At only six, Mississippi State wore as few uniform combinations in 2017 as they had since at least 2010. ​

As you can see above, 2017 was an even more constrained uniform season than 2016 was, with only four jerseys being worn the entire season. Three of the jerseys were retained from 2016; the other was the White "State" Pinstripe jersey, which was announced before the season. There were no new uniforms unveiled throughout the season; all six combinations had been worn 11 games into the season.

Not retained from 2016 were the White MS Jersey, Black 85 Jersey, and both camo jerseys. The White MS, Black 85, and Digital Camo jerseys had all been worn for two seasons, which is quickly becoming a common lifespan for alternate uniforms in rotation. The Cream MS jerseys were a previous victim of the two-year cut.

After only being worn with white pants in 2016, the Maroon MS jersey was a part of three different combinations in 2017. It was worn a staggering 31 times with the plain white pants (a big reason why State should add a second maroon jersey in 2018), 7 times with the white pinstripe pants (with an impressive 6-1 record), and twice with the gray pinstripe pants.

The Maroon MS over gray pinstripes combo was the first time that a maroon jersey had been worn with gray pinstripe pants since 2001. It was only worn twice, both times early in the season. It seemed to correct one of the biggest problems of the 2016 uniform set- that white pants were worn in the first game of every road series, going against the baseball etiquette of gray pants on the road. However, after the Arkansas series, the Maroon MS over gray pinstripes combo was never worn again, and white pants were worn in 9 of the last 14 regular season games.

Overall, 2017 was a very solid uniform season for Mississippi State. It was the first season without camo uniforms since 2014 and the first without black uniforms since 2008! There are still some things that need to be fixed- like wearing Maroon MS over White too much, wearing white pants on the road too much, and the inverted numbers and wordmark on the White 85 jerseys being hard to read. But on the whole, 2017 showed why Mississippi State has the most classic uniforms in college baseball.

 The first year of the Andy Cannizaro era came to an end early Monday morning. The 2017 Bulldogs, after losing 10 players to the 2016 Draft and a staggering amount of pitchers to injury, fought all the to 40 wins on the season and a super regional berth. The future is bright for the Andy Cannizaro era!

In the first game of the Baton Rouge Super Regional, the Bulldogs wore the Maroon MS jersey with white pants. In the season-ending loss on Sunday night, they went with the inverted White 85 jerseys that had posted a 3-0 record in the Hattiesburg Regional a week earlier.

​The Bulldogs ended the season wearing only six uniform combinations, three less than last season and the least since at least 2010. A season recap will be posted later this week.

Uniform Models for the Baton Rouge Super Regional:

Saturday vs 1(4). LSU- Maroon MS over White- #15 Jake Mangum
Sunday vs 1(4). LSU- White 85- #38 Harrison Bragg

For the first time since 2012, Mississippi State lost the first game of its regional. But for the first time since 1979, the Bulldogs won 4 straight to win the regional despite losing the first game. I was able to attend all five games; it was an incredible experience to come from behind and advance to our second straight super regional.

In game one on Friday, the Bulldogs lost to 3 seed South Alabama while wearing Maroon MS over White. Saturday's games were rained out, so the Bulldogs ended up playing the 4 seed UIC on Sunday Morning at 10 A.M.  Wearing Maroon MS over White for the sixth straight game, the Bulldogs narrowly eliminated the Flames and survived to play another game.

In the Sunday night rematch vs South Alabama, the Bulldogs were the designated visiting team and batted first.  Oddly, everything else about the game was backwards. South Alabama had been in the first base dugout in their preceding game against Southern Miss and elected not to switch dugouts.  The Jaguars were wearing their red jerseys with white pants; in an attempt to switch things up, the Bulldogs had switched to the inverted White 85 jerseys. The result was that the Bulldogs were in the "home" third base dugout and were wearing "home" white jerseys despite being the "away" home. The Bulldogs won the game 7-3, and advanced to play Southern Miss on Monday.

More rain delays pushed the Monday game back to Monday night; the Bulldogs had to beat the Golden Eagles twice before Wednesday to advance, and the rain was making a hard task even harder. Nonetheless, the two teams took the field at 5:45 Monday night, the Bulldogs back in the inverted White 85s as the "home" team in game 1.  Jacob Billingsey and the Bulldogs dominated game 1, winning 8-1 to force a winner-take-all final. The Bulldogs were the "away" team for the final game, but stuck with the thus-far successful inverted White 85s. Nearly an hour after midnight, the Bulldogs clinched the regional championship with an 8-6 victory.

​The Hattiesburg Regional continued last season's tradition of winning championships in the inverted White 85 jerseys. They debuted in a Governor's Cup victory; they were later worn in the 2016 SEC Regular Season Title clinching victory over Arkansas and the 2016 Starkville Regional Championship over Louisiana Tech.

​The Bulldogs will head to Baton Rouge this weekend for their second consecutive Super Regional. It will be a Sat-Sun-Mon series, with games 1 and 2 scheduled for 8 P.M. central on Saturday and Sunday night respectively.

Uniform Models for the Hattiesburg Regional:

Friday vs 3. South Alabama- Maroon MS over White- #26 Cody Brown
Sunday vs 4. Illinois Chicago- Maroon MS over White- #48 Konnor Pilkington
Sunday vs 3. South Alabama- White 85- #2 Hunter Stovall
Monday vs 1. Southern Miss- White 85- #45 Jacob Billingsley
Monday vs 1. Southern Miss- White 85- #19 Brent Rooker

The Bulldogs stuck with the same uniform combination, Maroon MS over White, for all four of their games in the 2017 SEC Baseball Tournament. Normally, I'd be against such lack of variety, but given what's happened in Hoover in the past, I'm okay with this. That being said, this is a clear example of why we need two maroon jerseys, like we had from 2009 through 2015, to keep things from getting too repetitive.

This was a solid tournament run until the 8th inning of game three, when all reliable pitching was exhausted. Despite the losses on Friday, solid starts from Cole Gordon and Jacob Billingsley inspire confidence for regional play next week. The Bulldogs will find out their tournament destination, likely as a 2 seed, Monday morning at 11 A.M.

Uniform Models for the 2017 SEC Baseball Tournament:

Wednesday vs 12.Georgia- Maroon MS over White - #48 Konnor Pilkington
Thursday vs 4.Arkansas - Maroon MS over White - #19 Brent Rooker
Friday vs 1.Florida - Maroon MS over White- #24 Cole Gordon
Friday vs 4.Arkansas - Maroon MS over White- #26 Cody Brown

Unless a 2007-like scenario happens where the Bulldogs host a super regional as a two seed, the final week of games at the current incarnation of Dudy Noble Field took place this past week.  The week started with a win over Troy in the White "State" Pinstripes.  That was the end of the week's good fortune, however, as the Bulldogs lost a close game on Thursday and then struggled on the mound in losses on Friday and Saturday.  They wore the Maroon MS over White combo on Thursday and Friday.  On Saturday, they wore the inverted White 85 jerseys for the first time since April 9th against Kentucky.  It was the second season in the row that the jerseys had been worn in the last game of the regular season; last year they were worn in the SEC-clinching win over Arkansas.

By getting swept, the Bulldogs fell to 17-13, good for third in the SEC West and fifth in the SEC. Not as high a finish as last season, but much better than I think most expected.  The Bulldogs will be the 5 seed in the SEC Tournament and will play against the 12 seed, Georgia, for a chance to advance to the double elimination round.  It's the third time in 5 years that the Bulldogs have been the 5 seed in the tournament; the last five years, they've either been the 1 seed (2016), not in the tournament (2015), or the 5 seed (2013, 2014, and 2017). Below are the final 2017 Standings and SEC Tournament Bracket.

There was a new addition to the jerseys of four Bulldog players this past week.  #16 Josh Lovelady, #19 Brent Rooker, #26 Cody Brown, and #45 Jacob Billingsley all graduated and became eligible for the SEC Graduate patch, a program that was started during football season this past fall.  These are the first four Mississippi State baseball players to ever wear the patch.

This weekend was also the last home weekend for 5th year senior #26 (Downtown) Cody Brown.  Brown was redshirted during the 2013 Omaha run and has played significantly every season since 2014.  As a result, I am fairly certain that Brown has worn more uniform combinations than any player in Mississippi State baseball history. Only counting games in which he has made an appearance, Brown has worn 42 different uniform combinations as a Bulldog.

After a big series win at Texas A&M, the Bulldogs slacked this weekend in a surprising series loss to a hot Georgia team.  After dominating in Maroon MS over White on Friday, State lost on Saturday in the gray pinstripes and again on Sunday in Maroon MS over White.

State's National Seed and SEC title hopes took a hit after dropping the series at Georgia, but winning the series against LSU this weekend would go a long way towards securing a home regional and an SEC West title.  Scenarios for the Bulldogs going into the final week of SEC play are:

To secure a first round bye in the SEC Tournament:
Win 1 vs LSU and have Florida sweep Kentucky OR
Win 1 vs LSU and have Texas A&M win at least 2 against Arkansas OR
Win 2 vs LSU

To tie for first in the west with LSU (with whom State would have the tiebreaker for a #2 SECT seed):
Win 2 vs LSU and have Texas A&M win at least one against Arkansas

To win the west outright:
Sweep LSU

To win a share of the overall SEC Title, meaning back to back titles and the #1 seed in the SEC tournament for the second year in a row:
Sweep LSU and have Kentucky win exactly 2 against Florida.

Basically, cheer for MSU (obviously), and Texas A&M every game this weekend. Cheer for Kentucky to take 2 of 3 from Florida if State can sweep LSU. If State only wins one over LSU, cheer for Florida to sweep.

The Dawgs are back.  After slipping in a series loss to Auburn last weekend, the Bulldogs bounced back and took two from top 15 Texas A&M down in College Station.  With Alabama taking two from Auburn today and Georgia beating Kentucky last night, the Bulldogs will finish the weekend at least tied for first in the SEC and all alone at first in the West.

The series in College Station got off to a rough start on Thursday, as the Aggies dominated in a 9-2 win.  Thursday's game saw the Bulldogs wearing Maroon MS over white and the Aggies wearing some nice cream uniforms.  I'm not a fan of white pants on the road; it works fine (but still not great) when the other team also wears white pants, but it looked really bad Thursday night against A&M's cream.  That's a game in which we should've at least worn gray pants, if not just full gray pins.

On Friday, the Bulldogs evened the series wearing Maroon MS over White again, while the Aggies wore their Adidas Heritage "Texas Aggies" uniforms, complete with a really nice white hat.  On Saturday, the Aggies were the ones in maroon jerseys and white (pinstripe) pants, while the Bulldogs went with the gray pinstripes in their series clinching win.

Uniform Models for the series win in College Station:

Thursday at Texas A&M - Maroon MS over White - #26 Cody Brown
Friday at Texas A&M - Maroon MS over White- #32 Hunter Vansau
Saturday at Texas A&M - Gray Pinstripes- #16 Josh Lovelady

The Bulldogs continued their recent hot streak by taking care of Mississippi Valley State in the midweek and then traveling to South Carolina to take a series from the top 15 Gamecocks.

In the midweek game with Mississippi Valley State, the Bulldogs wore the Maroon MS jerseys with white pinstripe pants; the win gave them a 5-1 record in that combination this season.  In wins at South Carolina on Friday and Saturday, the Bulldogs wore Maroon MS over white, marking the second straight road series that the have neglected to wear the Maroon MS over gray pins combo.  After the two wins, the Maroon MS over white combo now has a record off 9-4 on the season, after a 1-3 start.  On Sunday, the Bulldogs wore gray pinstripes as the Gamecocks picked up their lone win of the weekend.

Another successful week meant another rise in the rankings for Mississippi State baseball; they were ranked as high as #13 and were at least #21 in all 6 polls heading into the weekend.  After the series win in South Carolina, those numbers changed to as high as #11 and at least #16.  In the SEC standings, the Bulldogs are tied at 10-5 (Two games ahead of where last year's SEC Championship team was at this point (8-7)) for second place in the west and for second place overall.