Cubs Apparently Prepping for Ads on Janky Jerseys, Will Additional Revenue Increase Payroll?

Remember when Tom Ricketts said way back on Monday that the Cubs needed more revenue in order to increase payroll beyond current levels? Maybe he was being more coy than foolish, as Paul Lukas of Uni Watch points out that the team’s official photos signal the addition of a jersey ad in the near future. While it could simply be yet another in a litany of poor choices by Nike and Fanatics, this is probably inevitable.

As you can see in the featured image above, the jerseys don’t all have the Walking Bear logo on the left sleeve as has been the case in the future. This is a telltale sign of an ad patch since said promos go on a batter’s front-facing sleeve in order to maximize visibility on television. Though Shōta Imanaga won’t bat unless things get really weird, we can see that the lefty’s right sleeve is bear bare. The right-handed Seiya Suzuki has nothing on his left arm.

The same is true for other players’ jerseys, so this probably isn’t a fluke. You know what else isn’t a fluke but most definitely should be? These shoddy-ass togs don’t even feature embroidered patches. The Walking Bear logos you see are basically the same as you’d get on a shirsey. They’ve also removed the circle-R trademark symbol from the bullseye logo as Lukas noted previously.

Some fans may not care one way or the other, but adding an ad patch to the Cubs’ uniforms is not going to go over well for a very large segment of loyalists. Even using the extra money on Cody Bellinger and/or other additions may not be enough to placate what is sure to be a vocal crowd, but at least it’d be a start.

Now the big question is who will be paying to desecrate these formerly venerated vestments? My money is on a company with strong local ties as we see with most other ads on American sports jerseys, though I don’t suppose Ricketts would turn down a mint from, say, a gum company. Nah, it’d be silly to have the Cubs associated with something like that.