text:
As you . . . → Read More: Happy Thanksgiving]]>
As you surely know, one of the big Thanksgiving traditions here in New York is the annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. What you might not know — and what I didn't know myself until reader Michael Clary schooled me on it — is that the 1946 edition of the parade featured a baseball player named Harold (additional photos here). Harold's name was almost certainly a play on Macy's location in Herald Square, and the star on his chest had to be a reference to the Macy's logo, which has always featured a star in one way or another, all of which is to say that Harold was a corporate shill. Still, he was pretty adorable. And look — he and his handlers had matching socks!
Five years earlier, in 1941, the parade had featured a football player. I don't have a full-body of him, but here's a very effective teaser photo (again, credit to Michael Clary; click to enlarge):
I'm sure there have been other sports-related floats in the parade, but that's enough for now. In the spirit of the day, I'm thankful for having a place where I can share these things, and an audience that appreciates them.
By the time most of you read this, I'll be on my way to pick up my brother in Queens, and then we're heading to Long Island to spend the day with Mom. Whatever you're doing today, I hope your Thanksgiving is a good one. Peace.
Click to enlarge
Pat Quinn, who passed away on Sunday, had the distinction of being a coach/GM for two different teams, both of which announced yesterday that they'll be memorializing him on their uniforms. The Maple Leafs will be wearing a jersey patch, but only for their next two . . . → Read More: In the Clover: The Mighty Quinn]]>
Click to enlarge
Pat Quinn, who passed away on Sunday, had the distinction of being a coach/GM for two different teams, both of which announced yesterday that they'll be memorializing him on their uniforms. The Maple Leafs will be wearing a jersey patch, but only for their next two games (on the road tonight in Pittsburgh and at home on Saturday against the Caps), while the Canucks have added a helmet decal that they'll wear for the rest of this season. It's almost like the two teams took a quality vs. quantity approach — less time for the bigger gesture, more time for the smaller one. Maybe it all evens out.
Interesting to note that the Leafs used a three-leaf clover while the Canucks went with four. Speaking of which: Why is it de rigueur to use clovers as the default symbol for Irishmen (the Tug McGraw memorial patch is another example) but there's no comparable symbol for other ethnicities? Like, when someone of Italian descent dies, you don't see memorial patches shaped like a stick of pepperoni, right? I'm not saying there's anything wrong with the Irish/clover trope, I'm just wondering why we don't see anything similar for other groups.
Quinn also coached the Flyers, Kings, and Oilers, incidentally. To my knowledge, none of those teams has announced plans to uni-memorialize him. That's not surprising in the case of the Kings (Quinn left on bad terms) or the Oilers (Quinn coached them for only one season, and it was a bad one), but I'm a little surprised the Flyers haven't done anything — Quinn coached them to the 1980 Stanley Cup Finals. Can someone who's a bigger NHL fan than I am provide some insight?
NFL Superhero Project
By Thomas Correia
We're a day early this week, because of the Thanksgiving holiday. And in the spirit of Thanksgiving, I'd like to begin by giving thanks to a few people. First off, my thanks to Paul, for having faith in this project and trusting a complete stranger to contribute to his site on a weekly basis. Thanks also to my buddy and fellow Uni Watch fan Ryan Noonan, for guiding me as my own personal "art director/critic" on each one of these logos. Thanks to my two kids for always asking to see the new logo Daddy created and occasionally providing some great ideas to add. And thanks to my wife for those two kids.
Today we're going to cover four of the six teams playing in tomorrow's NFL games, beginning with the Eagles and Lions (click to enlarge):
There's no better hero to represent Detroit's blue, hairy lion than Marvel's own blue, hairy mutant, Beast. I had a lot of fun with this one by re-creating the hands, feet, and head that would humanize the lion and transform it into one of the X-Men's original members. The eye and wavy lines were carried over from the Lion's logo. Credit to my nine-year-old daughter for reminding me to include the "X logo" belt buckle.
A funny story about this Eagles logo: I initially figured the beaked helmet of DC's Hawkman would make for a good look. My biggest problem was creating the giant wing on the side of Hawkman's helmet. I had spent time sketching it out and had just finished building a frame for it when it suddenly dawned on me that the Eagles have a wing on the side of their football helmets — duh. For me, that one additional element elevated this hero/team combo from good to great.
Now let's look at the Seahawks/49ers game (click to enlarge):
The focal point of the Seahawks logo has always been its eye. Therefore, it seemed fitting to use Hawkeye of the Avengers for Seattle. I simply placed his classic purple mask onto the Seahawks logo. My six-year-old son wasn't that impressed, so he suggested that I needed to include an arrow somewhere, just to emphasize the character's archer identity a bit more. As usual, he was right.
The 49ers' interlocking "SF" logo is tricky, because not many heroes have interlocking letters on their chest. But one well-known exception is Marvel's Daredevil, who coincidentally recently moved to San Francisco in the comics. But instead of using San Fran's plain oval logo, I opted to get creative with the Niners' retro shield logo. I replaced the "SF" with Daredevil's "DD" and replaced the football in the top-right quadrant with a scale (which hints at Daredevil's alter ego as criminal lawyer Matt Murdock). But my favorite part of this logo is that DD's billy club creates a "4" while the moon/city forms a "9."
There are two other teams playing on Thanksgiving — the Cowboys and Bears — but I'll feature them in next week's installment. Which heroes will I use to represent them? Post your guesses in today's comments, and have a great Thanksgiving!
One more sponsorship shout-out: Yesterday I gave little testimonials to our new holiday-season advertisers, There Used to Be a Ballpark and Left Field Cards. Today we have one more new advertiser who's hopped on board, and I want to say a few words about them as well.
So: One of the nice surprises of 2014 has been the emergence of Oxford Pennant, which offers retro-styled, made-in-USA pennants. The graphics are sharp and the soft felt materials feel really plush. Do yourself a favor and take a look at their product line. (As an aside, it's also worth noting that Oxford Pennant is based in Buffalo, so they could probably use a little pick-me-up right about now.)
As always, my thanks to all of these folks for partnering with Uni Watch. I hope you'll consider them for your holiday shopping.
PermaRec update: There's a new book (shown at right) about a stash of 1930s love letters that lead down a rabbit hole of family secrets and Holocaust history. Learn more in the latest Permanent Record entry.
Baseball News: Who's the super-suave dude in the Colorado Rockies cap? None other than jazz great Sonny Rollins (big thanks to Jeff Katz). … The Padres are once again supplying uniforms to local Little Leagues, with the designs drawn from all eras of Padres history. … I think we may have seen this before, but once more won't hurt: Here's a WKRP in Cincinnati screen shot that shows Venus Flytrap wearing a Reds-ish jacket with "Cincinnato" on the chest. Was this a licensing issue? (From Gene Sanny.)
NFL News: Looks like the cover design of the next issue of Mad magazine, due out on Dec. 5, pokes some fun at the NFL logo. … Love this old photo of Johnny U with a "fumble-proof football" (from Michael Clary). … Pats owner Robert Kraft got his own pair of signature Nike shoes (thanks, Brinke). … While looking for something else, I came across this Lions pipe. Well, that's one way to get though Thanksgiving with the relatives.
College Football News: Here's an amazing, if disturbing, sight: Mississippi Gov. Ross Barnett proudly holding a Confederate flag at the Mississippi/Kentucky game on Sept. 29, 1962. The following day he refused to allow James Meredith to enroll as the school's first black student. Further details here. … If you have to make your uniform look like a costume, at least wear my favorite colors, like USF will be doing this Friday.
Hockey News: "As a general rule, goalies seem to keep their pad designs for a year (altough they can run through duplicate sets of each annual design)," says Mike Engle. "Here's an exception: Toronto's Jonathan Bernier has made a mid-season switch from this design to this blue stencil design. It's still the CCM E-Flex Pro 2 pad — just a different graphic. Personally, I like the new one. If you can only have one color (Toronto blue here), I like the lines. They pop." … According to a small item buried within this page, town council members in the Canadian town of Marystown "wore hockey jerseys to last week's [council] meeting. Residents are also being encouraged to wear a jersey to school or work this Friday in celebration of Jersey Day." … What happens when you dress one hockey team as Batman and another as the Riddler? A fight, of course (from Robert Lapidus). … Cross-dressing alert! The AHL's Charlotte Checkers will wear Hornets-themed jerseys this Saturday (thanks, Phil). … The ECHL's Colorado Eagles will use candy-striped sticks on Saturday. The sticks will then be auctioned off to benefit local children's charities. Nice move, although it'd be a lot nicer if the sticks weren't plastered with corporate douchebaggery. Further details here (from Ted Phillips). … Ken Pilpel's daughter plays on a high school girls' hockey team comprised of students from four different schools, so their uniforms use all four schools' colors. Fortunately, those colors mesh pretty well. Then there's Ken's son, who plays in the Maryland Youth Hockey Association. "The teams only have color jerseys, so all the games are color-on-color," says Ken. "Most of the time the matchup is good, but sometimes it gets murky. This year my son's team is blue, but last year there were purple and we were playing a royal blue team. The ref made my son's team wear pinnies so they could tell the difference." … A fan at last night's Sens/Blues game was dressed as a blind ref (from Matt Larsen).
Basketball News: The Nets will soon begin a series of six "Brooklyn Blue Nights" presented by the team's latest corporate partner, BlueRock Energy. For these games, "In celebration o Brooklyn's rich heritage and tradition, the Nets will wear blue jerseys, and fans will be encouraged to turn Barclays Center into a sea of Brooklyn blue pride." Huh — I've been living in Brooklyn for over 27 years and wearing blue jeans for the vast majority of that time without even knowing I was Brooklyn-proud. … My old high school in Indiana has had the same band sign at basketball games for over 20 years," says Matt Blinkco. "After they recently tweeted a photo of it, I finally realized that it has an upside-down 'K' and has most likely been like that since its creation."
Grab Bag: Oh baby, look at this spectacular vintage roller derby jersey. Va-va-fucking-VOOM! (Big thanks to Jeff Ash.) … Big news in the soccer worlds, as Sony is reportedly ending its sponsorship of the World Cup. … A severe head injury suffered by Australian cricket player Phil Hughes has led to some detailed analysis of cricket helmet design. … New Superleague rugby uniforms for Catalans Dragons (from George Chilvers).
Gobble-gobble: The day before Thanksgiving always feels like a big drumroll — the drumroll before the drumstick, or something like that. Here in New York, they originally said we were due for some significant snowfall today, so I was hoping to go sledding, but now they're saying there'll be little if any accumulation. Rats.
If you're traveling today, travel safe. If you're working today, I hope they let you out early. If you're cooking a few things in advance today, I hope they all turn out great. And if you're doing some last-minute food shopping today, well, I hope you come out of the supermarket scrum in one piece.
My brother and I will be spending Thanksgiving with our mom, who's still rehabbing from hip-replacement surgery earlier this month (but doing fine, thanks), so I'll be off the grid for most of tomorrow. But the site will be open for comments, grousing about traffic, grousing about relatives, and so on, so feel free to swing by.
Shields recently partnered Fansided to create a series of videos that show him creating pancake versions of all 32 . . . → Read More: That Logo Looks Good Enough to Eat!]]>
Shields recently partnered Fansided to create a series of videos that show him creating pancake versions of all 32 NFL team logos. It would be one thing if he used little plastic logo molds or something like that, but he drew them freehand — so cool! The videos are mesmerizing to watch, and the results are surprisingly good. I have a feeling most of these weren't done perfectly on the first take, but whatever — it's a great project.
Each video runs about half a minute. You can see all 32 of them below, grouped by division:
I could quibble with some of Shields's logo choices. I wish he'd done the Ravens' helmet logo instead of their secondary logo, for example, and I definitely wish he'd done Brownie the Elf instead of the Browns' bulldog logo. (I say that with apologies to Todd Radom, who designed that bulldog logo and based it on his own dog!) I also wish there was at least one video shown at regular speed, instead of sped up, just so we could get a better sense of the process in real time. But hey, it's Shields's project, so he gets to call those shots.
If you're thinking we've seen NFL logo pancakes before, you're right. Longtime Uni Watch reader/contributor Brady Phelps made these pancakes for the last Super Bowl, for example. Still, I love seeing the videos that show the process, some of which are really surprising (check out the Colts vid, e.g.). Kudos to Shields, and to Fansided for partnering with him on these videos.
One additional thought about pancakes: If you want to give your maple syrup a boost, add a capful or two of bourbon to it, and then heat up the syrup before serving (which you should be doing anyway). The alcohol will vaporize but you'll still get the bourbon flavor, which goes really well with the maple syrup. Trust me.
New ESPN piece: As I mentioned yesterday, Giants wideout Odell Beckham Jr.'s amazing catch on Sunday night wouldn't have been possible if he hadn't been wearing gloves. The same can be said of a one-handed catch made by Robert Woods of the Bills last night — no way he makes that grab bare-handed. That's not a knock on Beckham or Woods; it's just reality. It also reinforces a point I've made here several times over years, namely that the rise of gloves is among the most important changes on the gridiron over the past generation, and almost certainly the most unheralded and underrated one.
With that in mind, I've written a short ESPN piece about how gloves have transformed the sport over the past few decades. Check it out here.
As an aside, reader Jerry Wolper reports that AP sportswriter Will Graves issued a series of tweets last night regarding a conversation he had with former Steelers great Lynn Swann. They talked about Beckham's catch and gloves. The pertinent tweets are here and here.
Click to enlarge
By Brinke Guthrie
Stillers fans! Check out our lead item today, taken from the pages of a Sears Christmas Wish Book from back in the day. This is the first one of these NFL bulletin boards I've seen on eBay. Corners are a little gnarly on the ends, but the classic artwork more than makes up for that.
(And speaking of Sears, shame on me if I've never shared this link that shows more Sears Christmas Wish Books than you can imagine. Have at it!)
Here are the rest of my picks for this week:
• Staying with the Steelers, here's a nice-looking vintage women's Steelers sweater. Oh and while we're at it, let's toss in this 1970s boys' varsity jacket, and this helmet plaque, too — never seen one with the black facemask before.
• This vintage Reds bobblehead is a little … different-looking, wouldn't you say?
• Never seen these before: Philadelphia Flyers sneakers — from P.F. Flyers, naturally.
• Staying with the Philly theme, here's a classic-looking Eagles poster with artwork by the legendary Chuck Ren. It's framed, too.
• You're a step ahead in Keds, especially if you get this 1960s store display.
• Helmet Buggy alert! This ad is for a 1970s Colts buggy. They mistakenly listed it as Indy instead of Baltimore, but the look is still the same, eh?
• You'll have people at the gym shouting, "Luv Ya Blue!" as you stroll by with this 1970s Oilers gym bag.
• Two AFC cups and one NFC iHop cup, all from the 1970s, in this auction! (I have the NFL version of this — it's my official daily orange juice breakfast cup.)
• Distinctive artwork on this 1960s SF Giants scarf.
• I can't imagine using this Bengals helmet as an ashtray, but that's what it was meant for.
• From reader Michael Clary, here's a 1960s New York football Giants wind-up doll. (Not a Giants fan? Here are versions for the Falcons, Oilers, and Cowboys.
Holiday sponsor shout-outs: As you may have noticed, we have a bunch of new advertisers that are vying for your attention and dollars during the holiday run-up. They all offer excellent product lines, and I'm proud to have them on the site. One at a time:
• A few weeks ago I raffled off a few prints of Jeff Suntala's gorgeous baseball stadium illustrations. If you lost out on the raffle, you should definitely consider shopping around on Jeff's website, There Used to Be a Ballpark. And even if you've been to his site before, he's just added some new prints. Great, great stuff.
• I've been a huge fan of Amelie Mancini and her Left Field Cards business for several years. (I even wrote an ESPN column about her two and a half years ago.) If you're a baseball fan — or if there's one on your holiday shopping list — then her super-cool cards and T-shirts should be just what you're looking for. Check them out here.
• Our friends at Grey Flannel Auctions have a new catalog auction underway. I'll be spotlighting some of the more interesting items in an upcoming edition of "Auction Action," which will likely run next week.
• And although this isn't new, I continue to be a big fan of American Trench's excellent socks, a pair of which I'm wearing right now.
And there's one additional new advertiser — a very cool one — whose ad should be showing up on the site soon. Stay tuned.
My thanks to all of these enterprises for partnering with Uni Watch. Please consider supporting them as you're doing your holiday shopping.
Footnote: If you're thinking of posting some sort of "Gotcha!" comment ("Sure, Lukas hates advertising — until it's one of his advertisers!"), please read this before you do so. Thanks.
PermaRec update: A 95-year-old letter from a former student who was apply for a substitute teaching job (shown at right) is the key document in the latest entry on Permanent Record.
By Garrett McGrath
Baseball News: Here's an old newspaper article, apparently from the 1930s, about the growing trend of sunglasses on the baseball field (from Kenn Tomasch). … The single-A Mahoning Valley Scrappers a new alternate logo (thanks, Paul). … The newly renamed Biloxi Shuckers, the double-A Brewers affiliate, posted their new cap logos (thanks, Phil). … History watch from 1883: A photo of the St. Louis Browns (also Brown Stockings) of the American Association at the original Sportsman's Park (from Jonathan Daniel).
Pro and College Football News: The Lions unveiled a new logo celebrating the history of their Thanksgiving game. … The Oregon National Guard 41st Brigade logo will be worn on helmets during the upcoming Oregon/OSU Civil War game.
Hockey News: Here is a list of the top five forgettable NHL sweaters from the late 1990s and the early 2000s (thanks Paul). … "As I was perusing some classic Queen videos on YouTube, I noticed in the one for Spread Your Wings from 1978 that bassist John Deacon is wearing a sweet Chicago Blackhawks letterman jacket," says Phil Johnson.
NBA News: The Magic's sleeved gray jersey will make its on-court debut tomorrow (thanks, Phil). … The Heat will roll out a new "Miami Red" uniform campaign tonight (from Phil).
College Hoops News: "The Kansas women's basketball team is wearing a black "Whitney" patch this season in honor of a longtime fan who died of leukemia this off-season," says Jeff Braun. "Makes for a large number of patches on the jersey front." … This article includes an interesting quote from Maine coach Bob Walsh: "All of our guys are wearing zero on the back of their practice jerseys. That's the number of times we've been in the NCAA Tournament and we want to embrace it and attack it." … No photo, but a note buried within this page indicates that NJIT — that's the New Jersey Institute of Technology — is wearing "JC" patches in memory of Joe Caiola, the Assistant Director of Athletics who passed away in June.
Grab Bag: Here are your mascots for the Rio 2016 Olympics and Paralympics (thanks, Paul). … The uniform is nearly complete for the 154-member Cavalcade of Bands Honors Band, which is scheduled to participate in the 126th Tournament of Roses Parade (thanks, Paul). … Pumas are the official shoe of Rikers Island Prison (from Paul Lee). … Port Adelaide completes its V-line guernsey range with a new summer jumper in teal (from Leo Strawn Jr.). … Yesterday, we posted a leaked version of the NYCFC away kit. here is the official look (thanks, Phil).
The "GSH" decal on the throwback helmet has always been . . . → Read More: Monday Morning Uni Watch]]>
The "GSH" decal on the throwback helmet has always been fairly small and easy to miss. Someone with the Bears apparently thought it was too small, because yesterday they made it a bit bigger (click to enlarge):
This isn't just an aberration involving those two players. I looked at a lot of photos going back several seasons, and there's no question that the decal was larger yesterday. How's that for a subtle in-season change?
Aside from that, it was a pretty uni-uneventful day around the league. But here are a few tidbits:
• Lions defensive end George Johnson wore an Under Armour base layer and made a half-hearted attempt to cover up the logo. Here's another view.
• The "1" on Falcons cornerback Desmond Trufant's back uni number was upside-down. You can tell because the drop shadow is projecting the wrong way.
• The Browns wore their brown pants.
• The paint wasn't even dry yet on Giants wideout Odell Beckham Jr.'s amazing catch when Nike turned it into a branding exercise, and some enterprising designer turned it into a T-shirt.
As an aside: Beckham's catch wouldn't have been possible a generation ago, when players didn't routinely wear super-grippy gloves. As I've said several times in the past, I think this is one of the biggest and most under-reported changes in the game over the past few decades. I'm not anti-glove, but I'd love to see today's players go without the gloves for one game, just to see how big a difference it would make. I think the results would be fascinating.
(My thanks to all contributors, including JustinSr, Means1974, Eric Stoker, Jamie Uthe, and of course Phil.)
Call for entries: My next ESPN column, to be published sometime next week, will be the annual Uni Watch holiday gift guide. I already have a pretty good assortment of stuff to feature, but I'm always happy to have more. If you know of a uni- or logo-related item that would make a good stocking stuffer, please send details this-a-way. Thanks.
Click to enlarge
Bonus 'Skins Watch: I usually wait until Friday to run 'Skins Watch, but there's already a lot of chatter about this week's New Yorker cover illo (plus Phil mentioned it in Saturday's Ticker), so I didn't want to wait.
The cover design, by longtime illustration pro Bruce McCall, makes the obvious connection between the 'Skins and Thanksgiving — or at least now it seems obvious, although I don't recall anyone having connected those dots before. Good work by McCall, who explains some of the thinking behind the design here.
Membership update: Another eight designs have been added to the membership card gallery (including D.P. McIntire's awesome-looking Stargell-era Pirates treatment, shown at right). The printed/laminated versions of those cards should mail out today or tomorrow.
As always, you can sign up for your own custom-made membership card here, you can see all the cards we've designed so far here, and you can see the step-by-step process by which we produce the cards here.
Baseball News: Strong work by game-used jersey debunker Peter Nash, who's presented convincing evidence that an old New York Giants jersey that was supposedly worn by Jim Thorpe and was then cut up into pieces that were sold along with cards produced by Donruss, was actually never worn by Thorpe. … Cardinals manager Mike Matheny is giving up his regular No. 22 so newly acquired Jason Heyward can wear it. No word yet on which number Matheny will wear (from Mark Richter). … New uniforms for the Seibu Lions. "The right sleeve patch 'Believe Lions' colors are taken from the three colors that the team has had in its history — black (Nishitetsu), light blue (original Seibu color), and 'legends blue' (the current darker color)," says Jeremy Brahm. "The new road uniform (dark blue) was the third uniform last year. I think they'll also have some throwbacks." … I was watching an old episode of The Sopranos the other day, and there's this sequence where it turns out that this guy Tony's been meeting with is actually an FBI informant and has secretly been recording the meetings via a tiny microphone hidden in the button of his baseball cap. I kept waiting for them to use the term "squatchee," but no dice. Dang. … The name and logo for Biloxi, Mississippi's new minor league baseball team will be announced today.
NFL News: The 'Skins lease on FedEx Field runs for another dozen years, but the team is already planning for a new stadium (from Tommy Turner). … With the Bills having a "home" game in Detroit tonight, the Bills' logos are being added to the Ford Field end zones and at midfield (thanks, Phil). … Good spot by Joshua Johnson, who writes: "Remember Randall Cobb getting ketchup on his jersey during a Lambeau Leap? He parlayed that into an advertising gig for Clorox. But what's with his jersey? It looks like Clorox just had him turn his standard jersey inside-out." Interesting — we've seen plenty of instances of advertisers using faux NFL jerseys when they don't have a license to use the real thing, but I don't think I've ever seen an inside-out jersey before. … The NFL and New Era think you're stupid enough to buy an ugly new cap for Thanksgiving. … Saints owner Tom Benson is donating $11 million to the Pro Football hall of Fame, most of which will be spent to renovate the Hall's stadium, which will be renamed after Benson.
College Football News: Hawaii wore their gorgeous rainbow throwbacks against UNLV on Thursday night (from Eric Bangeman). … Harvard's placekicker wears glasses — like, regular eyeglasses, not sports glasses — on the field.
Hockey News: Several Rangers players don't want to see ads on NHL jerseys (from Brooks Simpson). … Teams in the ECHL are gearing up for a Batman/Riddler promotion. … Oooh, the 1950-51 Lethbridge Native Sons — an old junior team — had one of the most gorgeous jerseys I've ever seen. That's the back of the jerseys, so they were going with the city name as the NOB (from Graham Clayton). … Is this an old women's hockey team? Nope — it's a bunch of ice show performers who were doing a show at Maple Leaf Gardens in the 1950s (from Will Scheibler). … " On Sunday, just for the heck of it, I decided to watch the French language video feed of the Canadiens game," says Matt Larsen. "In the second period they promoted an upcoming Ottawa/Detroit game. Interestingly, they translated 'Senators' into 'Senateurs' but did not do likewise for the 'Ailes Rouges.'" … Small note at the bottom of this article indicates that the Rockford IceHogs will be wearing "Brovember" jerseys on Wednesday. … Are the Kings gonna be going with the infamous Burger King design for their upcoming Stadium Series game? "Either that or else this is the best troll job ever," says Mike Engle.
NBA News: Depending on what kind of cable deal you have, you may be able to see this very good nine-minute documentary about the Lakers' uniform manager. Recommended viewing (from Paul Lee). … Forty-six years ago yesterday, the Bucks used one of the greatest program covers ever. Yowza! (Great find by BSmile.)
College Hoops News: The Nebraska women's team wore these very nice throwbacks yesterday (thanks, Phil). … Akron wore black uniforms with a big "Z" on the front and TNOB for yesterday's win over South Carolina.
Soccer News: "Joe Allen of Liverpool took an elbow to the head, which busted him open," says Mark Coale. "He ended up wearing a numberless blood jersey and a head wrap." … The NYCFC away kit has leaked. … Ditto for the Orlando City road kit.
Grab Bag: I've been a member of the Center for Land Use Interpretation for many years. The problem is that they're based in L.A., so I'm often unable to see their very cool exhibits. They currently have a new exhibit about the U.S./Canada border that I wish I could see. If any of you SoCal readers want to check it out, I'm eager to hear your reactions, descriptions, etc. … Flags and flag design seem to come up semi-regularly around here, so I was happy to learn a new word the other day: vexillology, which is the study of flags. … WBO welterweight champ Manny Pacquiao and challenger Chris Algieri both wore blue trunks when facing each other on Saturday night. … I was recently visiting a luthier (that's someone who builds and repairs stringed instruments, don'tcha know), and her workshop had this really cool wall display of various sizes of planes. Sorry for the shitty photo, but I trust you can see why I found that so appealing. … Back in 1981, Sony was considering a new logo. Here's a bunch of proposed designs that were rejected. … The International Rugby Board has rebranded as World Rugby. "Reaction from the rugby community has been overwhelmingly negative," says Eric Bangeman. "I, for one, look forward to the 2015 World Rugby Rugby World Cup." … Alex Allen came across these DVDs of Bull Durham and Hoosiers with cool minimalist cover art. … Mark Nicklawske found a very cool hat in the thrift shop but doesn't know what team or sport it's for. Anyone know more?
What Paul did
last night a week ago: I'm a big fan of Slate's weekly politics podcast and culture podcast, plus they also have a very good sports podcast (although I rarely listen to that one because I already have enough sports in my life). Each of these three podcasts has its own three-person team, and last Monday night all nine of those people — several of whom I have connections to — came to New York for a live tag-team event, which I was very happy to attend.
The format was like so: All nine people were onstage together, with each three-person team getting a chance to do a truncated version of its own weekly podcast. First up were the politics podcasters — David Plotz, Emily Bazelon, and John Dickerson — who discussed President Obama's immigration policy (for all of these admittedly crappy photos, you can click to enlarge):
My connection to this crew is that Plotz, who's now the CEO of Atlas Obsura, was Slate's editor-in-chief when my 10-part "Permanent Record" series ran there. He was a big booster of the series, for which I'll always be grateful. (He also got me on the comp list for this show — thanks, David!)
Next up were the culture podcasters — Julia Turner, Dana Stevens, and Stephen Metcalf — who discussed the cultural implications of this New York magazine article about emoji:
My connection here is that Stevens, who's Slate's movie critic, lives around the corner from me. I got friendly with her and her husband, Robert Weinstock, about a decade ago, when I wrote a New York Times article about how he'd lost his sense of smell.
Then came the sports podcasters — Mike Pesca, Josh Levine, and Stefan Fatsis — who discussed NBA commish Adam Silver's recent push for legalized sports gambling:
I've had dealings with all three of these guys. Pesca, who used to work for NPR, interviewed me for an NPR story a while back; Levine was my editor at Slate in 2004, when Uni Watch was briefly appearing there; and Fatsis and I have been mutual fans for years, plus I interviewed him here on the Uni Watch blog back in 2007, when he'd written a book about his tryout with the Broncos.
After each three-person podcast team did its thing, the podcasters were put into assorted mix-and-match panels and assigned to debate various hypothetical questions — one of which, as it turned out, involved the Washington football team. The question was basically this: "You oppose the team's name. A good friend of yours posts something on Facebook supporting the team's name. Do you confront your friend on Facebook or let it slide?" Turner and Plotz were assigned to defend the "Let it slide" position, while Stevens and Levine were assigned to argue in favor of confronting the friend. I took some really shitty video of the debate, which lasted three minutes. It begins with Plotz explaining why the friend should not be confronted on Facebook:
The several Billy Joel jokes in there are references to the previous debate, in which four of the panelists were asked, "If the world could hear the music of only one person for the rest of eternity, and if that person had to be either Billy Joel or Beethoven, which one would you choose?" That debate, frankly, was more interesting that the 'Skins one, but I didn't record it. You can hear it, however, along with the rest of the night's content, here.
By Phil Hecken
With the NCAA College Football season beginning its wind-down, there wasn't a whole lot of "uni action" during Week 13. But, there was one of the most-anticipated showdowns, especially uni-wise, last evening, as USC and UCLA hooked up in the Rose Bowl for their annual crosstown showdown. For yesterday's game, . . . → Read More: Sunday Morning Uni Watch]]>
By Phil Hecken
With the NCAA College Football season beginning its wind-down, there wasn't a whole lot of "uni action" during Week 13. But, there was one of the most-anticipated showdowns, especially uni-wise, last evening, as USC and UCLA hooked up in the Rose Bowl for their annual crosstown showdown. For yesterday's game, UCLA was the home team, but as they have done for the past several years, both teams wore their "home" uniforms.
They've actually been wearing the color versus color since 2008 (and did so for all years but one, when in 2011 UCLA wore all white — and lost 50-0). When the teams first returned to color vs. color in 2008, I wrote about it, if you're interested in the history of the color-vs-color in the two teams' past (they had both worn the home uniforms for a number of years, but ceased doing so in the 1980s).
Anyway, yesterday the two teams again went color against color. Here's a bunch of photos from the game (click on any to enlarge):
Beautiful, right?
Of course — it's such a great matchup of colors. But, it wasn't as great as it could have been, unfortunately — but that's more due to the deficiencies of the uniform makers (adidas still can't make jerseys with actual "UCLA stripes"), or fashion choices (USC wore their shiny helmets and wore black socks and leggings). But other than that…
Sadly, UCLA has this new "thing" for the use of facepaint — last night was no different. What's worse is the guy on the left, below, is the punter(!):
And this is not the first time, as the coaches (that's from 2012) have gotten into it, as well as players (that's from this year) as well. Enough guys — you don't look tough, you just look stupid.
But aside from the stupid, there was also some very cool stuff. Yesterday UCLA retired #42 across all sports to honor Jackie Robinson (which is an awesome honor, don't get me wrong). But — Jackie wore 18 for basketball, 28 for football, he didn't have a number for track, and in his "worst sport," (heh), baseball, he only played one season and he wore "28". He wore a bunch of different numbers in the negro leagues & minors, none of which was 42. It's just that 42 has, deservedly so, become so "associated" with Jackie Robinson.
In recognition of this, UCLA placed a "42" on the field:
However, either due to oversight, or perhaps because the current "UCLA" logo is too large, the "42s" on the field (there were two of them), were both placed at the 32 yard lines. A number of folks questioned whether or not it might have been more appropriately placed at the 42 yard line.
Nice gesture by UCLA.
OK, that's about all from me, so now I'll turn it all over to my trusty side-kick for the SMUW, TJ Duroncelet, who'll take you take you through the rest of your…
Sunday Morning Uni Watch
by Terry Duroncelet, Jr.
As the season cools down like the weather around this time, teams are buckling down to seal their postseason spots, all while balancing their long-awaited rivalry games, but of course, there's no shortage of fancy uniforms and the like. What did Week 13 have in store for us? Well…
From Tuesday:
• I normally wouldn't really give Ohio too much of a mention for their black costumes, but this year's version has white numerals in place of the green from before, to make them more sensible for the NCAA's new rules regarding jersey number contrast.
From Wednesday:
• Bowling Green wore all-orange while Toledo wore a grey 'Glass City' jersey with navy pants, resulting in a color-vs.-color matchup. I like what BGSU wore, but I'm kind of on the fence about Toledo's outfit. Leaning towards "I can dig". Here's Toledo's helmet (along with the I-75 trophy) for that game.
From Thursday:
• Remember those light blue chrome helmets that North Carolina wore a couple of years ago against N.C. State? Well, the Tar Heels dusted them off and slapped some new chrome facemasks and new decals for their in-state match against Duke, who were looking like the Black Devils more than the Blue Devils.
From Saturday:
• Florida State wore these ribbon decals against Boston College on Saturday. And something that came up in a later game (Tennessee vs. Vanderbilt) was the ESPN graphics crew used an outdated FSU logo.
• Something that I somehow neglected to mention last week was that Maryland wore a new all-black uniform, which I believe is the 4th version of their
Pride Hubris uniforms. As far the Terps showing off their metaphorical chiseled butts in the metaphorical Speedos in the form of one-off uniforms, this one wasn't bad at all. I tried my damnedest to not laugh at what I just typed. Needless to say, I've been laughing at that sentence for 84 years. But wait! There's more! Maryland — understanding that anything in life needs balance in order to function properly — wore WHITE versions of last week's togs this week. I'm just sitting here waiting for them to roll out an all-red and all-yellow version. Wait, what the hell am I saying? Forget I even said anything. Speaking of red…
• …Someone spotted this during the Ohio State/Indiana game. Ya know, given the apparent increase in graphics fumbles this year, I'm surprised that I haven't seen an instance of someone putting up a Wisconsin Huskers/Nebraska Badgers graphic. I'm kinda disappointed, actually.
• Utah wore a tribute helmet for Senior Day against Arizona. I believe this is a tribute to the Ute tribe, but I could be wrong. Can anyone fill me in on the details? Here's a close-up.
• This seems so very Harvard. Wasn't there a column on football players who wear their glasses on the field a long while back?
• Wisconsin altered their uniform a tad by switching out the red facemasks for white. Eh, it's O.K., but I prefer the red.
• Remember a month ago when I said that Pitt spoiled the script 'Pitt' mood by using their block 'PITT' at midfield? I'm not sure if they just so happened to have read that particular column, but hey, better late than never.
• Colorado wore matte black helmets with white logos over the weekend.
• #70 for Boise State apparently lost his '7' from his helmet. Credit goes to Cork Gaines.
• There is no amount of Layrite pomade that can make your hair game anywhere near as strong as this guy's.
• A bit more FCS action from yesterday included Lehigh going up against Lafayette for the 150th time. The game took place at Yankee stadium, and Lehigh… well, let's just say that they dressed up for the occasion. Honestly, I'm surprised that I don't see pinstriped football uniforms more often. Not necessarily saying we NEED more of them, just wondering why they're not as common.
• No two
zebras Cardinals have the same stripes.
• Speaking of stripes, a player for Oklahoma State was losing part of his on his pants.
• Phil did a great job on covering the UCLA/USC game, but one thing that I noticed towards the end was #71 for UCLA (specifically, RS Freshman Poasi Moala), who not only has some wicked hair, but as you can see, he had his usual helmet, but a #49 jersey, due to him working at TE this week (he's normally a tackle). Also, you can see the #36 memorial decal for Nick Pasquale (they started wearing that last year). So that's three different uniform numbers on one player at the same time while the primary helmet number did not match the primary jersey number. First time I've ever seen that personally, but I'm sure there are other examples.
And that about does it for this week's games. I'll be taking next week off since there's a high chance most of us will be much entirely too food-drunk to function. Everyone enjoy your Thanksgiving week, stay safe, and I'll catch you in a couple of weeks!
Thanks, TJ — and it's not just TJ who will be off next Sunday — due to me needing some extra time to try to finish up my Capstone (that's basically the equivalent of a Masters' Thesis — and it's due in like 2 weeks), Paul's giving me next weekend off — so the usual stuff you're all accustomed to over the weekends will be taking a one-week hiatus. But like Terry says, hopefully everyone will be too Thanksgiving-and-shopping'ed out to notice! OK, now on to the rest of the day's content.
Catherine Ryan's 5 & 1
Every Sunday, Catherine will give us the rundown of her best five and one worst uniform matchups from the College Football games played this week. Since it's practically impossible to watch every game, you guys can help by sending your thoughts on "good" and "bad" matchups (and hopefully with photos from that game) by e-mailing her at email@example.com.
OK, here's Catherine with this week's 5 & 1.
Happy Sunday, UniWatchers! I tried to pick a few teams this week that haven't yet seen the countdown. This week saw our tip-line receive more emails than ever before and a lot of you had thoughts about the following games!
5. Louisville vs. Notre Dame: I loved Louisville's white/white/red combo and thought it contrasted nicely with Notre Dame's classic home look.
4. Yale vs. Harvard: ESPN spent the day in Cambridge covering this beautiful match-up. Harvard looked great in the home crimson/gold combo while Yale went with an all-white combo.
3. Villanova vs. Delaware: I have been wanting to show my alma mater some love this year but I had to wait for the right match-up. I thought yesterday's Battle of the Blue was one of 'Nova's best uni match-ups of the season.
2. Montana State vs. Montana: I'm on an FCS kick this weekend. I loved this match-up between the Grizzlies in the all-maroon combo and Montana State in these gorgeous gold/white/gold's.
1. USC vs. UCLA: This is always one of my favorite games of the year. I love the color-on-color match-up between the home uniforms and the contrast was just gorgeous if you caught the game on TV. A clear cut #1 this week!
+1 Lehigh vs. Lafayette: My roommate went to Lehigh and I really wanted to like this game. I felt like neither team looked good and, as a whole, it was a pretty ugly match-up. What are your thoughts on Lehigh's pinstripes?
Thanks, Catherine! Everyone knew the #1 going in, but that's OK — it always deserves to be there. And yeah, those Lehigh pins…um. Pretty good call for the "and 1."
OK readers, how'd she do?
Duck Tracker
Each week, as we have done on Uni Watch for the past five seasons, we'll be tracking the uniform combinations of the Oregon Ducks. Back for his third season is Tim E. O'Brien, who'll show you what the Ducks wore in their last game, and add a few words of wisdom.
Here's this weeks costume (click to enlarge):
Here's Tim:
Back to fatigue. Boo. First time in the green helmet all season though…
Thanks. Yeah, not the prettiest of unis for the Ducks, but at least it's in school colors, for a game against Colorado which wasn't even on the board in Vegas. But the Ducks did get some bright yellow shoes, though, so at least there was some brightness with the dull greens. Thankfully Colorado wore all white unis.
EPL Tracker
Each Saturday or Sunday, Alex Gerwitz will be tracking the kit combinations (shirt/shorts/socks) of the teams in the English Premier League from the previous weekend and the current weekend.
Here is the EPL tracker for Week 12 — Part I (click to enlarge):
Unfortunately due to
an unforeseen labor strike, fire, and theft of uniforms, due to the personal commitments of both Rob Holecko and Andrew Seagraves, the UWFFL will be taking a one-week hiatus this weekend from Uni Watch. There are still games to be played, however.
You can head over to uwfantasyfootballleague.com to vote on this week's UWFFL matchups.
Apologies to any/all who were expecting the usual UWFFL fare here.
Uni Watch News Ticker:
Baseball News: Mets in the news? "My brother went to Citi Field to get tickets for the Foo Fighters show in July and spotted Mrs. Met wearing this," says Diego Bauzá. I like what Mrs. Met has done with her hair. Here's another look (via Matt Harris). You'll also note that both Mr. & Mrs. Met are wearing the new white pinstripe uniforms. … The Hagerstown Suns (Class-A affiliate of the Washington Nationals) recently unveiled their 35th anniversary logo for the 2015 season (thanks to Justin McAllister). Here's the link to the press release.
NFL News: Following up on Paul's NFL "leaks" article from a couple days ago, Mike Karamas writes, "I read your article and found that there's a change for the patriots jerseys. It looks like they've updated the team name on the front of the jersey above the number. It now shows the new Patriots logo, replacing the old script logo. I posted a few pics but they're a little blurry." … Bit of an update on the "Does Brownie the Elf have a tail" from yesterday. tc writes, "I think you're mistaken with Brownie and the tale. The left side (his right) is a bit more obvious in showing that the white is the underside of the 'flare' section of his top. I've attached an image which demonstrates this by going over the football and the hand in each arm. I think you'll agree it makes the most sense." … Also, from yesterday's comments (posted by Tony Crespo), "the Brownie Elf costume doesn't have a tail. I have the second linked item as my background, what I think happened in some cases they didn't finish coloring in the bottom of the shirt." … Remember that nice Bengals fan lady who had the ball snatched from her by that Saints fan? Well, she got seven autographed jerseys from Cincinnati to make up for it.
College & High School Football News: There are some brutal digital Camo endzones in a high school playoff game in Colorado. Says submiter Landon Troka, "I've attached a screen grab from a video as well as a link to a tweet that has a clear picture. Pretty interesting/cool!" But there's more: "These are from the Ralston Valley-Cherry Creek semi-final in Colorado. Ralston Valley plays in a shared stadium, but for this game deep in the playoffs they painted it for them, and went with the digi-camo endzones." … Hmmm. Douglas Ford notes there were generic helmets used on a Home Depot commercial during College Game Day. … Remember the yellow line is not official. … Of course, neither is the black line (h/t Trés Lawless). … Check out these awesome old Iowa helmets, including an old winged, leather helmet (h/t Cork Gaines). … Our own Mike the Intern writes, "I know nothing about high school football helmetry, but this is as odd of a facemask as I've seen. Also, the team has just one helmet logo, on the back. That's Phillips High School in Chicago, they played Coal City in the Illinois state playoffs. … This helmet is that of Attica/Argonia, a combination of two Kansas high schools, notes David Steinle. He adds, "The team's nickname is the Titans, thus the big T in the middle like Texas A&M. But also notice the ampersand inside the T to join the 'As'." … Also from David, Nicholls State (FCS) wore white at home during its game Thursday vs. Southeastern Louisiana.
Hockey News: Last evening, the AHL Syracuse Crunch wore Devon Still Bengals jerseys during warmups (in support of Still's daughter, Leah, who battling Stage 4 pediatric cancer). Pic via Dan Anderson. Here's a bit more on that. … OUCH! St. Louis Blues goalie Brian Elliott tweeted a picture of his broken cup after yesterday's game. Hope that doesn't leave a mark.
Grab Bag: Eric Roberts' Malcolm X-themed baseball jersey from the 2008 Entourage episode Tree Trippers, with an X instead of a number on the back (from Matt Larsen). … Sony asked the public to redesign its logo in 1981. It didn't work out (thanks, Brinke). … Reader Kevin Wallace spotted a couple of malfunctions in the Scotland v Tonga rugby match yesterday afternoon. The numbers for the Tongan players didn't look like they were properly heat pressed. "There were a number of wrinkled ones and I saw many with the corners peeled off. I've attached 2 screencaps where you can see it – no. 7 is obvious and no. 14 has both numbers coming off at the corners." … I think we've seen these amazing photos of Liz Taylor wearing this gorgeous 1948 "All America" sweater before, but once more can't hurt. Those come from this article (thanks, Brinke). … Black mourning bands are apparently not exclusive to uniforms, as evidence by Ray Sadecki's page on baseball-reference.com (great spot by Matt Larsen).
And that's going to do it for today — as I mentioned after the SMUW section, I'll be taking next weekend off, so you guys and gals won't hear from me until December. Everyone have a great Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Cyber Monday etc. Thanks to Terry, Catherine, Tim and Alex, and of course everyone who sends in ticker submissions and tweets at me.
Follow me on Twitter @PhilHecken.
"I don't care if Lafayette wore mono slate or anthracite or whatever that was…Lehigh looked as good as any team I've ever seen. That's a top five matchup for sure. Pinstripes, big numbers, NNOB, lots of brown…what's not to love?"
–Jakob Wolf
Uni Watch stalwart Leo Strawn, Jr. has a very cool DIY project he shared with me (and which is described below), and which I want to share with you today (for any inline images, click to enlarge). I apologize for the lack of a more "uniform" related lede, but I've been . . . → Read More: Leo's DIY – Turning a Table into the Melbourne Cricket Ground for Aussie Footy]]>
Uni Watch stalwart Leo Strawn, Jr. has a very cool DIY project he shared with me (and which is described below), and which I want to share with you today (for any inline images, click to enlarge). I apologize for the lack of a more "uniform" related lede, but I've been extremely busy this week. But below there is plenty of good stuff, including the return of the uni concepts and a pretty full ticker, so enjoy! — PH
By Leo Strawn
I had an idea for a footy table and kept an eye out at yard sales to locate a good, yet cheap, table. Just had to be sturdy; looks, of course, didn't matter as long as it wasn't terribly banged up. Found the perfect table for a couple of bucks and proceeded to completely forget about it. It was an ugly wood, needed resurfaced, but actually a nice enough table just needing a bit of attention, and since I wasn't doing anything with it, my significant other went ahead and painted it gloss black, one day.
I finally got motivated and started it a year later, just a few months ago. First, I sanded and primed the top; the rest of the table was in good enough shape as far as I was concerned. Then I had to get the dimensions of the footy ground I wanted to model the table after; the most hallowed of all footy ovals: Melbourne Cricket Ground.
Then came the boring math. Essentially I had to take the dimensions of 173.6 m long x 148.3 m wide, from fence to fence, and scale that down to fit on smaller than a 20″ x 24″ table top, because the top edges are beveled leaving a bit less than that in actual flat surface area. The boundary line at the MCG is located five m inside the fence.
I located the center of the table top, discovered that the width was the dimension that mattered on this particular top, and made the width equal to 19″. That 19″ width accounted for 7.8 m/in on scale, so I divided 173.6 by 7.8, giving me a length of 22 1/4″. There would be a little bit leftover on the long ends of the table. I then lightly drew my axis off the center and placed push pins in the ends of the long axis. Now I was ready to create the ellipse.
I took a compass stretched across half of the long axis, then placed the point on the ends of the short axis, drawing arcs through the longer axis. Next step was to stretch and tie a string taut between the push pins. Once the string was secured to the push pins, I moved the pins to those intersections I drew with the compass earlier. Pushing a pencil to the limit within the string and moving it around the outside of the pins created the dimensions from fence to fence.
The remainder was drawn in three ways. First, with a ruler, based on that 7.8 meters = 1 inch scale. I also drew a second ellipse, freehand, after measuring 5/8″ inside the original ellipse to designate the boundary line, which is 5 meters inside of the fence. The 50 meter arcs around the goals were drawn by compass.
Finally, the painting began! I started by painting black up to the edge of the "fence". Then, I painted the red and blue lines of the 50 meter arcs and painted white areas…:
…with a few coats of paint, large enough to cover the lines that would be white, also. Then, the green for the grass…
…and finished with a few light coats of polyurethane for protection, and voila, a table-sized MCG!
Great stuff, Leo! That's a neat-o project, and one that even the less DIY-inclined among us (like myself) could probably even come close to approximating. Thanks for sharing.
Classic Ballpark Scoreboards
I'm pleased to continue with a new weekend feature here at Uni Watch, "Classic Ballpark Scoreboards," which are created by Gary Chanko. You probably know Gary best for his wonderful colorizations, but he has been a solid contributor for many years, and this is his new project. This segment will appear every Saturday on Uni Watch.
Here's Gary (click on image to enlarge):
Classic Football Scoreboards – Second in a Series
by Gary Chanko
The early 1920s saw an explosion of new collegiate football stadiums in California. The Rose Bowl, Stanford Stadium, the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, and California Memorial Stadium were built during this period.
This edition of Classic Football Scoreboards looks at California Memorial Stadium, still today one of the best venues for watching college football.
California Memorial Stadium
Inspired by the Roman Coliseum, Cal's 75,000 seat Memorial Stadium was built surrounded with controversy. The uproar was caused by the proposed location the scenic area known as Strawberry Canyon.
Memorial Stadium opened just in time for the Golden Bears last game of the 1923 season – The Big Game against cross bay rival Stanford.
The graphic captures the scoreboard at the end of that inaugural game.
A Few Things to Know
• The $1.4 million (about $20 million in todays dollars) stadium was funded entirely by seat subscriptions (and you thought that funding concept was a 21st century invention). The $100 subscriptions sold out in ten days. What you got was a $10 voucher for ten years to purchase game tickets.
• The original scoreboard architecture reflected the neoclassical style of the stadium. Besides the game score, the scoreboard layout provided ball field position and distance to go for first down – all manually operated. It must have been a frantic exercise to keep the game information current. The process used to rely information to the scoreboard operators, located in the end zone, would be interesting reading.
• Fortunately the recent stadium renovations keep the basic scoreboard size and classical architecture while adding a state-of-the-art electronic display, sound system, and yes, a corporate sponsor.
Next time the series heads about 375 miles south to visit another classic scoreboard from the 1920s, the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.
If anyone is interested in purchasing a digital copy of these posters, Gary is working on an online purchase option. In the interim you can contact him directly at firstname.lastname@example.com.
Tweaks Concepts
It's been a while since I ran this, but I still have a bunch of concepts (and they do continue to trickle in — and concepters, please keep them coming)…
So if you've concept for any sport, or just a tweak or wholesale revision, send them my way.
Please do try to keep your descriptions to ~50 words (give or take) per image — if you have three uniform concepts in one image, then obviously, you can go a little over, but no novels, OK? OK!. You guys have usually been good with keeping the descriptions pretty short, and I thank you for that.
Like the colorizations, I'm going to run these as inline pics — click on each one to enlarge.
And so, lets begin:
First up today is Cole Hammers, who has a concept for the Houston Texans:
Hi Phil,
I never liked how Texans logo faced the wrong way on one side of the helmet, so I drew up an alternate with the horns on the side a-la-Vikings. The rest is just a slight tweak on the standard away uni.
And we close today with Kyle Geralds who has some Detroit Tigers concepts:
Detroit Tiger Concepts – No Sacred Cows
Tigers have maintained a lot of tradition limiting uniform concepts. The Tigers have only worn an alternate jersey once, they use two different Old English Ds and they only wear orange on the road.
I wanted to see what it'd be like using just the ball cap D on the uniform, using orange at home, creating an alternate, using a script Tigers instead of the home D and an orange only (no navy) road uniform. Here are 10 concepts (above). I am a traditionalist and never want the Tigers to change their home uniform or use an alternate, so killing these "sacred cows," was morally challenging.
If you are interested in more, the 10 were chosen from these 22.
-Kyle G
PS: A Short Look at Tiger Uniform History:
• 1927-1931 was the 1st time the Tigers wore orange (home and away) then stopped for 16 years.
• 1947-1951 Tigers wore the orange D on their home cap but a white D on the road (opposite of today).
• 1952-57 they wore the orange D on their home and away caps.
• 1958-1971 the Tigers did not wear orange at all and in 1960 the Tigers script was used in place of the English D on the home uniform.
• Since 1972 the Tigers have only worn orange on the road. Interestingly, 1972-1982 the Tigers road cap featured an orange D with a white outline.
• 1994 the Tigers wore stripes down the sleeves of their road uniform and an orange bill on the cap that lasted 4 years and included the Tiger wiggling through the D for three.
• In 1995 the Tigers wore an official alternate for only one game. They were smoked by the Red Sox and the owner, John McHale, ended the alt saying, "That uniform just didn't say Detroit Tigers to me. We're open to trying new things, but those didn't do it for me."
And that's it for today. Back with more next time.
Unfortunately due to
an unforeseen labor strike, fire, and theft of uniforms, due to the personal commitments of both Rob Holecko and Andrew Seagraves, the UWFFL will be taking a one-week hiatus this weekend from Uni Watch. There are still games to be played, however.
You can head over to uwfantasyfootballleague.com to vote on this week's UWFFL matchups.
Apologies to any/all who were expecting the usual UWFFL fare here.
Uni Watch News Ticker:
NFL News: Interesting cover for The New Yorker next month. (This would usually be reserved for the 'skins Watch section, but it's getting too much pub to wait a week.) … Did you know that the old Browns mascot, Brownie the Elf, has a tail? Neither did I until I saw this picture (with enlargement by The Real Kub). Whoa. Who knew elves had tails? When I retweeted that image, Johnny Okray posted a different image of Brownie, and in that one it appears the "tail" is the shadow of his shirt. But if you go back to the first image the shirt/tunic (whatever Brownie is wearing) is different — almost a two-piece, so whatever it is, it's not a shadow or outline of a shirt. I asked Todd Radom if he knew more and he thought it might be an outturned pocket. … "More Nike fun," says Britton Thomas. The Falcons have apparently adopted a new motto for the season (something about trying to go 1-0 each week). "Can't have a motto without a shirt." … If you take a look at this video, you'll see Freddie Mercury wearing a Cowboys t-shirt that Jeff Wilk has never seen before. He adds, "There's the spot you get the first good look at the front, but let it roll on and you get other great views at 6:40. It's the star logo in the D that makes me wonder what kind of yellow Cowboys shirt is this?"
College/High School Football News: USC and UCLA will play color-vs-color today (as God intended), so here's a good look at the rivalry. Also, check out this beautiful ticket stub from the 1956 UCLA/USA game (from Jeremy Formo). … Pretty sure this isn't unique, but on Thursday night, a K-State player was wearing a shirt with built-in pockets (from Steven). We've definitely seen it in the pros (h/t Noel Blaha). … The Illinois Illini will be wearing white/orange/white today, the only combination they've worn more than once (they've worn it five times) – thanks to J.P. Young. … The UM Terps have a new 'vision' for the Cole Field House, which includes a new locker room (thanks to Mark Johnson). … Here is a good slide show of the uniforms and also the evaluation of uniforms through the years of the Lehigh Lafayette rivalry. Says submitter Jason Ricles, "I, as a Lehigh alum, and uniform enthusiasts love looking through the slide show and see how they changed through the years. So upset I decided I didn't want to freeze my butt off this weekend to see what they pull out this Saturday in person but will def see on tv." … Special helmets this weekend for Montana against Montana State in the "Brawl of the Wild." (thanks to @CubbyTheKraut). Also noticing this was Brett Clark, who believes the team will also be putting the names of Montana counties on the back of the helmet. (Jackson Wagner later confirmed that it's the name of the County for the player wearing it – h/t for that last pic to Nick Mills). Not sure if any non-Montanans play for the team or how that will be handled. … This was in yesterday's ticker, but here is a side by side comparison of the 2012 chrome helmet and the 2014 chrome helmet for UNC (which they wore Thursday night vs. Duke). Thanks to Todd Gaines. … Baylor will be going all black with their uniforms vs. Okie State (thanks to Andrew Lind). Also from Andrew, Mississippi State will be wearing their anniversary uniforms against Vanderbilt. … Florida State will wear a helmet decal to honor the victims of Wednesday's library shooting (h/t B.J. Lanier). … Jim Vilk would approve of these "comically large" numbers for a high school football team in Salem, VA (thanks to David Jordan). … Jeremy Langford's thigh pad has a Spartan helmet imprinted on it (grab by Cory Fisher). … Want to own one of those special blue chrome UNC helmets from the Duke game Thursday? You can, but it wall cost you $1,195 plus an extra $29.95 for shipping and handling. … If you scroll down to the bottom of this article, you will note that Clemson will wear
the accursed color of death purple today (first time since 2013). … Fun article on how "MIT Engineered a Football Team Out of Scrap", from the Wall Street Journal. … Ever wonder what the SEC would look like if someone did military/patriotic uniform concepts? Wonder no more (thanks to Andrew Daley).
NBA News: You won't see a better NBA link today than the Sacramento Kings Christmas sweater photoshoot (via Todd Gaines). The full gallery can be seen here. Enjoy! … Here's a neat look at the history and evolution of the Miami Heat uniforms throughout that franchise's history. … Last night, the Cavs and Wizards went color-on-color (thanks, Paul).
Hockey News: The AHL's Adirondack Flames will be wearing these camo…things as their alternate jerseys today (h/t to Brandson LaFerriere, I think). … St. Louis Blues goaltender Jake Allen is letting fans choose his new mask (thanks to Mike T.). … GAH! The Pensacola Ice Flyers hockey team wore these … things last night (h/t Bob Marshall). … The Syracuse Crunch will wear Devon Still jerseys during pregame warmups against the Utica Comets today. … Wow! Check out Hall of Famer Ebbie Goodfellow with his son in oldest replica red wings jersey we will ever see, from 1938 (great find by Douglas Ford). … "While watching the New Jersey-Edmonton game Friday night the Oiler announcers referenced a Calgary-based group of Jagr fans, apparently called the 'Traveling Jagrs'," says Matt Larsen. "Apparently they first dressed up as Jagr for Halloween, then decided to follow Jaromir around. Jagr got to meet them before Friday's game."
Soccer News: Here's a leak of Mexico's Copa America 2015 away kit (thanks to Conrad Burry). Here are some additional looks at the new jersey (via conejo_ape). … Also from Conrad, here's a leak of Colombia's Copa America 2015 away kit and to Paraguay's home kit as well. … Nike won't sell Women's National Team jerseys to men because…reasons. What are those reasons? "(T)he company does not offer jerseys with stars in men's sizes. The converse is also true: Jerseys without stars do not come in women's sizes. Nike, Wilkins says, fears that adding stars to the men's replicas would be interpreted as a false claim that the men had won two World Cups." … Batman sues? From across the pond, George Chilvers says, "Holy bats! Valencia have had this badge since 1919 – it is the emblem of the region."
College Hoops News: "My beloved Rainbow Warriors have changed (what it looks like to me ONLY) their basketball shorts design (to a simpler/generic template) Last years shorts, while admittedly a little cluttered, were unique," writes Aaron Wigg. "You see the new style in the very first image 'Men's Basketball vs High Point 11-17-14'. You see the old style in the second row 'Men's Basketball vs Long Beach State'." … East Tennessee State University has updated their logo and fonts. Here are the 2013-14 home unis (here are the new 2014-15 home unis), and here are the 2013-14 road unis compared to the new 2014-15 road unis. Thanks to Jenny Wittenauer for the update. … Here's a look at some of the Kansas Womens' basketball uniforms thoughtout the years.
Grab Bag: In college lacrosse news, the Florida Gators wore these new helmets (with simulated gator skin logos in their matchup with Florida State last night (thanks to Dave Doop). … "Forget Kim Kardashian," writes Douglas Ford, "this pic of (Bill) Cosby will break the internet."
OK, that will do it for today. Big thanks to Leo for helping me out in a pinch with his DIY, and also to Gary for another stellar installment of the Scoreboards series. I'll be back tomorrow with the usual Sunday Morning Uni Watch fare.
Remember, if you see an NCAA game today you think would qualify for the "5 & 1″ let Catherine know about it by e-mailing her at email@example.com — if you don't let her know what you think is a good (or bad) candidate for the Five and One, you shouldn't be complaining about her choices tomorrow, right? Right! I mean, we all know the USC/UCLA game will be tomorrow's #1 (as it should be), but there will be fierce competition for 2-5, and surely there will be some bad looking games out there. Catch you guys tomorrow.
Follow me on Twitter @PhilHecken.
"The argument I've always made is that fancy new uniforms are akin to corporate perks like happy hours and foosball tables and comfy chairs. At the end of the day, an engineer might choose his workplace based on the wages and the long-term prospects of the company and the type of projects they'd work on, but the small perks do make a difference because they signal how an employer views its employees."
— "terriblehuman"
By Sean Engelhardt
Henrik Lundqvist, like most NHL goaltenders, has a new mask this year. The design resembles the one he's used in years past, but this . . . → Read More: A Close Look at Hockey Goalie Facemask Cages]]>
[Today we have a sensational guest entry from Sean Egelhardt, who's written a superb analysis of a little-noted uniform element. You're gonna like this one. — PL]
By Sean Engelhardt
Henrik Lundqvist, like most NHL goaltenders, has a new mask this year. The design resembles the one he's used in years past, but this year the cage — by which I mean the bars in the center of the mask — is blue rather than the white he's previously used. More interestingly, the inside of the cage is white, creating a two-toned effect he uses on his secondary mask (which he wears when the Rangers wear their third jerseys) and which he used in the Sochi Olympics (click to enlarge):
I believe this marks a performance/style intersection for Hank. I think he likes the way the blue looks from the outside but believes white bars work best for his vision, which plays such an important part of goaltending.
Having grown up playing goalie myself, I can recall the topic of preferred cage colors coming up now and again, but I've never heard it discussed on TV or elsewhere. I always preferred a white cage, because I thought the white blended in with the ice and was less distracting. I felt that white bars let your brain do what it does when you watch a choppy animation — fill in missing information with what should be there. I felt that this allowed me to track the puck a bit truer, rather than having a dark puck blend into a dark cage and possibly introduce milliseconds of uncertainty about which side of the bar the puck was on. That might sound questionable, but hockey moves very quickly, and any advantage, even if it's imagined, can help.
So how does Lundqvist's cage stack up with those of his fellow NHL goalies? About half of the league's netminders currently use a white cage, half go with chrome/stainless steel, and a few others go with team colors. Only Lundqvist's cage has a different color inside than out (click to enlarge):
As long as we're taking about cages, let's turn to the issue of bar configuration. Most professional goaltenders prefer the cat-eye style, which has two large curved openings in front of the eyes. The cat-eye cage is illegal in junior hockey, because it lacks certification from the Hockey Equipment Certification Council (HECC) — not, as many people mistakenly think, because the puck can fit through the openings (it can't), but because the butt-end of a stick can. As a result, young goaltenders always start their careers with a grid (much like a normal skater's cage) or "Certified Cat Eye" (a hideous-looking design meant to entice goalies who want the pro look but require a HECC-certified mask). You can see the three primary styles here (click to enlarge):
The added bars on the certified cat-eye make the cage legal but defeat the point of the high-visibility cat-eye, so most goalies graduate to the professional cat-eye as soon they can.
In the modern goalie-mask era, a few notables have strayed from the cat-eye cage. Tim Thomas and Don Beaupre opted for custom, high-visibility, non-HECC-certified grids, while John Vanbiesbrouck went with a tight grid in what I believe had to provide the worst visibility of any mask in the modern era. You can barely see Beezer in there! But what do I know? He has 374 more wins than me.
The Overanalyzed Hockey Equipment Details Hall of Fame also includes such staples as which direction to tape your stick so that the puck rolls off smoothest; whether black tape makes it harder for a goalie to pick up the puck coming off a stick blade; if shin pads should sit above or below the tongue of the skate; whether to tape shin pads; and how many notches to tighten your leg pads. Any of these — or all of them! — would make good topics for future Uni Watch entries.
Paul here. Please join me in thanking Sean for his spectacular work here. First-rate! And as for those other topics he brought up at the end: Sean, if you want to tackle any of those, please consider yourself invited to do so.
Membership update: Another eight designs have been added to the membership card gallery (including Harry Michelson's Steelers bumblebee throwback treatment, shown at right). These cards haven't yet been printed or laminated, but that should take place over the next few days, and the finished cards will mail out early next week.
As always, you can order your own custom-designed card here, you can see all the cards we've designed so far here, and you can see the process by which we produce the cards here.
'Skins Watch: With the 'Skins on the road against the 49ers this Sunday, a Bay Area coalition is planning a rally and protest at Levi's Stadium (thanks, Brinke). … Someone has developed a browser extension that will replace the 'Skins name in your browser. … The Prince Albert Raiders — a junior hockey team in Saskatchewan — have a new mascot that's being criticized for playing on Middle Eastern stereotypes.
Baseball News: All of the Mets' Saturday home games next season are night games. Disappointing. … New uniforms and logos for the double-A San Antonio Missions. … What's worse than an advertising patch on a uniform? A purple advertising patch on a uniform! That's what MLBers were wearing during their recent tour of Japan (from Nick Hanson).
NFL News: I think we've covered this before, but people keep asking me, so here it is again: The Lions will not be wearing throwbacks on Thanksgiving. … Small uni-related moment in yesterday's installment of Sarah Koenig's excellent Serial podcast, which is about the 1999 murder of a Baltimore teen-ager named Hae Min Lee. Koenig was listing a few things people remembered about Lee, including this: "The Dallas Cowboys were her favorite team — not because she cared about football, but because she liked the colors blue and silver." Insert obligatory comment about the Cowboys' multiple shades of blue and silver here. … Why Stadium Sponsorships Suck, Part 739: Some poor soul who works at the Oakland Coliseum had to cover up the old sponsorship logos on the sideline benches. Douchebags (screen shot by Andy Bartsch).
College Football News: Here's a look at Dartmouth football uniforms through the years. … Is Maryland on its way to becoming "the Oregon of the East"? One observer says nuh-uh. … Small note toward the end of this piece on Nebraska football: "In practice on Tuesday, seven top-unit defenders voluntarily relinquished their traditional Blackshirt jerseys" — apparently as penance for giving up 59 points to Wisconsin last Saturday. … Arizona State will go mono-maroon with a white helmet tomorrow, and Vanderbilt is going black-white-gold. … Love the throwback helmet that West Virginia wore last night. … Army will be wearing gray this weekend. … UNC debuted a new chrome helmet last night. … Blackout costume tomorrow for Washington.
Hockey News: Which Tampa Bay Lightning jersey should you own? Take this quiz and find out. … Years ago I did an entry about the wonderful children's book The Hockey Sweater. Here's an interview with the book's author. … Key passage in this article about T.J. Oshie of the Blues: "When [Oshie's father] was a child, he moved to Anoka, Minnesota. … [He] was the organizer of the street, gathering kids and assigning them to baseball or football teams that would play against other kids from other streets. They'd fashion uniforms out of T-shirts with logos and names written on them with marker." … Batman- and Riddler-themed uniforms upcoming for the Toledo Walleye and Evansville IceMen. … The Flyers have inducted Eric Lindros and John LeClair into their Hall of Fame and marked the occasion last night by wearing both of their numbers on a patch. "For some reason, I'm craving a black-and-white cookie," says Mike Engle.
NBA News: Corporate Bullshit Dept.: Nike was planning on a sneaker that was sort of a wink-wink tribute to (or exploitation of) Allen Iverson, but they've now scrapped the idea because Iverson, who has an endorsement deal with Reebok, objected (from Douglas Ford). … More corporate nonsense: Clippers G Chris Paul taped over the Jumpman logo on his socks last night. One might ask why he was wearing Jumpman-logo socks to begin with, or why any socks need to be logo-emblazoned, but those queries would clearly make the Earth spin off its axis.
College Hoops News: Here are some thoughts on UMass's sleeved alternate jerseys. … Here's a weird one: UAB players are wear mismatched shoe colors this season. "A lot of variety with it, too," says Justin Semore. "Most have green on the left foot and white on the right. Others have a grey right foot. Some have shine on the shoes, others don't; some have green laces, some have white, some alternate. As far as I can tell, they are all Nike. It's to raise awareness of childhood cancer (Birmingham Children's Hospital is a part of campus)." Can't say I understand what mismatched footwear has to do with cancer awareness, but whatever — it's certainly an interesting look.
Soccer News: The La Liga team Valencia is being sued by DC Comics because the team's logo is similar to the Batman logo. … This movie review of the new documentary about the UK rock band Pulp includes the following: "The band's longtime drummer, Nick Banks, coaches a Sheffield girls' soccer team, of which Pulp is a partial sponsor — the band's name is emblazoned on the jerseys. Banks' daughter is on the team, and her father says that when some of her teammates asked her what, exactly, this 'Pulp' might be, she referred to it as her 'dad's crap band.'" … Argentina's and Colombia's Copa America kits have leaked.
Grab Bag: "This U.S. map illustration is from a Thai airline's in-flight magazine," says Gordon Blau. "It accompanied a story about a cross-country road trip. I found it interesting that they made no effort to regionalize the iconography. A cowboy resides along the Great Lakes, for example; the Empire State Building bisects Texas; the White House is in the heartland; the Capitol is in the Pacific Northwest (wrong Washington). No American art director would approve this graphic. But whereas we consider ourselves a collection of distinct regions, each with its own iconography, I guess other parts of the world view us as one big jumble of interchangeable symbols." … Everything Must Be Branded: The city of Bluefield, West Virginia, is asking residents to vote on a new city logo. Meanwhile, the upstate New York town of Massena is paying a designer $5000 to create a new logo. … "Top secret" new uni in the works for the UK rugby team Barrow Raiders. … F1 driver Fernando Alonso will wear a specially designed helmet in his final race for Ferrari in Abu Dhabi on Sunday. … Here's one designer's proposal for new license plate designs for all 50 states (thanks, Brinke). … I love this: a short video about a Cleveland man who makes very cool hand-painted signs (big thanks to Jeremy Baker). … New lacrosse uniforms for the NLL team the New England Black Wolves. … Professional motorcyclist Jorge Lorenzo has renewed his endorsement deal with HJC Helmets. … Not an Onion story, honest: A town in Poland will not allow Winnie the Pooh to be part of a playground logo because he is of "dubious sexuality" and isn't fully clothed. … Ever wonder which school in the California Collegiate Athletic Association has the coolest logo? Me neither, but here's a page where you can vote on your choice. … Employees at a British ice cream factory must now wear uniforms without pockets after a product-tampering scandal.
By the time most of you read this, I'll be on my way to deal with a personal matter that's going to keep me off the grid for most of the day. Play nice while I'm away. Phil will handle the weekend, as usual, and I'll be back on Monday. See you then.
For all of today's images, you can click to enlarge
Heard yesterday from a trusted industry source, who shared the new Nike/NFL 2015 youth catalog with me (the cover of which is shown above). This isn't as good as seeing the adult catalog, natch, but it nonetheless offers some . . . → Read More: Uni Watch Exclusive! Leaked Catalog Hints at New Alternate Jerseys for NFL Teams]]>
For all of today's images, you can click to enlarge
Heard yesterday from a trusted industry source, who shared the new Nike/NFL 2015 youth catalog with me (the cover of which is shown above). This isn't as good as seeing the adult catalog, natch, but it nonetheless offers some interesting hints regarding what's in store for next season.
Let's start with the colored jerseys:
Also, the catalog shows the Eagles wearing midnight green. So if they're really switching to kelly green, as has been rumored, it's not happening in 2015, at least if this catalog is to be believed. (Note to Nike: You might wanna stock up on midnight green dye this time.)
The other thing worth noting here is that the Titans' light-blue jersey is still shown. As was noted two days ago in the Ticker, Titans CEO Tommy Smith recently stated that we've probably seen the last of the light-blues, at least for this season, and ESPN's Titans beat reporter, Paul Kuharsky, says this means they'll be redesignating the navy jerseys and their primaries. I asked a team spokesperson about that and he confirmed for me yesterday that the team will wear white for the rest of this season's games but said the team had no other uni-related news to announce at this time. So if they do plan to make navy their primary, then the catalog is wrong (or perhaps simply hasn't been updated to reflect the team's current thinking).
Now let's look at the white jerseys:
The next set of listings is where things get interesting — the alternate jerseys. Let's take a look:
• Looks like there will be new alternate designs for the Browns (duh), Dolphins (orange?), 49ers (beats me), and Packers (what, no more Acme Packers?).
• The Titans' navy jersey is shown here as an alternate. As noted above, it's not clear how this plays in with the team's current thinking.
• As you can see, they're showing a red Patriots throwback. My initial thought was, "A-ha! If they're bringing back that throwback, then they must be planning to scrap the one-helmet rule." But then I double-checked with my source, who said the red throwback youth jersey has been available for sale all along. Ditto for that white Colts throwback. So those don't necessarily indicate anything regarding on-field jerseys.
So the real news here — aside from the Browns stuff, which we already knew — is that the 49ers, Dolphins, and Packers appear poised to unveil new alternate jerseys that we can't see yet. Okay, so that's not completely satisfying, but it's still fun to look through these catalogs, right?
ESPN reminder: In case you missed it yesterday (and you probably did, because it didn't post until pretty late in the day), my latest ESPN column is a follow-up to last week's college hoops season preview.
Membership update: A bunch of new designs have been added to the membership card gallery (including Bobby Hoekstra's Tim Duncan-era Wake Forest design treatment, shown at right). Some of those new cards have already been printed, laminated, and shipped out; the rest should be in the mail at some point next week. And we have about two dozen additional new enrollees whose card designs should be available for your viewing pleasure soon. My thanks everyone who responded to my "Now or possibly never" call over the past week.
Meanwhile, I've made a simple change that I probably should have done ages ago: The membership card gallery now has the newest designs at the top, instead of at the bottom. Much easier to see the most recent designs this way.
As always, you can see how we make the membership cards here and sign up for your own here.
By Thomas Correia
Did you hear the big news this past weekend? Underoos have officially made a comeback — and they're now for adults! Although it's highly unlikely, I'd like to think that our little project here played a small role in the return of this sorely missed element from undergarment history. So let's strike while the iron is now even hotter and bring you this week's NFL superheroes, which are based on tonight's game between the Chiefs and Raiders (click to enlarge):
I have to give a shout-out to a commenter from last week named Winter, who guessed that the Chiefs would be represented by Green Arrow's sidekick, Speedy. He would indeed be a perfect fit, but I opted to use a more famous DC hero who also wears red and gold: the Flash. I incorporated the Flash's logo and some speed lines into a slightly skewed arrowhead to give it a sense of motion, which is what the Flash is all about.
When I got to the Raiders, one character immediately came to mind: the Punisher. The Raiders of yore and lore were always out to punish teams for entering their stadium. Victory was had by any means necessary. Also, Raiders fans are diehard and menacing, just like the Punisher when he's dispensing justice to those who break the law.
Next week will be a special holiday edition featuring four of the teams that will be playing on Thanksgiving: the Seahawks, 49ers, Eagles, and Lions. Guess which heroes will represent each team in today's comments.
By Mike Chamernik
Which failed uniform trend are you most glad went away? Here's mine: In the mid-2000s several NBA teams wore sleeveless T-shirts instead of the standard tank-top silhouette. I didn't like the look, but I thought they were the wave of the future. Fortunately, I was wrong, as they've mostly disappeared.
We have a ton of options here, from the pullovers in baseball to cut-off jerseys in college football to short shorts in basketball, and everything in between.
Also, which contemporary trend should disappear? [Editor's Note: If you're thinking of saying anything other than "baseball pajama pants," please remain where you are. The reprogramming truck will be arriving momentarily. — PL]
PermaRec update: A soldier's pass to visit Nome, Alaska, in 1945 (shown at right), which was found in an old book, is the subject of the latest entry on Permanent Record.
By Mike Chamernik
Baseball News: Louisville Slugger makes camo bats now (from Jonathan Daniel). … A Nats fan made a nine-foot Jayson Werth gnome out of canned seafood (from Andrew Hoenig). … Ben Fortney found a cool Texas Rangers program cover on Pinterest. … A's outfielder Josh Reddick will switch to No. 22 as newcomer Billy Butler will take Reddick's former No. 16 (from Rich Paloma). … We've seen this before, but it's still cool to check out this gallery of 19th-century baseball players in game-action poses (from Chris Flinn). … Semi-related, here are some turn-of-the-century sports photos by photographer George Grantham Bain (from Jonathan Daniel).
Football News: Bowling Green wore all-orange last night (from Phil). … Toledo wore "Glass City" uniforms last night and Tom Konecny wrote a few words about it. … Also, Toledo's coach wore a multi-branded cap. … Here's a history on the Penn State paw print logo (from William Yurasko). … Vanderbilt will wear matte helmets against Mississippi State (from Phil). … Borrowed orange unis played a big part in MIT's football history (from Phil). … Tim Erney took a tour of Levi's Stadium and saw not only a poster for uniform guidelines but also a display for a game-used Jim Harbaugh outfit.
Hockey News: The Rangers wore white at home last night. … "Arturs Irbe is the Sabres' goalie coach and was forced into the backup role Tuesday night due to an injury to starter Michal Neuvirth," says Mike Monaghan. "He wore team's terrible third jersey, but a nameplate from the regular home blues." … The Islanders and the Brooklyn Nets swapped jerseys.
Soccer News: The San Jose Earthquakes' new stadium has a corporate sponsor. … Here are some colorizations of some old soccer photos (from Jack Coyier).
College Hoops News: We discussed college players (specifally those who wear Under Armour unis) rolling up their shorts at the waistband yesterday. Kendrick Nunn from Illinois, a Nike school, also does it (from Ben Zoss). … San Diego State will wear turquoise against Bakersfield tonight (from Phil). … New home, road and alternates for Southeastern Louisiana. Isn't that where Bobby Boucher played foosball? (From Chris Mycoskie.) … Houston Baptist is wearing a patch to honor 50 years of basketball at the school (from Jeff Sutton).
Grab Bag: Delaware's student newspaper said it will stop referring to the school's women's teams as the Lady Hens. … Josh Lassiter is tracking all of Baylor's uniforms. … Icelandic RFU is holding a new logo contest. Winner doesn't get paid; he or she will only get a free shirt (from Eric Bangeman). … Here's a quiz where you guess which state these colleges are from, based on the logo (from Anthony Nuccio). … Nice library find from Patrick (who prefers that his last name not be used): some bound pages showing illustrations of U.S. Navy uniforms through the years. Good stuff! … Through photo manipulation, an artist covered babies in tattoos of corporate logos to prove a point of some sort (from Jay Sullivan). … Chas Wagner runs a site called Rally, and it sells famous play-inspired T-shirts and coasters, among other nifty items. … David Firestone wrote a few blog posts recently, including one about a driver suit that has both an Oakley and Simpson logo on the back and a breakdown of the best and worst NASCAR paint schemes this year. … Apple released a new typeface (from Brinke). … "A couple of Australian players wearing the uniform for the 'International Rules' series against Ireland," says Graham Clayton. "International Rules is a hybrid of Australian rules football and Gaelic football."
Trolls are a fact of life on the internet. And while trolls can be annoying, I can respect a good troll, the same way I can respect a good villain in a movie. In fact, there's one troll — Joe "Big Cock" Johnson, who bedeviled this website for several years — who I . . . → Read More: In Which I Gain a New Secret Admirer]]>
Trolls are a fact of life on the internet. And while trolls can be annoying, I can respect a good troll, the same way I can respect a good villain in a movie. In fact, there's one troll — Joe "Big Cock" Johnson, who bedeviled this website for several years — who I respected so much that I ended up interviewing him and eventually even created a separate website for him.
Joe Johnson admittedly set a pretty high bar — you don't come across a troll like that every day. (The Jeff doesn't count — he's a contrarian, not a troll.) Still, I'd like to think we can do better than the copy/paste hack who showed up here on the site yesterday morning. He fired his first salvo at 8:50am (for all of these, you can click to enlarge):
It went on like that for about another two screens' worth. Pretty tedious, eh? Obviously, I deleted the comment and blocked the guy who posted it, but not before he added this:
That one scrolled on for another few screens' worth. Now, it's possible for juvenile name-calling to be effective, or even entertaining ("The Ballad of Jerry Curlan" comes to mind). But "Paul is gay," times a thousand? Seriously? Come on, man — I'd like to think Uni Watch readers are more creative than that.
Based on his IP address, this little shit is apparently a student at UMass. Son, I hope you're better at your classwork (or beer pong, or getting laid, or any of the other things college students are supposed to be doing) than you are at trolling, because you're never gonna make it in this game with that lazy-ass approach.
I wouldn't have bothered to mention any of this except that another Uni Watch troll emerged yesterday, and on a new platform to boot! Check it out:
That's a screen shot from the home page of a new Twitter feed called Uni Watch Watch, which apparently launched yesterday afternoon. For now it's mostly just retweets of my tweets, with a short put-down appended to each one — okay, so that's kinda meh, but I still feel it has potential! Frankly, I wouldn't have even known about it except that Phil and reader BSmile both spotted it yesterday and brought it to my attention. (Unfortunately, Phil also "reported" it to the Twitter authorities, so it's possible that this troll account will be deleted by the time you read this, but I'll try to deal with that as we go along. Here, see if this link to the troll account still works. If it doesn't, blame Phil!)
Let's take a closer look at Uni Watch Watch:
• The "Uni Watch Watch" handle: I like it! The double-"Watch" effect works nicely, and the troll gets bonus points for knowing that "Uni Watch" is two words, both capped, with a space in between (which is more than I can say for, ahem, lots of you non-trolls out there). On the standard Uni Watch spectrum of Good to Stupid, I'd say this handle is very, very, Good.
• The troll's name:
"Luke Paulass"? Dude, you just undid all the good work you'd done with the handle. "Paul is gay" looks like literature compared to this. Should've just stuck with "Uni Watch Watch." Very, very Stupid. Hey, he just changed it from "Luke Paulass" (awful) to "Watchy McWatcherson" (not great but definitely less cringe-inducing)! I like this — a troll who takes advice. Still pretty Stupid, but he's getting there.
• The avatar: Looks like he just used a stock illustration for the little guy with the magnifying glass (it's clearly watermarked). Still, the idea of his avatar looking at my avatar is pretty clever — a good visual representation of "Uni Watch Watch." I like! Good.
• The little statement of purpose: This wasn't originally part of the guy's page, but then he added it a few hours after creating the account. It's a pretty straightforward manifesto: "The only thing worse than watching minor changes to sports uniforms is watching the tweets from the guy who watches the changes to sports uniforms." I like that — you get in, you say your piece, you get out. Good.
• The header design: The baseball diamond and basketball net feel pretty random, but whatever. The real issue is that he used green, my favorite color. Come on, dude — if you want to fuck with my head, you know which color to use! Seriously, hello!! Stupid.
• The tweets: Normally, I'd embed a few of the tweets here for you to see. But again, it's possible that the troll account may have been taken down by the time you read this, so I've taken screen shots of the first five tweets and gathered them into a Flickr set (if you can't see the slideshow below, click here):
All in all, I'd say Big Cock Johnson's place in the Uni Watch pantheon remains secure. But a fella can dream, can't he? If the Uni Watch Watch account hasn't been taken down yet, I urge everyone to follow it, if only to give the troll some incentive to work on his craft. Meanwhile, you can track the account here:
A final thought: I'm sure some of you are thinking, "This is exactly why I don't bother with Twitter." And you're right! That's actually one of my favorite things about Uni Watch Watch — I feel like it's trolling Twitter as much as it's trolling me, and that's a good thing.
Uni-centric movie review: Frequent Uni Watch commenter BvK1126 checked in with the following in yesterday's comments:
Last night I went to a screening of the documentary Red Army, which is about the Soviet Union's domination of the sport of ice hockey for the better part of four decades. It's an engrossing film, especially for anyone who remembers those seemingly unstoppable Soviet Red Army and national teams from the '70s and '80s.
It's also a feast for a Uni Watcher's eyes, with lots of footage and photos of various versions of what may be the most feared uniform in sports history. One of the most intriguing to me was this jersey, which features two very distinct shades of red. (The brighter shade looks almost highlighter pink in the film footage.)
A guy in the front row of the screening came decked out for the occasion in a jersey that looked like this, except that the lettering on the back was in Cyrillic and the letters and numbers were screened on in white instead of black. Unfortunately, I wasn't quite close enough to get a decent shot of him in the dim lighting.
Sounds good, right? If you live in New York, Red Army is currently playing at the AMC Empire 25 in Times Square; it's due to open in other cities in late January. Here's the trailer:
Roll your own: Reader Scott Novosel spent a good chunk of yesterday obsessing over (and peppering me with emails about) an admirably esoteric uniform detail: college hoops players who roll up their shorts' waistbands in order to make the shorts a bit shorter. He spotted players from three different teams doing this yesterday — South Carolina, Manhattan, and Utah (click to enlarge):
The interesting thing about this, as Scott noted several times during the course of the day, is that those are all Under Armour schools, which led Scott to speculate, "I wonder if UA is making the shorts too lengthy."
Speaking of college hoops: I have a new ESPN column today — a follow-up to last week's season preview.
Baseball News: The Angels have been wearing black belts and black shoes with their road grays, but Matt Shoemaker, pitching in Japan as part of the MLB tour, wore a red belt and red shoes with his road grays the other day. A team insider tells me that's a change that's being made for 2015. … "It seems the Giants and A's donate their old uniforms to the San Quentin prison team, which are worn when San Quentin plays other prison teams, as well as minor league and semi-pro teams," says Don Gray. "Of particular interest is this nifty sleeve patch." … The Mets have once again moved in their rightfield fence. There's a photo gallery here. … Oooh, look at this awesome piece of championship jewelry that the 1912 Red Sox got (from BSmile and Jonathan Daniel. … The Giants have a new championship logo, which is stylistically similar to the logos they used to mark their championships in 2010 and 2012. In case you're wondering, they didn't wear those logos as sleeve patches in the years following their titles; instead they wore this much more generic patch design in 2011 and then this very similar generic patch design in 2013. Remains to be seen what they'll do next season, but the pattern appears to have been set.
NFL News: Reprinted from yesterday's comments: Titans CEO Tommy Smith said on a radio show that we've probably seen the last of the light-blue jerseys. I asked a team spokesman if this means they're redesignating the navys as their primary jersey or if they've getting an overhaul — no response. I'll keep poking around to see what I can find out. … Stan Capp was watching Monday Night Football at a hotel in Mexico, which had several of these handmade-looking NFL logo banners on display. … "The Giants still get their duffles from Gerry Cosby in New York, which has been supplying the team for well over 50 years," says Mark Gonillo. "They no longer have NFL logo rights, hence the generic 'Football Giants' stencil. It's refreshing a team staying loyal to a longtime supplier."
College Football News: Here's a gallery of Lafayette football unis through the years (thanks, Phil). … When UNC and Duke play each other tomorrow night, they'll both be wearing black helmets — even though black isn't actually a school color for either team. … Nicholls State has been granted permission to wear white at home for tomorrow's game against Southeastern Louisiana (from Chris Mycoskie). … UGA coach Mark Richt says the team might wear black at some point this season (thanks, Phil). … USC and UCLA will once again go color-vs.-color when they face off at the Rose Bowl (thanks, Phil). … "I was downloading the Mountain West Network app on my phone and noticed they have Derek Carr on their cover with a WAC patch instead of a MW patch," says Ramon M. … Here's Maryland's latest costume.
Hockey News: The Hockey News has been sold from one media conglomerate to another. … "While looking through the Google newspaper archives, I found this 1945 article about some of the innovations made by the original Maple Leaf Gardens superintendent, Doug Morris," says Will Scheibler. "One innovation was the penalty clocks, so I looked and found this 1940s photo tat shows the clocks, and this 1965 close-up. In that last photo, Eddie Shack of the Leafs — No. 23 — is serving a penalty." … The anthem singer at last night's Ducks/Flames game wore a jersey with a musical note instead of a TV number on the sleeve — not bad! Is this a standard thing for the Flames' anthem singers? (Thanks, Phil.) … Previously unnoted change for this season: The Bruins' helmet numbers have changed from black to gold (thanks, Phil).
Basketball News: Ogie Menor, who plays for a team in the Philippines called the Blackwater Elite, has arguably the greatest haircut of any athlete ever. But what animal is that supposed to be — a lizard? Something else? In any case, my compliments to the chef. … Here's an absolutely spectacular interactive site that chronicles more than a century's worth of Iowa basketball history. Don't miss (big thanks to Brad Eenhuis). … Love this old photo of Senate and House pages dressed up in basketball togs (thanks, Phil).
Grab Bag: This interview with Under Armour founder Kevin Plank includes an explanation for why he spelled "Armour" with a "u": "I was skeptical at the time about whether this whole Internet thing would stick. So I thought the phone number 888-4ARMOUR was much more compelling than 888-44ARMOR. I wish there was a little more science or an entire marketing study behind it, but it was that simple" (from Yusuke Toyoda). … Here's a look at the evolution of the Virgin logo (thanks, Brinke). … Last Sunday's New York Times Magazine had a long list of innovations and technologies that either failed or fell out of favor. Of interest to us here is the entry on decorative German military helmets. … Fox Footy is asking fans to vote on which AFL team has the best clash jumper. "Only problem I see on the list is that Collingwood's main jumper is featured, rather than their clash." … A "bobblehead hall of fame" is hoping to open in Milwaukee in 2016, and look, there's Brinke ordering his plane ticket already! … If you're going to go color-vs.-color, you may as well use the greatest colors available! Those are members of the Australian and South African cricket teams, which are currently playing a one-day international series in Australia (from Graham Clayton).
[Editor's Note: Today we have a guest entry from Tom Speed, who made some great uni-related observations during a recent visit to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He emailed his entry to me as a PDF, with all the photos already laid out, so I'm simply going to run it as he presented it. You can click on each "page" to enlarge. — PL]
By Tom Speed
Click to enlarge
By Brinke Guthrie
This 1960s NFL bedspread from JC Penny is very similar to a cool item I once had. It was a lightweight NFL hooded rain poncho with reflective aluminum on the inside to keep you warm, and it had these exact logos on it. Sure wish I could see one of those again — this is probably as close as I get.
Here are the rest of this week's picks:
• From reader Jeff Flynn, a rather curious-looking 1960s WABC-NY Jets bottle opener that looks like an old helmet bank.
This 1960s NHL Pee-Wee Hockey game looks to be in pretty decent shape, with all Canadiens and Maple Leafs figures included.
• I love the bicentennial look to this 1976 Yankees media guide.
• Baseball toy figures from the 1960s! They cost exactly 15 cents back in the day, still marked with their original price.
• We've seen this All-Pro Helmet Kit before — you get 16 helmets, but the box alone is worth it.
• Pay one price, get two 1970s pro league stickers — NFL and MLB — from Gatorade.
• Here's a nice 1970s San Francisco 49ers single-bar helmet plaque.
• The news that Adidas is now back in the NFL as an official shoe/glove sponsor reminded me that arch-rival Puma also held an NFL license. I think they got in via an existing Logo Athletic license or something — remember how they just covered up the Logo Athletic mark with the Puma logo? All of which is a roundabout way of bringing up this very nice Cleveland Browns varsity jacket, made by Puma.
•Any Raiders fans left out there? If so, you might want this 1970s vintage poster, featuring a quarterback who's wearing No. 12 but who definitely isn't Kenny Stabler.
• And we wrap up this week with a 1960s New York Giants charm bracelet from Coca Cola.
FAST Corp. reminder: In case you missed it yesterday, I recently paid a visit to FAST Corp. (the acronym is short of "Fiberglass Animals, Shapes, and Trademarks"), the company that makes giant fiberglass cows, ice cream cones, ears of corn, Bob's Big Boy statues, and so on. My article about that visit is up now on the design website re:Form, and I don't mind saying I think it turned out pretty well. Check it out here.
PermaRec update: A girl whose student record described her as "insolent," "impudent," and "a ringleader" is the subject of the latest entry on Permanent Record.
By Garrett McGrath
NFL News: Titan Quentin Groves raised his jersey after a sack during last night's game against the Steelers, exposing his love for his hometown of Greenville, Mississippi (from Phil). … Another Titan, Jurrell Casey, was exposing his piggy bank slot on the game's final play (screen shot by Joseph Gerard). … Meanwhile, Le'Veon Bell of the Steelers suffered a torn jersey (screen shot by Matt Barnett). … A Washington Football Team fan set fire to his team merchandise after latest loss (from Tommy Turner). … "Marques Colston of the Saints has been wearing Nike Tiempo soccer cleats," says Wesley Eustis. … "My boss brought in his Cleveland Browns toaster – it is suppose to say Browns on the bagel afterwards," says Jason Johnson.
College and High School Football News: On Thursday Duke will be wearing all black against UNC. … Eastern Washington will be wearing all white on Friday. They want fans to give this white uni its own name, and Phil had a good suggestion. … FSU will be wearing their "unconquered" uniform this weekend. … The Times-Picayune has another installment of its best helmet in Louisiana poll, this one for "pro-style" helmet designs. It features two Rams knockoffs (from Joel Manuel). … Did you know Toledo is known as the "Glass City"? You will after seeing Toledo's new uniforms for tomorrow's game against Bowling Green.
NBA News: If the Bucks get a new arena, it might look like this. "I don't know why the windows and 'natural light' are such a big thing when 95 percent of Bucks home games will be at night," says Mike Chamernik.
Soccer News: From yesterday's ticker: Mike Aronson noticed that MLS had dropped the American/Canadian flags from the designs. "The league has decided to place the league logo on both sleeves of the jersey like all the other major professional soccer leagues," says Justin Garton. … To celebrate their 101st anniversary this past weekend, Colombian side Independiente Medellin unfurled a giant banner at the Estadio Atanasio Girardot (from Yusuke Toyoda). … Newcastle will not advertise their payday loan sponsor, Wonga, on children's replica jerseys starting in 2016 (from Yusuke Toyoda). … This is pretty good: home and away kits for each state and Washington, D.C. (thanks, Phil).
Grab Bag: Adding magnets to football helmets could reduce the risk of concussions, new research suggests (from Drew Mastin). … Nutrition bar maker Clif Bar has dropped its sponsorship of a number of "extreme" athletes due to concerns over what it views as unreasonably dangerous pursuits (from Patrick O'Neill). … An TV news anchorman from Australia has worn the same suit on TV for almost a year (thanks, Paul). … The dismantling of Candlestick Park in San Francisco has begun (thanks, Brinke). … "Aussie Rules football club Melbourne Demons released their 2015 alternate jumpers, including a new white clash and special red away guernsey, both featuring the club monogram," reports Leo Strawn Jr. … Students at BYU want the school to lift its longstanding ban on beards.