MADISON –The Rocket City Trash Pandas are going the extra mile to make sure fans enjoying a game at Toyota Field have an optimal and memorable visual expereince.
The team has partnered with California-based EnChroma, a producer of leading-edge eyewear, to be the first pro baseball team in the country to provide specially made glasses for attendees who are red-green color blind.
To promote the new eye wear, the Trash Pandas invited eight color blind fans onto the field before Tuesday’s game and gave them each a pair to try on. After donning the glasses, the entire group seemed to experience a collective eye-opening reaction to the colors displayed before them.
Tonight, we teamed up with @enchroma to provide a special pregame experience for 7 red-green color blind fans.
With EnChroma glasses, these guests can better experience the vibrant colors of baseball, and we will now have them permanently available to borrow during our games! pic.twitter.com/1ssuDCWRBP
— Rocket City Trash Pandas (@trashpandas) August 7, 2024
“Green grass and the incredible blue ‘baseball’ skies are so synonymous with the baseball,” said Garrett Fahrmann, Trash Pandas Executive Vice President and General Manager. “We’re glad to partner with EnChroma to make these opportunities available to fans who wouldn’t otherwise have the opportunity to experience the breathtaking sights of a Trash Pandas game.”
Erik Ritchie, CEO of EnChroma, noted the potential of the glasses not only for fans but also players.
“For color blind players, the baseball can blend in with the brown dirt infield and the green grass, while the red of the Trash Pandas’ uniforms can look dull. Even colorful sunsets, scoreboard graphics and postgame fireworks may seem less impressive,” said Ritchie. “We are thrilled that the Trash Pandas are pioneering color accessibility in baseball. We hope that other ballclubs and sports teams will enable color blind fans to experience their favorite teams in richer color with our glasses too.”
One in 12 men (8%) and one in 200 women (.5%) are color blind. In the US, 13 million people are color blind and 350 million worldwide.
With approximately 170 million baseball fans in the US alone, at least 7.2 million are color blind and cannot see the colors of game the same as those with normal color vision. With 40 players under contract per Major League Baseball (MLB) team, nearly 100 major league players are color blind.
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