Hey QCS, glad you're starting a new series, especially baseball! Looking forward to seeing it develop.

For the league logo, I like the neutral shades but I think the logo could use a little more to it, such as further developing a baseball into it, or significantly thickening up the lines and such on it to give it some weight. Right now it strikes me like a volleyball for some reason. Not sure if you're familiar with doing arched text, but it might be cool to see that in it.

For the initial cities, lots of choices! Starting in 2003 is a very unique choice. Based on top market DMA's in that time period, I'd go for a top-10 like this:

New York City
Los Angeles
Chicago
Philadelphia
San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose
Boston
Dallas-Fort Worth
Washington DC
Atlanta
Detroit

I'd also potentially consider doing the top 6 and adding two teams to NYC and LA, or top 7 and two teams in NYC to start off. But any of those top 10 teams would seem like a solid starting point for the league.

Offbeat question: Since you're on an alternate timeline where MLB never existed/rose to prominence, will you be avoiding or using MLB team nicknames?

Alright, here we have the first team! Hailing from San Jose, California...

The California Golden Suns!

The team is named after the bright, golden sunshine found in The Golden State! The color scheme is simple, just yellow and black. On the home and away jerseys, I went for a traditional style, with black and yellow piping and simple stripes on the sleeves. The primary logo serves as a sleeve patch while the nickname/location is printed arched in yellow with black outlining. The alts are a little different, however. I was going to add an outline around the logo, but I realized I liked how it looked with just the yellow or black parts showing. With that in mind, I placed the primary on the chest, one with a yellow base, the other with a black base.The first alt gets a special cap, mostly yellow with a black brim, while the other cap, used with the other jerseys, is mostly black with a yellow brim. 

Two quick side notes: first, the template is of my own creation, based on real life images. Second, the team is actually named after my favorite game of all time, Golden Sun. However, it fit with California, so I ran with it!

So, what do you guys think? This was the first full concept I created, so feel free to critique my concepts and presentation. I want to improve!

I reeeeally like the font choice for California! The name is uniquely awesome as well. The logo is growing on me. At first I thought a C or combo of CGS or GS inserted in the middle of the sun would be cool, but that could be a future update of some sort. I like how the beveled sun rays are different colors so it looks different on the different colored jerseys. I'm also a sucker for black and gold (Pittsburgh blood dies hard) so I'm a fan of this whole situation here.

The only other thing I'll offer as a minor suggestion is you could make the rays a little bolder, same amount of rays but a little fatter in width, so when it's on a colored background the half-bevels stand out a little more. Not sure if that make sense or not.

I also dig the template, nice work on creating that. Looks clean. Good start man!

Steelman wrote:

I reeeeally like the font choice for California! The name is uniquely awesome as well. The logo is growing on me. At first I thought a C or combo of CGS or GS inserted in the middle of the sun would be cool, but that could be a future update of some sort. I like how the beveled sun rays are different colors so it looks different on the different colored jerseys. I'm also a sucker for black and gold (Pittsburgh blood dies hard) so I'm a fan of this whole situation here.

The only other thing I'll offer as a minor suggestion is you could make the rays a little bolder, same amount of rays but a little fatter in width, so when it's on a colored background the half-bevels stand out a little more. Not sure if that make sense or not.

I also dig the template, nice work on creating that. Looks clean. Good start man!

Thank you! I see where you're getting at with the rays, and I'll see how it looks with larger rays. Honestly, the Golden Suns are probably my favorite team I've ever done, so I may be cheering for them (although my sports teams luck is lousy, so good luck with that).

Anyway, on to the next concept! Taking flight from the ATL, it's.... the Atlanta Jets!



The Jets take their name from Atlanta's famous airport, as well as owner Tyler Hudson's desire for the team to capture the "fast-moving speed" of the city of Atlanta. The colors are red for Atlanta's other sports, as well as gold for the "champion spirit", as Hudson put it.

Honestly, I'm personally not sold on the design, but it's a nostalgic theme for me (the name and logo comes from my first fictional league, several years ago, although the logo belonged to a different team) and I felt the logo was strong enough to stand on its own. I went with a red and gold color scheme, not exactly like the Five Stripes, but pretty darn close (if you're wondering, the gold is different and so is the dark red). The home and away jerseys are simple, with gold piping on the home and red on the away, and one red and one gold sleeve stripes. The number is displayed on the front, under the wordmark. I really liked how "Atlanta" looked when it was framed by the primary, so I picked a font to go with that. The alt is a little different. A red base, gold wordmark, dark red sleeve stripes, and the number as a sleeve patch, this is definitely an "out-there" idea for a more traditional team. The cap is a simple red base with a gold brim.

That's team number two! Again, if you guys have any suggestions for cities and names, I'm always open. Thanks for your kind words. Enjoy!

C&C welcome.