Ryukyu Turtles

Quick facts:
Founded: N/A
Field: Okinawa Cellular Stadium, Naha, Okinawa
Owner: N/A

The Ryukyu Turtles are the only fictional team in this series, representing Okinawa Prefecture and the entire Ryukyu Islands. A baseball team, known as the Ryukyu Blue Oceans, attempted to organize and enter NPB, but fell apart due to financial difficulties after the COVID-19 pandemic. The islands were previously ruled by the Ryukyu Kingdom before annexation by Japan in 1879. The Ryukyu name still holds tremendous value to the people of Okinawa and is used for their two current major sports, FC Ryukyu Okinawa of soccer and the Ryukyu Golden Kings of basketball. An Okinawa team could draw from locals as well as capitalize on the major U.S. military bases on the islands (a major source of contention from native Okinawans). 

Following the trend of NPB teams named for animals, I considered two local marine animals as the nickname for Okinawa's team. The prefecture is home to both sea turtles and dugongs, but as the Dragons already use "D" in alphabetical abbreviations, Turtles was the better choice. The logo is a stylized turtle seen from above, similar to this Daytona Tortugas logo. I went for a unique double-green color scheme with a light tan representing the turtle's shell. This way, Ryukyu stands out from the other green teams in NPB.



Ryukyu's jerseys were a place for me to implement ideas that I hadn't yet in NPB, including a mascot character on the home jersey and a sand-colored road jersey like the Padres, referencing Okinawa's tropical nature. The third jersey is a bright green set with a Turtles script while the fourth jersey shows off Okinawa pride, placing the prefecture front and center. 

It remains to be seen if the Blue Oceans' dream of a local NPB team ever reaches fruition, but they certainly have my support. Okinawa is a beautiful place and somewhere I would love to visit one day when I'm able, hopefully with a local team to call their own.

What do you all think? All comments are appreciated! Tomorrow will be the last team of the series, the Japanese national baseball team, Samurai Japan!

Dan O'Mac wrote:

I genuinely love this set. The only thing I'm not sure of is the home having a turtle on the chest and on the cap. The Ryukyu script makes me very happy though.

Thanks! I agree with you but I wanted to have the turtle on the jersey and it only made sense to keep it on the cap. The Ryukyu script is a favorite of mine as well.

ventures: solid, classic baseball look. definitely reminds me of the yankees too. you really took it to another level with the changes you made; the rope pattern is such a great touch

pirates: this is another one with a weird logo. it almost reads like a C and an I to me, although I also kinda see a lowercase e for ehime in there? still, when it's based on an existing brand, it feels right. the colors are awesome; I love orange and green and it feels like the only choice for a team based around mandarin oranges. oh and I almost missed the secondary logo on the sleeves! holy banger

turtles: I love almost everything about this. the color scheme is great and the turtle logo is really well done. the only issue I have is the tan road uniform. I think the reason it works for the padres and not the turtles is that the padres' tan complements their shade of brown really well, but here it clashes with the green. if you want to try something different on the road, maybe a powder blue would work here? it might also look really bad, idk

samurai: not much to say here, but I definitely like the tweaks you made to the colors. it just feels like the japanese national baseball team. the red alt is nice, albeit maybe a little dark, but I think it works

all in all, just an absolutely stellar job from top to bottom. can't wait to see what you tackle next!

Yomiuri Giants: I think these simple updates look really nice. Super clean, classy set.

Chiba Lotte Marines: I like what you've done to differentiate them from the ChiSox. A good-looking black and white set just feels right for baseball. The red jersey gives a nice change and the wild fourth is pretty cool. I'm not personally a fan of staggered front logo/number in baseball, but I get it. I do wish the Chiba script wasn't quite so large, feels a little oversized compared to the Marines script.

Yokohama DeNA BayStars: Firstly, the team name is terrible and has a terrible IRL brand to match. So really anything you did was prob gonna be an improvement, however, I do think you did some cool things here. The new color scheme is fantastic. Beautiful combo with the gold. That feels like a significant change that should stick IRL. I think your cap logos are much stronger than the primary logo, but still feels better than their current "looks like a seafood brand" logo. The skewed star doesn't really do it for me, along with the floating text, but I think the shooting star look on the cap logos are really nice. The home and away unis are nice. The third is still growing on me. I think it works for the league but in a vacuum feels weird, ya know? I don't hate it though. Overall, good improvements, especially with a more clearly defined nautical direction. I think you could prob lean into that even more.

Tokyo Yakult Swallows: I'll preface my thoughts with, I think you're on the right track here. The navy is gorgeous but I think the green is too brightly hued for me. I'd prefer a more Kelly green with a little blue in it for balance. It could still be bright but less abrasive. I think what's bothering me is that there seems to be two competing styles with the logos and scripts, which isn't really your fault but worth noting. The new primary logo has a very modern almost graffiti-like element to it with hard angles, while the original S/Swallows logo is smooth and has soft edges. Granted the old logo is a total disaster, but I think you could help strengthen your direction here by choosing one or the other. I personally think the original Swallows mark with the little wings is nicer, where the new YS logo could be used only for an alternate jersey. However, if used in that way, it doesn't flow with the nice scripts, and perhaps a further point for me, the scripts don't flow with either the Swallows wordmark either. I think you should consider new scripts or do something to simplify which styles you're using here. Maybe leave the scripts to one of the alt jerseys? I really dislike the drop shadows. But I think drops could work if they were singular instead of floating shadows. I think the old Padres-style numbers look better with the scripts/Swallows logo but the SF Giants numbers can work too if they're soley paired with the hard-angled logo. That's basically it, lol. I really want to love the Swallows, just trying to attempt to describe what bothers me.