The slumping Orioles have lost five in a row, but on Monday, they came away with a win off the diamond.
The Orioles have the best uniforms in the major leagues, according to a recent fan poll conducted by ESPN.
The O's entered the SportsNation bracket, dubbed the Battle of the Uniforms, as the 13th seed in the American League. "Always liked the orange-and-black scheme, but the white-paneled cap is a bad, bad look from the '70s," wrote ESPN's Jim Caple, who seeded the AL side of the bracket. In Caple's eyes, only the Texas Rangers and Cleveland Indians had worse uniforms than the O's, who switched back to the cartoon bird logo in 2012.
But thanks, presumably, to the clicks of all those diehard Baltimore fans, the Orioles were able to defy their doubters -- well, Caple -- and play the role of Cinderella. They beat the fourth-seeded Houston Astros in the first round and the fifth-seeded Kansas City Royals in the second. They edged out the top-seeded Detroit Tigers before beating the New York Yankees to advance to the final, where they were matched up with the St. Louis Cardinals.
In the championship poll, they beat the National League's best, garnering 59 percent of the votes (there were 147,418 total votes).
Baltimore's victory in the Battle of the Uniforms forced Caple to concede that the Orioles weren't "undeserving champions."
"Baltimore's uniform has some great style features, beginning with those wonderful orange and black colors (always an outstanding look) and extending to the great cartoon Oriole logo on the cap (much preferable to the ornithologically correct version). It's a classic uniform that looked great on Brooks Robinson, Frank Robinson and Jim Palmer, and it still looks great on Adam Jones, Matt Wieters and Chris Davis," Caple wrote. "On the other hand … can we talk about those home caps with the white-panel front?"
He might not be a fan, but it appears many, many others are.