Corporate sponsorship in baseball has slowly moved from billboards behind home plates in the 80s (in full view from the default center field television cameras), to stadium naming rights in the 90s, to the newest fad, followed by several teams in this year's World Baseball Classic:
Corporate sponsor names on uniform sleeves and helmets (and not to pick on team Puerto Rico; several other teams have them, but Puerto Rico played today allowing me to get screencaps)
Is this a sign for things to come to the major leagues?
Do you think that the next step would be naming rights to post-season games and the world series, like with the college bowl games? How does "Jiffy Lube NLDS" sound? What about the "KFC All-star game"?
Or could it be the European soccer model, where teams instead of wearing their team's name on their chests, they wear their team's sponsor's. Will the next iteration of the Twins' franchise be the Minnesota Targets?
What do you think?
