MLB London Series is producing some truly blasphemous Phillies-Mets merch

There has never been nor will there likely ever be any love lost between the Philadelphia Phillies and New York Mets. The bitter NL East rivals have been at odds for as long as memory will allow and it's fitting that it's these two divisional foes were selected to head to London Stadium this season for the MLB London Series.

Having said that, our baseball-loving friends might not quite understand just how bitter the Mets-Phillies rivalry actually is.

Case in point would be the merchandise that's already on sale ahead of the London Series. Rather than just promoting the London Series or either team, fans have been posting some of the apparel being sold which features the Phillies and Mets logos side-by-side.

MLB London Series apparel blasphemously misses the Mets-Phillies rivalry

First, take a look at this blasphemous jacket:

Which self-respecting fan of either of these two teams is ever letting this fabric within five feet of their body?

But wait! If you thought that jacket was bad, how about we unveil perhaps the biggest eyesore of all, another top that features both logos together but in a design that you couldn't pay me to wear if it the logos were embossed with real 24-carat gold.

Truly remarkably awful stuff.

Now, let's be fair. London gets only a taste of Major League Baseball in the grand scheme of things. There is a good chance that fans are agnostic when it comes to the Mets-Phillies rivalry and are just trying to commemorate MLB coming to town and which teams were playing when it happened in 2024. In that capacity, I can't fault these designs -- though I'd still contend that polo is an abomination and a crime against fashion.

Having said that, stateside fans, whether they have an affinity for the Mets and Phillies, are rightly appalled seeing something like this. For anyone in England, this would be akin to having Chelsea and Tottenham logos on the same shirt/jacket. It sounds crazy just to say that, and that's because it is.

Alas, bad merchandising is nothing new, especially when we get these odd items for international games in professional sports. But if you see a Mets or Phillies fans ever wearing one of these items with both logos, be sure to let them know that they were duped by the MLB London Series hype machine. It's a rare exception for wearing this to actually be an acceptable thing to do.