The Loop
Wait, is CC Sabathia’s family Christmas card the greatest thing of all time ever?
Ah, the dreaded Christmas card—an ancient horror. Giving or receiving, it doesn’t matter. Itchy turtle necks, bossy parents, endless handwritten oversharing from some guy you barely even talked to in college. The PTSD ring-ting-a-lings at the mere thought of them. But this holiday season, amidst volcanic eruption and congressional insult, one lone visionary has stepped to the mound to revive the entire stale medium once and for all. That man? One CC Sabathia.
Holiday-observing ladies and gentleman of baseball and beyond, I think we can all agree this is the greatest Christmas card we’ve seen this year, perhaps in our lifetimes. We have no idea how CC convinced his entire family of six to get a few hours of makeup done and then pose for a family photo as potted plants, but the results are extraordinary.
It’s not just the visual or the nod to one of the classic gifts of American Christmas past that makes this so good, however. It also the card copy, which makes the perfunctory “Merry Christmas and Happy New Year” seem downright lazy. “SabatChia Pet - Watch Us Grow!” it reads in the style of the original packaging. “Plant Smiles. Grow Laughter. Harvest Love.”
From Chia fro to toe, it’s perfectly conceived and, despite the Christmas card stigma, a welcome sight in any mailbox this holiday season . . . unless you have a Massachusetts zip code, that is.