Houston Astros "Flashback Fridays" Throwback Lineup

So what's going on in Texas?

As has been announced, the Texas Rangers and Houston Astros are doing some extreme throwbacks for the 2012 season in celebration of their 40th and 50th birthdays respectively. Although the Texas Rangers have yet to really reveal their full uniforms, caps are excluded in pictures, the Houston Astros are definitely ready to roll with the throwbacks and are prepared to celebrate 50 years with style.

For the Houston Astros, we have been given almost no secrets in regards to the caps, which we are going to assume are New Era, but even if not they will still be reported on. The Houston Astros are picking 6 new throwbacks, one for each of the five decades of the Houston Astros and one representing the original team which were named the Colts.

The jerseys and caps seen above are in a nice time line, Colts are on the left and the decades increase as the jerseys move to the left.

About the moment that the Flashback Fridays were announced there immediately became concerns with the Houston Colt .45's and the pistol which would be represented on the jersey. When this was reported, MLB originally announced that the Houston Astros would not be permitted to wear the jerseys if the pistol was present, but ultimately left the decision up to the team which allowed sanity to dominate over political correctness, leaving the pistol on the jersey.

Regardless of the jersey tops, the 1962-1964 Colt .45s New Era cap appears to be a base blue with what would most likely be raised embroidery on the front panels of the cap reading ".45s" in orange, adorned with an orange button on the top of the crown.

Moving on just 3 years after their formation, the team became the Houston Astros which caused their uniforms to move to the "Shooting Star" which brought about new caps. These new caps for the brand new Astros are a simple navy blue cap much like the .45s, but the cap will be assumed to feature flat embroidery for the orange star that rests in the middle, and a raised "H" in white stitching for the script covering it, and much like the .45s cap the button on top will be orange.

Come the 1971 season, uniforms changed again to the infamous rainbow effect as seen above, but the caps are pretty much unchanged except for the colour inversion. This cap here features the base orange cap which would make this the only other full orange cap On-Field other than the Miami Marlins' home alternate. The logo features the regular star, but stitched in the dark blue and is also covered by the white raised embroidered "H".

Come 1980 the team moved its rainbow scheme from a horizontal stripe along the abdomen to going horizontal down the shoulders, this cap moves back a bit in years to the first Astros incarnation, but the only difference we will see in this New Era cap is the button on top, which is the same base navy blue rather than orange as seen in prior years.

By 1994 the team changed uniform schemes again, the new ones are a pure white with a new stylized and sci-fi like script on the front with a new shooting star logo in gold. The caps are once again a base navy blue and will feature a raised embroidered shooting star in gold on the front panels, but we do not get to see the gold brimmed caps that were also present in this era.

2012 New York Mets Alterations

As of yesterday morning, the New York Mets announced that they will be slightly altering their uniform scheme, and part of the alterations is that they are dropping their black motif completely from their caps and perhaps will drop their black jersey all together. The Mets have introduced two new logos which will be placed on their caps and jerseys respectively. The new patches are a simple alteration of the traditional Mets logo but are completed with a banner that omits the anniversary, a gold outline is also present.

Jersey Patch

Cap Patch

As expected, the 50th anniversary cap will contain a patch, but unlike traditional patches which are located on the left side of the cap it will be placed on the back; much like the 2009 New York Yankees cap. The difference with this cap is not only the movement of the patch to the back, but the traditional MLB logo is absent from the cap due to the placement of the patch. Other than the alterations with the patch and rear of the cap, the front has not been altered what so ever.

The Mets are the MLB's most recent team which are moving back to their roots of their uniforms, but their idea of getting rid of black as a colour scheme seems to work extremely well for them. One idea of mine that probably wouldn't go over well with the rest of baseball would be for them to utilise orange more in their colour scheme, but not to the extent of the Giants, Marlins, or Orioles. In my personal opinion, the Mets could at least wear orange undershirts and whatnot; it wouldn't hurt too much.

2012 New York Mets

The 2012 New York Mets are slightly changing their uniforms, but these minor changes will be extremely noticeable when it comes to any Mets fan. The changes of uniform appear to be going back to their 1980's roots, much like the Orioles when their team was successful. So what are your thoughts on the new changes for the New York Mets?

Houston Astros 50th Anniversary On-Field Patch

Now back on September 22nd, 2011 the Houston Astros unveiled their banner for their 50th anniversary season celebrating from 1962-2012, and assumingly will plaster this banner on anything they can just as most teams do for their celebratory year.

Much as the trend has been in recent years, the Houston Astros will utilize their 50th Anniversary banner on the side of their New Era caps for the 2012 Season, and these caps have just broken out on the Astros’ official Team Shop on MLB’s shop website.

Buy Black Home/Away at MLB.com

Buy Brick Red Alternate at MLB.com


The caps shown below are as expected to be the “Cool Base” Performance Polyester caps as they have been since New Era made the shift for the 2007 season, and the caps will be complimented by the patches that will most likely be the current velvety material with some minor embroidery, but the level of detail on this patch suggests that the patches might have more embroidery on them than previously anticipated.

The patch itself has an interesting design to it being that it successfully merges the Astros, post Colt .45's, along with 2012 scheme. The number 50 is a direct rip from the Astros' current jersey number scheme, which adds to the flavour of the rainbow like band underneath it. This rainbow band is reminiscent of the uniform colour scheme they notoriously wore in the 1970's, however the only thing this patch doesn't seem to recognize as Astros history were their first two years known as the Houston Colt. 45's.

If you are a Houston Astros fan and are in need of a brand new cap, this might be right up your alley, but I’d shy away from any new merchandise until the team makes a successful transition to the American League should that deal not fall through.