Colorado Rockies Uniforms Will Have New Shade of Purple

The Colorado Rockies have been wearing two different shades of purple in their uniforms for years, but will now have a consistent shade across all uniforms.

As an ode to the “purple mountain majesties” line in “America the Beautiful,” the Colorado Rockies have used purple as their primary color since the team’s inception in 1993. The Rockies have been the only major league team to don purple, so their uniforms have always had a unique flair to them.

But apparently they were unique for more than just that reason. For the past several years, the Rockies uniforms have had slightly different shades of purple in the team’s hats and uniforms. The difference is barely noticeable on the field, but clear when shown close up.

The above photo shows the new uniforms (left) and the old (right). The change brings a new, brighter shade of purple – which is the first change to the team’s logo or color scheme in its 24-year existence.

Here’s a closer look at the updated color, via Chris Creamer of SportsLogos.net.

Rockies director of retail operations Aaron Heinrich said the color change is a rebrand to add consistency to the Rockies franchise, via Thomas Harding of MLB.com.

“The purple that we had, the issue was for something that’s such a part of our core — the Rockies and purple are synonymous – that purple had a lot of variance,” Heinrich said. “So this isn’t a change – that kind of symbolizes breaking away, a rebrand. We are defining a Rockies purple that we can use – one that is communicated consistently on-field, one that we believe looks good over the media when you see it on TV, and one that we can be consistent with.”

The Rockies offered a tease of the team’s upcoming spring training uniforms.

The Rockies believe the new purple shade will show up the same on caps, protective gear, uniforms and various hoodies and t-shirts on authentic gear. In case you’re wondering, the new shade of purple under the Pantone Matching System (PMS) is PMS 2685, which replaces the previous shade of PMS 273.

Heinrich said the new shade should stay consistent in spring 2020, when Under Armour replaces Majestic as the official MLB uniform supplier.

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“We think we honored the purple – who we are – and kept that tradition, but we made it something that is more consistent,” Heinrich said.