New Era was going to produce the caps for the team, so everyone anticipated the upcoming Polyester version of the purple dbacks hat. Turns out, New Era's competency can't expand THAT far. We all know they've fucked up before on throwbacks such as with the Orioles from the 70s and what not, but not on a cap that they discontinued under 5 years ago.

Here is a picture of two Diamondbacks hats next to each other, the left is the authentic dbacks New Era and the right is the version that New Era made for the throwbacks which were sold in the Diamondbacks Official Team Shop.

Here we can see there are some huge differences right off of the bat. The first error is the immense size of the “A” on the front of the cap, it's a good 130% larger than the original caps and the embroidery is mainly flat instead of raised as it should be. The central part of the “A” is also incorrect, as you can see the piece is supposed to be black instead of turquoise.

Many New Era customers were extremely disappointed with the way that they handled this cap, one customer who was disappointed was the team itself! The Arizona Diamondbacks didn't even wear these caps on the field, instead they wore caps they had in stock which dated back to 2006, at least they knew then they would be getting the correct cap to give the throwback uniforms some justice.

Here is a screencap of manager Kirk Gibson the September 9th game vs. the Padres, wearing the correct throwback caps.

Imaged owned by Major League Baseball

About the only plus about the cap was the fact that it was made in the USA, I was extremely disappointed because I've been an Arizona Diamondbacks fan since their formation in 1998 and I was looking forward to getting a modern throwback hat which is made out of the modern Performance Polyester material, I was so irritated with New Era that I didn't even buy the cap, which is amazing due to the fact that I normally can't let anything Dbacks go.

2011 AZ Diamondbacks

So as it stands today, the Arizona Diamondbacks have taken the lead in the National League West.  The Arizona Diamondbacks take the lead with a 6-3 win over the Houston Astros as the San Francisco Giants lose 9-2 against the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Can we win this?  Fuck yes.



Let's go dbacks!

2011 MLB All-Star Game

So with the 2011 All-Star Game in Phoenix, AZ, I made the decision to go for it and splurged the money on some tickets.  The Diamondbacks probably wouldn't host the game for another ±30 years, I figured I might as well just go for it.... so I ended up to go to the game with my dad and we had a great time.

 

Driving to Arizona is always a neat experience.  To me, Arizona is one of the most unique places in the United States, and most likely one of the most unique places in the world to visit due to it's scenery and people within it.  When driving to Arizona I always make sure to stop in a little town called Wikieup and stop at the Wikieup Trading Post for lunch, dinner, or any meal of the day.  The Wikieup Trading Post is known for it's fried rattlesnake that they sell, something you've got to try if you have never had it before.  It basically tastes like chicken but with a rubbery texture, awesome meal.  My only complaint about it is that there isn't enough meat on it, well it is a snake so you shouldn't expect too much going on.

 

So in Phoenix for the All-Star Game, and any time I visit Phoenix, I stay in a little unknown hotel that's right near downtown, the Budget Lodge Phoenix.  It's a great little hotel, pretty cheap too and it's located right near downtown; clean rooms, great price, great location.

So now getting onto the series of events..... Sunday kicked it all off with the Futures Game.  The Futures Game is basically some of the most highly thought of prospects in Minor League Baseball, and the Futures from the USA play against the Futures of the WORLD team.  The Diamondbacks had two representatives, Pitcher Tyler Skaggs and 1st Baseman Paul Goldschmidt; each of whom started the game.  The USA ended up to win the Futures Game with a very nice come from behind by tacking on 3 runs in the bottom of the 8th inning, they won by a score of 6-4, gotta root for the good ol' USA.

Monday came the Home Run Derby, in it were 8 participants:

Robinson Cano

Adrian Gonzalez
David Ortiz
Prince Fielder
Matt Holliday
Jose Bautista
Rickie Weeks
Matt Kemp

...who finished in that order.  The entire time I was all for Robinson Cano, he was crushing the ball left and right, hit some of the farthest home runs I've ever seen at Chase Field before.  The runner up was Adrian Gonzalez, thankfully he lost since I honestly don't believe he should have been at the All-Star Game anyway.  During the whole Arizona immigration law, Adrian announced he was going to boycott the 2011 All-Star Game simply because it was in Phoenix, and spoke out about it often.  Come 1 year later, he not only showed up to the game, he also participated in the Home Run Derby.

 

Tuesday came the actual All-Star Game, and the defending Champion National League team attempted to make it two wins in a row for the first time in more than a decade.  The American League came out swinging first with a Splash Blast by Adrian Gonzalez to put the American League up 1-0, but immediately following was a 3-run shot by the National League's own Prince Fielder, which put the NL up 3-1.  The Nationals never looked back from there, and went on to take the game 5-1.

Would I go back to the All-Star Game?  Well since it was in Arizona, that's what made the event really special to me.  Other than that, if I were to go to more All-Star events I'd probably just stick to the Futures Game.  Something about seeing the prospects made it really fun for me, probably because I was born in a Minor League Baseball town and see the Las Vegas 51s play all of the time, but any of the events would definitely be something not to miss if you have the opportunity to go.