This week in Minor League Baseball promotions: Emeralds to host 'Portlandia Night'

There are three certainties in life: death, taxes and most importantly, Minor League promotions. MiLB.com's Ben Hill has the inside scoop on the last of those certainties, and he'll be sharing a taste with us and you each and every week. Check out a unique upcoming promo below and read his full recap of the week's best promotions right here. You can follow Ben on Twitter @Bensbiz.

"Portlandia is all about how eccentric Portland is. Eugene is a mini-Portland. We're just as weird."

So says Eugene Emeralds general manager Allan Benavides, whose team is staging Portlandia Night on Thursday. The team plans to "honor the weirdness" of Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein's hipster-skewering sketch show by getting plenty weird themselves. The Emeralds will take the field in a flannel and skinny jeans ensemble that, had I ever seen an episode of the show, would certainly have inspired me to make a clever and apropos reference at this juncture of the blog post.

The Emeralds' "flannel" jerseys are, in a word, ugly. But 2015 has been awash in similarly discordant on-field fashions (see MiLB.com's Jersey Joust - last day to vote!), with teams wearing jerseys that reference everything from Rugrats to Full House to Jumanji. But the "denim" pants? Those, like a leaderless nation, are without precedent.

"We decided to do some flannel but decided that wasn't enough," said Benavides. "We thought 'We're missing something.' But pants material is close to the jersey material….Can we design pants? That was it. That was the catch for us. Oh, my God, skinny jeans on baseball pants! That's gonna be over the top."

Or over the bottom, as it were, but let's not waste time on semantic distinctions.

The Emeralds "Portlandia Night" promo has the full blessing of the show. IFC has donated Portlandia DVDs, Blu-Rays, cookbooks and assorted paraphernalia to give away throughout the evening. Armisen, meanwhile, has sent along three short videos specific to the occasion, to be debuted at the ballpark. Portlandia references (which, again, I am not capable of making) will be flying fast and furious throughout. Benavides points out that a kickball championship game is scheduled to precede the game, and a pickling demonstration will take place as well. 

"This is our show, this is the northwest," said Benavides. "It's gonna be a silly night, for sure." 

Check out the rest of the fun, weird and heart-warming promos from the coming week of Minor League Baseball.