Meet Erisbel Arruebarruena. He plays shortstop on the Cuban team in the World Baseball Classic. And as you can see, he has one doozy of an NOB –13 letters, which is one less than Salty. But Arruebarruena’s NOB looks extra-imposing because of his team’s ridiculous chunky NOB font. I mean, if you’re gonna use that font, even a short NOB like “Castro” will look fairly large. Feels like they’re trying to game the system or something. Damn commies.
Speaking of the WBC NOBs, check out Diego França from the Brazilian team:
As reader Jeremy Brahm points out, that’s not a proper cedilla under the “c” — it’s a tilde turned on its side. Sneaky!
Uni Watch News Ticker: Arizona State’s Sparky mascot is getting a makeover. … The color of Yoda’s light sabre on Ilya Bryzgalov’s new Star Wars-themed mask has been changed. The earlier version incorrectly marked Yoda as a member of the Sith (from Scott Lederer). … As a longtime asthmatic, I’m intrigued to see that Memphis hoops player DJ Stephens was using an inhaler during a timeout. Never seen that before (screen shot by Matt Snyder). … The Bay Area Seals of the WSHL wore California Seals throwbacks for the month of February. Lots of photos on their Facebook page (From Rich Paloma). … The L.A. D-Fenders of the D-League have added a jersey sponsor (from Vivek Tanna). … I was out very late last night, so there are a lot of Ticker submissions I didn’t get to here. They’ll run tomorrow, okay? Okay.
Wow. A comicbook mascot. I don’t know if this is genius or absurdity, but it looks really dumb.
I like the new Sparky, it updates the look without diminishing any of the brand equity that’s been built up. You can instantly tell it’s ASU, unlike when the football team wears some of those clown costumes they call uniforms
I would infer that the comparison of ASU’s Sparky and Walt Disney that appeared on Uni Watch a while back struck a nerve.
Why would ASU need to “engage younger audiences”? Is the school about to start admitting 5th graders?
OK: “Franço,” as you said, or “França,” as the NOB says? Asking for a friend.
It’s França (portuguese for France). By the way Paul, the tilde is used a lot in the portuguese language, to indicate nasalization of the vowel as in João (John), razões (reasons) cão (dog), pão (bread), não (no), etc.
Really, all they had to do was cut off half of the cedilla and they could have put it under a regular capital C, and it would have looked fine.
Also from the WBC: during a TV story on the Japanese team, you could see someone wearing number 105 walking around in the background. It looks like the Japanese team is giving those bizarre staffer numbers to their WBC staff — and the manager and coaches are wearing the same 70s and 80s that they wear on their real clubs — even though there are presumably a whole lot of lower numbers available.
Former Tennessee basketball player Wayne Chism also battled asthma and often used an inhaler during games. His nickname: “Weezy.”
On the Yoda thing, are we sure that wasn’t just a bad (improperly white-balanced) first photo? Yoda is reddish orange, sort of like the lightsaber in the first photo, but both Yoda AND the lightsaber are green in the second.
Thparky!
I’m surprised the inhaler thing isn’t seen way more often.
I used to go to Indianapolis Ice hockey games in the late 90s, early 00s. They had a good player, Chris McKenzie, that I think could have played in the NHL. Anyway, after every shift he would get an inhaler from the trainer and take 2-3 puffs of of it. I have no idea what the medication was but I am sure he was exceeding the daily dosage.
Those White Seals uniforms look great. Especially the UCLA striping on the sweaters. UCLA-striped hockey sweaters are a personal favorite style of mine. But then I grew up watching the AHL Buffalo Bisons and the Quebec Aces wear them against the Amerks. Those White pants are going to get dirty after a few falls on your butt and from sitting on the bench.
The Seals all-white scheme looks great!
Yoda as a member of the Sith? That’s worse than Johnny U as a Charger or Willie Mays as a Met.
Oh come on… Yoda lived for 900 years, it’s not unreasonable for him to have explored the darker side of the force in his younger days.
Hey everybody experiments in college right? Or maybe he’s just in touch with his Sith side…of the Force?
I don’t know – Yoda either lied about or was wrong about basically every important question relating to the Force and good versus evil in the entire six-movie sequence. Yoda thinks he’s a good guy, and the films attempt to portray Yoda as a good guy, but they do so mainly through assertion rather than demonstration. Because demonstrably, Yoda was the Sith’s best asset. I like to think of the original helmet as an astute commentary on Yoda’s true nature, or anyway the true nature of his Jedi leadership. Dude was the James Buchanan of the Jedi. At best.
A few interesting pieces of uniform info for the University of Texas during their spring ball.
link
As you can see in several photos of the QBs, not only do they wear a different color jersey, they also have a helmet stripe to distinguish them.
Also, several players seem to be wearing loose long sleeve black undershirts with a bowl logo on the right sleeve. I can’t make out which bowl logo it is.
Still love how they have the multiple practice uniforms, and switch them up every week. I think it’s a good bit of flash and fun for the players since they stick to traditional (and beautiful) game uniforms.
That’s all I’ve got for now.
Looks like the patch is for the Valero Alamo Bowl, which they played in earlier this year
Actually, Dec 29th
I wonder if there are any other teams that have special practice uniforms like Texas and switch them around weekly? Beginning of a trend?
Wow, never realized how hilarious the 1946 Sparky drawing is. Is he wiping his butt with the shaft of his pitchfork, or is he mistaking the pitchfork for a flying broomstick? If it’s the latter, then maybe he should flip it around before takeoff, so he doesn’t fly backwards.
Lebron James started today’s game in bright yellow sneakers and finished in a black-based design. Any mention of why on the telecast?
Sporting KC and Philadelphia Union opened the MLS season yesterday at PPL park and the Union wore their new third kits, which use a different Bimbo bread logo than their primary kits. The goalkeeper ended up having a logo different from the rest of his team.
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Paul…
You’re right about that asthmatic basketball player using an inhaler during a game. He must’ve had an exercise-induced attack. I’m not quite sure what the brand is. I am also an asthmatic, and asthmatics don’t know when the next attack will strike.
Was just hankering for some baseball and watching the chi sox v padres on my phone. I apologize for no screen shots, on account of cell phone, but apparently they put two pitchers on the mound wearing 54. One was Duente Heath, wearing his number, and the other was Jake Peavy. His jersey didnt arrive in time so they issued him a 54 and fashioned a very servicable NOB out of athletic tape. Anyone care to get pictures?
I think whoever wrote this headline needs to look up the meaning of the word propaganda. The headline doesn’t make sense in any way, shape or form.
It’s a piece of pro-big-ugly-hideous-name-on-back propaganda, and a world where such things are normal is almost as unpleasant to live in as a world ruled by the iron fist of the communists.
In case nobody saw this yet, the S.F. Chronicle’s Bruce Jenkins wrote a nice piece on baseball gloves:
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Much like the original Sparky’s resemblence to Walt Disney, the new Sparky also has a resemblence that you cannot unsee:
Stupid Sexy Flanders: link
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