Adobe × MLB 2026: Made to Create
The feedback on Adobe's previous MLB season had been blunt: it didn't look like Adobe's own "Made to Create" work, it needed a stronger, more visible Adobe presence, and it needed a lower barrier into Adobe Express. I took over the 2026 partnership with a clear mandate: make it unmistakably Adobe, and make the product tie-in obvious. Adobe was Presenting Sponsor of MLB's 2026 Opening Day, Giants vs. Yankees, the league's first-ever Netflix broadcast, a bigger stage than the year before, with no room to repeat the same miss. I used Firefly to conceptualize the visual direction before handing it to Dentsu Creative, who built out the "Grit & Energy" system: expressive, hand-drawn type composited over real player footage, the design language running through every video. Derik Green helped shape that typography with me through a moodboard swipe: we were specific that it needed to sound like what a player was actually thinking in the middle of a play, not broadcast jargon or stock quotes. Dentsu built a custom font for the system, later extended into an MLB baseball engraving activation at Summit 2026. Bookending that expression, Adobe's own look and feel opened and closed each video: I customized Adobe's established "Made to create." end card for the campaign, and landed the opening title cards myself, typography and expression together, before handing them to Dentsu and ModLo to add motion.
MLB offered Ozzie Albies for the partnership: an easy yes given his All-Star presence, his own sense of style and OA streetwear collection, and his commitment to the Ozzie Albies Foundation. Adobe's Sports Marketing team finalized the agreement. Dentsu Creative built the creator track around him, "From Sketch to Stadium," which I directed, pairing Ozzie, on Dentsu's recommendation, with artist Mickt Flior for a behind-the-scenes collaboration he responded to immediately. The partnership played out across four videos with one narrative threading through: an announcement film, an All-Star Weekend piece, a film centered on the Ozzie Albies Foundation, and a Players Weekend unboxing of custom cleats and a bat as the payoff, each pointing viewers to Adobe Express templates, built with Adobe's internal Express team, so anyone watching could start creating along with it.
The full four-video series and hero assets shipped for the 2026 season, and the typography system lived on at Summit 2026, a partnership that finally looked like Adobe made it, with Express built into the story rather than bolted onto the end of it.
Credits
John Caponi / Senior Creative Director / Creative direction, opening title card design
Peter Chase / Writer and Editor
Derik Green / Adobe Art Director / Collaborator, typography direction
Angela Weidmann / Adobe Creative Producer
Dentsu Creative / Agency / Expression, strategy, narrative, storyboards, creative development, custom typeface
ModLo / Motion Graphics / Editing, social cutdowns
Mickt Flior / Artist / Behind-the-scenes creative collaborator, "From Sketch to Stadium"
