The 5 Best MLB Baseball Mascots

While baseball has always been considered “America’s pastime” and one of our country’s greatest sports, the MLB is first and foremost entertainment. Baseball has many great entertaining traditions, ranging from the 7th inning stretch to a box of Cracker Jack or tailgating in the stadium’s parking lot with friends and family. But, perhaps the most entertaining aspect of major league baseball, besides the game of course, is the mascot. Currently only four major league teams don’t have an official mascot, making mascots as much a part of the baseball stadium experience as the concession stands or bleachers. These are the five best baseball mascots in the sport today:

5) Slider

One of only four baseball mascots in The Mascot Hall of Fame, Slider is the official mascot of the Cleveland Indians. It’s uncertain as to what Slider is exactly. He looks like some sort of Sesame Street character with purple and yellow fuzzy hair, but one thing is certain, he has been perhaps the only entertaining aspect of Cleveland Indian baseball in the last 15 years. Best known for a falling off a wall and tearing knee ligaments in the 1995 ALCS, Slider is a survivor and sure to be a mainstay of Cleveland Indian games for years to come.

4) The San Diego Chicken

Originating in 1974, The San Diego Chicken, a.k.a. The Chicken, is considered to be a major influence in the history of MLB mascots. While the chicken has never been officially linked to the San Diego Padres, he has made thousands of appearances throughout the history of the franchise. Recently The Chicken appeared in a 2008 Sony commercial with Indianapolis Colts quarterback, Peyton Manning, and is seen regularly during promotional events throughout the country.

3) Mr. Met

Appearing at Shea Stadium in 1964, Mr. Met is the first live-action, costumed mascot in major league baseball. His legs and torso are that of a human’s while his head is simply an oversized baseball with a Mets hat on top. Elected to the Mascot Hall of Fame in 2007, he has entertained Mets fans for nearly 50 years with a brief absence in the early 70s. However, today he is as much a part of Citi Field as David Wright or the pitcher’s mound.

2) The Klement’s Racing Sausages

First seen as virtual racers on the scoreboard of Milwaukee Brewers home games, The Klement’s Racing Sausages didn’t appear in live form until the early 90s when the Bratwurst, Polish and Italian first took the field. In the middle of the 90s the Hot Dog joined the group and later in 2007 the Chorizo would round out the five racers we have today. The Racing Sausages have made appearances on Conan O’Brien and SportsCenter since their increase in popularity over the last decade with perhaps their most notorious moment occurring in 2003 when Randall Simon, then of the Pittsburgh Pirates, hit the Italian Sausage with a baseball bat as the racers passed by the visitor’s dugout. Later known as “Sausagegate,” no known attack has occurred on a MLB mascot since.

1) The Philly Phanatic

According to legend, The Philly Phanatic hails from the Galapagos Islands and has been a fixture of Philadelphia Phillies games since 1978. A green, fuzzy anomaly, this mascot was inducted into the Mascot Hall of Fame in 2005 and now rides out onto the field before every Phillies game on an ATV and entertains the crowd throughout each inning of the ball game. Perhaps the most world-renowned mascot in all of sports, the Philly Phanatic has made global and nationally televised appearances for the last three decades and is engrained in baseball history as the most popular and infamous of all MLB mascots.