The Twins New Era Local Caps Are An Abomination And Must Be Yeeted Into The Fucking Sun

Editor’s Note: This blog was originally written BEFORE the internet collectively bullied New Era into removing these godless headcovers from their store, so just like…pretend, ok? Be cool.

It’s a new era for the Twins as they FINALLY won a damn game in extra innings the other night. They’ve won 4 of their last 5 games, including last night’s win against an Orioles team that appears to support every NHL team besides the Wild. Then today, they announce some new hats! Things are looking up. The Twins New Era Local Caps have arrived!

Wait a minute, what the hell are these things??? These are the ugliest hats I’ve ever seen. Who would honestly wear these?! And what is all this garbage on the hat?! Let’s break it down.

The Right Side of the Twins New Era “Hat”

Ok “Minnesota – North Star State” that one’s easy enough. Looks lame how it’s off to the side, and they could have added The. Or been super fancy and gone L’Étoile du Nord, because who doesn’t like fancy words with a fancy font. The 1987 World Series logo is a nice reminder of our first, but why use the whole logo? Or if you’re gonna use the whole thing, why not use ’91 as well? Honestly, this is probably the second-best side of the hat, which is why I wanted to start with it. It’s only going downhill from here.

The Back of the “Hat”

Mandatory requirement for the team script and MLB logo. Those look good. Is that supposed to be a Juicy Lucy?? WHY?! Who did this to us? That has nothing to do with Twins baseball, it’s like the living embodiment of all of us sarcastically saying “graphic design is my passion” applied for a job at New Era, got it, googled “things about Minnesota” and then stapled a clip art cheeseburger to the back of a hat. What a joke. That’s clearly what they did with Cincy and Skyline Chili, after all.

The red Minnesota looks good, reminds me of the old 10K Logo (which I actually prefer, but that’s a different blog). But what is that in the middle? 1907? I’m not kidding, I spent half an hour trying to figure out what happened in 1907 in Minnesota to warrant making it on the hat. Benilde St-Margaret’s was founded, as was the Duluth Art Institute, but neither of those are particularly noteworthy for a baseball cap. The Gophers football team went 2-2-1 which is a fun footnote for such a storied program, but again, not baseball relevant. Don’t want to get the 10K internal Gophers vs Bison fight started again…

I THINK it is actually supposed to be 1901, which is when the Washington Senators were founded. As we all know, the Senators would eventually become the Twins, but that wouldn’t happen for another 60 years, so 1901 has NOTHING to do with the state of Minnesota, so why include it in the state outline? If you want to honor the Senators, why not incorporate their old logo? Or include the founding of the franchise year just on its own, and preferably in a font that distinguishes 1’s and 7’s. OR, better idea, don’t include them at all because the Twins New Era cap is supposed to represent the LOCAL market not historic.

The Best Side of the “Hat”

Ok, you know what? Paul Bunyan’s Axe has nothing to do with baseball, but this looks pretty sick. I’m good with it. It’s stupid. But compared to the rest of the Twins New Era Cap, it belongs in the goddamn Lourve.

The Abomination of the Front of the “Hat”

Woof. Where to even begin on this puppy. First of all, I’ve been to every corner of the state. I have a 612 number to this day, even though I haven’t lived in Minnesota full time in almost a decade. That’s too many damn area codes to include on a hat. I didn’t even know people used 320 and 507 area codes, and I have friends and family who live in Rochester and St. Cloud! What’s the point of the area codes? Are we expecting perfect strangers on the street to point at our hat like Leonardo DiCaprio and blurt out 218 REPRESENT MUHFUCKAAAA! DON’T CHIRP DULUTH!

Spoiler alert, I think the rest of the hat will give away that we have ties to Minnesota. We don’t need to add the area codes. People will get it, and it’s dumb.

Then we’ve got that lake outline. There are 10,000 lakes in Minnesota and you chose a pixelated rendering of Lake Calhoun? I think, anyway, who knows. That’s laughable. I like Lake Calhoun fine, but it’s definitely not the lake I would pick to represent all of Minnesota. And since we’re representing all of Minnesota with the area codes, it’s logically inconsistent to me to add Lake Calhoun. Why not mention the concept of purifying yourself in the waters of Lake Minnetonka? There’s a GREAT lake up in Duluth. One might even call it Superior to all of the other lakes. So, yeah, it’s stupid to include a lake you can’t even do lake things on and enjoy because of its contamination.

How To Fix The Twins New Era “Hat”

Honestly, there’s no fixing this version of it. I am reminded of the scene from Django Unchained, where the horribly racist piece of shit gentlemen are trying to put on their Intro to KKK hoods on for dramatic effect, but cannot see out of them… It was a nice idea, but poorly executed. Yeet these abominations into the sun and try again.

They should have us design the next hat, we are awesome at designing hats. Picture how sick our shirts are, but on a hat. That sick. Honestly, though, these hats all the way around the league are horrendous. Except Miami’s which always manages to look cool, even if it’s complete dogshit by Miami standards. I’m no expert in the fashion world, so when you’ve got someone who dresses like Adam Sandler most days commenting on the fashion bit, you know you fucked up. Do better, New Era.

P.S. 10k hats are coming soon