In the epic words of Jerry Seinfeld, "What's the deal with purple jerseys?"

A lot of fuss was made last year when it leaked out that the team was going to discontinue the purple jerseys from their official kit lineup. The players hadn't worn them in about two years, and even back then they were only selected for a handful of games. I remember someone menitoning they might be auctioned off for charity at some event. Personally, I wasn't distraught over this. I like the jerseys, don't get me wrong, but 5 jerseys is WAY too many for a baseball team. I like kits where a team has more hat styles than jerseys. (See, St. Louis Cardinals official jerseys.)

Fast forward to this year. By my count, we've worn pinstripes twice this season. I don't catch highlights from every game (Thanks ESPN!), but it seems that every other game has featured the purple jerseys. On top of that, not once this year have the vests, black or pinstripe, been chosen. This is quite a shift from the product we saw on the field last year. Black dominated at home and on the road, and the "CR" pinstripe vests were extremely popular at home.

However, the product on the field is also PERFORMING much differently than last year. I'm a huge baseball fan, and grew up loving the game, so I recognize the importance of superstitions. Is this the impetus for the sudden love of the Purple Power Polo's? Most likely, as this is what happened in 2007 with the black vests.

So does anyone out there know what has caused this change? I am hypothesizing that a group of players got together and said this year is going to be different. I like when something like that happens. It's like they said we're still the Rockies, but we want to improve our performance from last year. To do that, we need to change. It starts with the jerseys, and infects a lot of other aspects of the play on the field. So far, so good.