A New NFL Logo is Drawing a Lot of Opinions from Fans - What's Your Favorite and Most Disliked All-Time MLB Logo?

If you support one of the 30 teams around Major League Baseball you've likely put on some apparel in your life that supports that team. Logos is the way to show off what your team represents, and today our staff gives their take on their all-time favorite and least favorite MLB logos.

Monday the NFL's Los Angeles Rams unveiled their new logo for the 2020 season and beyond.

The logo is thought by some to be very plain, a blue and yellow circle with block letters in it, but in a piece on NFL.com it looks like the Rams players and even legends are in favor of the logo and its look.

In talking to our staff we took a poll of what logos they have always had a love for and those that they didn't really take a liking to.

Today we give you the results of those polls with some pictures to show examples of why our staff have liked or disliked the certain logos over the years.

Casey Drottar

Favorite - San Diego Padres 'Swinging Friar'

I'm a sucker for old school, unique logos in any sport. A logo which features a friar playing baseball sure feels like the perfect definition of that.

Least Favorite - Tampa Bay Devil Rays inaugural jerseys

Tampa's current uniforms are perfectly fine. Their originals looked like an answer to the question "what would happen if the XFL was asked to design baseball jerseys"

Dave Alligood

Favorite - San Diego Padres 'Swinging Friar'

Far and away the best logo in MLB is the San Diego Padres Swinging Friar logo of the 1970s that featured the original Padres colors of brown and mustard yellow. (A bit of history, the Swinging Friar first became a mascot of the PCL version of the Padres during the 1950s).

While some fans may prefer later versions such as the 1980s with the orange or, worse, the abominable eyesore that was the sand and navy blue logo, those fans probably also prefer “pitch” clocks and pajama bottom pants.

So what makes the 1970s Swinging Friar the best logo ever? For starters, there is the cartoon friar taking a vicious upper cut with an enigmatic grin on his face. (Another bit of history, the Franciscans founded the first mission in what would become the city of San Diego.)

This inclusion of the Friar suggests a divine appointment for the franchise (though the franchise’s historical record would suggest divine intervention of another kind). Also, as far as 1970s logos go, this one was a gem among gems.

Finally, you can never go wrong with the brown and mustard yellow color scheme. Truly, the 1970s Swinging Friar represents the best of baseball logos.

Runner Up:

The original Montreal Expos logo. This was another gem of the colorful 1970s and lasted as the primary logo until the Expos’ transformation in the early 1990s. The lower case “E” and “B” for “Expos Baseball” were stylized in a way to form an “M” for the city. Plus, the tri-color scheme was arranged beautifully to inspire provincial identity and pride.

Least Favorite - Any Colorado Rockies Logo

Let’s start with the colors: Black and purple are two colors that should never be combined on any baseball uniform or any other uniform whatsoever. It’s just a complete eyesore (for further evidence, see “Baltimore Ravens”).

Plus, the logo naturally is associated with the Colorado Rockies, a franchise whose existence was likely inspired by the metaphorical union of Medusa and Lord Sauron. Further discussion is not necessary here.

Runner up:

Anaheim Angels from the late 1990s to early 2000s. This logo featured the Angel wing “A” superimposed on a blue home plate which was superimposed on a pair of crossed bats (baseball bats, that is, not the flying mammal).

Besides looking like a corporate creation (Disney, anyone?), the logo is visually unattractive. Plus the wing-swept “A” cuts way too closely to the Colorado Avalanche logo.

And everyone knows how incompetent Colorado-based major league franchises are in choosing logos (see above).

Alex Hooper

I love elephants. I'm getting an elephant tattoo some day soon. So, my favorite logos of all time are any of the Athletics' logos that have the elephant. I like the goofy cartoonish one, but I mostly like to plan ones. Like the Philadelphia A's back in the 30 as drawn above.

Even better, I like the Oakland A's 2019 Spring hats as seen below.

Honorable mention: Initial Tampa Bay Rays logo, the Twins' logo with 'Minnie' and 'Paul,' and all logos using a sentient baseball-head.

Least Favorite:

On the other hand, I really dislike when teams have a perfect logo, and change it. Two birds, specifically. While the Orioles' anatomically correct bird logo was inoffensive, I still hate that it served in the stead of the cartoon Oriole. That guy rules. The most offensive bird that the MLB gave us was this one:

Toronto had the perfect Jay logo, then gave him arms and a bat in 2002, which wasn't the worst thing. Then they did this. Oof. I'm so glad the original birds of Baltimore and Toronto flew back north after their respective hiatuses.

T.J. Zuppe

Favorite - Brewers "Ball-in-Glove" Logo

So simple, yet so great. The glove forms an "M" and "B," and the color scheme is top notch. Milwaukee won the offseason simply by bringing back this favorite for 2020.

Least favorite - Every other Brewers Logo

How can you achieve perfection and then go in a different direction? WHY?! In particular, I wasn't fond of the barley logos and uniforms used from 2000-2019, partially because of the look and partially because it kept the ball-in-glove logo locked away.

Matt Loede

Favorite – Arizona Diamondbacks

The D-Backs began play in 1998, and right away started with a couple cool different looks that fit their play out in the desert of Arizona near Phoenix. The snake surrounding the ball is a modern look that fans seem to like, and the purple, black, teal and copper colors really fit the look of the team well. It took them into year two to introduce the copper colored snake in the shape of a ‘D,’ but again a very cool design that fans brought into right away.

Least Favorite – Oakland A’s

There’s just nothing appealing about this team in terms of the colors, the design, or the logo – of which there is none. The team did go back to using the elephant on its sleeve which was a cool throwback to its original logo used in the early 1900.

They had the elephant logo on their sweaters around 1909, and in 1918 the elephant showed up on their regular everyday jersey. The home white and green and gold are colors that just don’t pop out, and it’s just blah all the way around.

Of course playing in front of a stadium that most nights is 75-80 percent empty (average per night in 2019 was 20,521). This is a team in a need a complete overhaul logo and uniform wise.