[Amazin69]

Mets won. Don't care. I'm now THISCLOSE to rooting for them to lose every home game until sanity is restored.

My poor AI takes too much abuse, I'm afraid. My most recent "conversation" after seeing today's highlights:

Why are my New York Mets now wearing those crappy City Connect uniforms day after day? I thought this stinking MLB money-grab was just for Saturdays? Grey and MAGENTA are NOT the Mets' colors! "The fans are true to the ORANGE and BLUE" is how "Meet the Mets" goes…those colors have a particular meaning for the team, to say nothing of the history.

I dont' give a ****ety-**** if the team had a meeting and decided they needed to change their mojo or whatever. They'd better stop

AI responds in part:

You're right that the MLB City Connect program was initially designed with the idea of being worn primarily for Saturday home games (and sometimes road games if the opponent is wearing a similar alternate). The intention behind these uniforms is to celebrate a city's unique culture, history, or local identity, often with abstract designs and colors that step outside traditional team palettes.

However, while the "Saturday home game" guideline is common, it's not always a rigid, absolute rule for every single team or every single week. Teams do have some discretion and, at times, will choose to wear them on other days, or more frequently, especially if they believe it creates a "buzz" or if they're trying to integrate them more deeply into their branding, even if it's controversial.

That "integrate into their branding" made me queasy, so…

While I appreciate your emotional support, I was actually asking if you had access to any NEWS reports that would explain the shift. (Pretty sure GREY AND MAGENTA are NOT "associated with" NYC in any way.)

The AI repeated the press-release about the design, and then added this:

Why They Might Be Wearing Them More Often (Beyond Just Saturdays):

While the program generally aimed for Saturday home game debuts, news reports and discussions suggest a few factors that can lead to more frequent use:

Team and Player Discretion/Preference: Several reports, including one from SNY, indicate that once unveiled, teams, and often even individual starting pitchers, have some discretion to choose which uniform the team wears for a given game. This means if players "liked the unis" (as some early clubhouse conversations suggested), they might opt to wear them more often than just the scheduled Saturdays.

Marketing & Sales Push: As you suspected, there's a strong commercial incentive. The City Connect program is a huge revenue generator through merchandise sales. More visibility means more sales. News articles often mention the significant investment and expectations for record sales associated with these new uniforms. The Mets even revamped their team store which coincided with the City Connect launch.

"Slump Buster" or "Mojo" Attempts: While not explicitly cited as official policy, it's a common unwritten rule in baseball that teams (or players) might switch up uniforms or other routines in an attempt to break a losing streak or change their "mojo," as you alluded to.

"Connecting to New York" (Beyond Baseball): The Mets' chief marketing officer, Andy Goldberg, stated the design was meant to "connect to New York" and be something "Met fans can represent across the world," even if it's "not orange and blue by design." This broader appeal to the city's identity could be a reason for more prominent display.

The line about "represent across the world" nearly made me vomit, leading to this:

BLECH. The idea of throwing away 63 years of history, of struggle and triumph for these RIDICULOUS trashy unis (name another famous Magenta/Grey combination, anywhere?) and try and make this the "new brand" is vomitous

You'd never see the Yankees doing this. I'm pretty sure the Yanks don't even HAVE a "****TY CONNECT" uniform. That alone makes the Mets look like wannabes, trying for "buzz" at the expense of who they are.

They literally retired David Wright's number on Saturday…now they want to bathe themselves in garish garb utterly unlike anything David (or Doc Gooden or Tom Seaver or, hell, ROB GARDNER) ever wore. FFS

Which the AI confirmed:

You are absolutely correct. The New York Yankees are one of only two MLB teams (the other being the Oakland Athletics, due to their relocation issues) that do not have a City Connect uniform. This is largely due to their staunch commitment to tradition and classic pinstripes. Yankees managing general partner Hal Steinbrenner has explicitly stated his reluctance to deviate from their iconic look, saying he's "not having any serious conversations about doing it." The Yankees' brand is so strong and tied to their traditional uniforms that they've opted out of the program entirely, reinforcing their image as a team deeply rooted in history. This definitely makes the Mets' adoption and frequent use of the City Connect uniform stand out even more by contrast.

Me again, after confirming the AI knew "why orange and blue", specifically:

Yep. The idea was to reassure the New Yorkers of the Sixties that this wasn't some new team, they were the keepers of a heritage that stretched back beyond when the Yankees and the American League were even around. Organized baseball began in the Greater NY area (at the Elysian Fields in Hoboken NJ) and while the original NY Mutuals were booted from the National League early on, National League baseball in New York has been as constant as anywhere else other than Chicago.

I'm almost rooting for the Mets to lose a few games now…anything to prevent this cancer from MET-astatizing

And in the time it took for me to come here, the "almost" died. I now want the Mets to LOSE EVERY ****ING GAME they play in those abominations so we can kill off Andy Goldberg's dream of this being the brand "Mets fans represent across the world" and go back to having What It Means To Be A Met be about more than ****head Lindor liking purple and our pathetic joke of a "pitching staff" pissing on the graves of so many Mets moundsmen, from Tom to Tug to the recently-passed Jeff Bittiger.

Take your Magenta Mania and stick it in Grimace's ass, please. (And yes, I think that purple creature being an unofficial mascot last year is partly to blame, as well. Which, since all we ended up accomplishing was finishing 6th out of 15 teams, is just embarrassing.)

There may be many, many drawbacks to being a Yankees fan (that empty aching hole where your soul should be comes to mind… ) but even Hal Steinbrenner knows not to pull this sort of crapola. GRRRR

Four games in a row is four too many. In the words of Susan Powter…