Meet the baseball stars who will wear a special logo during the 2025 MLB season
MLB has announced that six players will wear a special gold patch on their jersey during the upcoming baseball season.
The best players in Major League Baseball (MLB) last season are to be honored with a special identifying mark on their jerseys in 2025.
In collaboration with collectibles company Topps and the apparel maker Nike, MLB has introduced a gold patch that will be worn by the 2024 season’s individual award winners.
Who will wear the special MLB patch?
The baseball stars who will sport the patch are: Shohei Ohtani and Aaron Judge, the league’s Most Valuable Players last season; Chris Sale and Tarik Skubal, the winners of the Cy Young award; and Paul Skenes and Luis Gil, MLB’s Rookies of the Year.
Fans also have the chance to own these distinctive patches: in official MLB stores, the logos will feature on all replica jerseys bearing each player’s name and number.
What’s more, 10 game-worn patches used by the six MLB award winners will be transformed into autographed Topps Logoman trading cards.
JUST IN: MLB, Topps & Fanatics have partnered on the brand-new Gold MLB Logo Patch program.
— MLB (@MLB) March 15, 2025
These six award winners from last year will wear a Gold MLB Logo Patch on their jersey for the duration of the 2025 season:
Shohei Ohtani
Aaron Judge
Tarik Skubal
Chris Sale
Paul Skenes… pic.twitter.com/cpE91xQR8i
Ohtani debuts gold patch in Tokyo
The first player to wear the new gold patch was the Los Angeles Dodgers' Japanese star Ohtani.
The designated hitter and pitcher could be seen wearing the patch during the Dodgers’ exhibition game against the Yomiuri Giants in Tokyo on Saturday, as the World Series champions finalized their preparations for the beginning of their MLB title defence next week.
MLB patch cards a sought-after collectors' item
This is not the first time that Topps and MLB have partnered to turn game-worn patches into exclusive trading cards.
Since the 2023 season, for example, players making their first appearance in MLB have worn a ‘Debut’ patch that has later featured on collectible cards.
These tradings cards are highly valuable - as demonstrated by Skenes’ debut card, which was obtained by an 11-year-old Californian boy.
The young collector turned down a trade offer from Skenes’ team, the Pittsburgh Pirates, who were ready to exchange the card for two tickets to every Pirates game for the next 30 seasons.
In addition, Pittsburgh offered the youngster the chance to play a softball game at their PNC Park home stadium, a VIP experience during the team’s training camp, a meet-and-greet with Skenes, and two autographed jerseys from the player.
Topps revealed in January that the collector had instead opted to put the card up for auction.
When does the 2025 MLB season start?
The 2025 MLB regular season begins on Tuesday, March 18, when the Dodgers take on the Chicago Cubs in the first of two games in the Japanese capital. The Tokyo Series will also see the Dodgers face the Cubs the following day, on Wednesday, March 19.
The rest of the regular season will be played from Thursday, March 27, to Sunday, September 28.
The dates for the 2025 MLB playoffs have not yet been confirmed, but the postseason tends to run from early October to early November at the latest.
Article originally written in Spanish, before translated with the assistance of AI, and edited and expanded by William Allen.
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