Unique Unis: 1977 San Francisco Giants Road Jerseys

Welcome to the first installment of Unique Unis. This is where I, Erik Johnsen, review some of the more obscure uniforms that have ever been put out and worn. For the premiere of this series, we're going to go back to the year 1977. The Apple Computer was released to the public, The Eagles released "Hotel California", and Star Wars was put out in theaters and later becomes the highest grossing film at the time.

And the San Francisco Giants were as mediocre as mediocre can be.

They were not the worst team in the league, by any means. The problem was that the Giants were stuck in the middle of the Juan Marichal led club and the Will Clark era that started the 1980s. Alas, the Giants were struggling to compete with the National League powerhouses such as the Los Angeles Dodgers, Cincinnati Reds, and Philadelphia Phillies. Led by the returning Willie McCovey, Bill Madlock and their manager, Joe Altobelli, the Giants trudged along to a 75-87 record.

Now about those jerseys. The Giants have always had the history of wearing four colors: white/cream, gray, orange, and black. These colors have been interwoven in San Francisco Giants history. The home uniforms worn during the 1977 are almost instantly recognizable. White jerseys with the Giants script italicized. The roads, on the other hand, are a different story.

(Credit to Mile High Card Company)

Now listen, I am a fan of the orange uniforms that the Giants have worn in their franchise's history. I even purchased a script jersey the last time I went to Oracle Park in 2014 during the "Orange Fridays" promotion the team runs. This was the first time the color was used for a primary jersey, and I'm going to be honest, these are not that bad. The shade of orange the team chose looked really nice and I like the white outlining on the black letters. It's an eye catching uniform for sure. Even during the game, the players looked good wearing these. Allow Willie McCovey to demonstrate:

(Photo credit to Bay Area Sports Guy)

Now this uniform does have it's drawbacks. I'm really not a fan of the "San Francisco" on the front of the jersey. The city's name is too long to fit on the front of these. The letters are too big and spaced out, and it looks like the last letters in Francisco are under McCovey's biceps. Going off of that, these should have never been a road uniform to begin with. The Giants should have stuck with the grays that they previously had for the road and worn these as a home alternate. All this jersey needed was some tweaks, and it would look gorgeous.

Tweak the set they did. In 1978, the Giants redid their road uniform, removing the "San Francisco" from the front and combining it with the classic "Giants" script. The result is the orange jersey that we know and love. Now with a more italicized script, a variation of the 1978 San Francisco Giants road jersey has been worn at every Friday home game since 2014. This one stood the test of time.

(Photo credit to Catch Release Shop on eBay)

The script was gone from the Giants permanent set by 1983, and the Giants went to their current font during the strike shortened season of 1994. That year, "San Francisco" returned to the front of the road uniforms. In 2000, as the Giants were becoming a World Series contender, white was gone from the color scheme and replaced with cream. Finally, in 2014, the orange script jerseys returned as an alternate, much to the delight of San Francisco Giants fans worldwide. In the cream home and gray road set, the Giants won four National League pennants and three World Series championships, with all three titles occurring in the 2010s.

The Giants have always been associated with the color orange, and most likely always will be. It has been a part of their history for over 100 years, and it is still associated with the team today. When the 1977 "San Francisco" alternates were introduced, the jerseys themselves fell flat, but the concept of orange as a primary uniform color was a success. However, we are very unlikely to see "San Francisco" on the front of an orange Giants jersey again. That is what makes the 1977 San Francisco Giants road jerseys a Unique Uni.