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Uni Watch

Tip-Off Time for College Hoops Is Almost Here

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The most unusual new college basketball uniform set for the coming season will be worn in Louisville, where the Cardinals have been given a highly unusual shorts design (the home and road versions of which are both conveniently shown in this photo from a recent intrasquad scrimmage; additional photos here). Rather amazingly, Adidas hasn’t dressed anyone else in this template — at least not yet. Anyone want to set the over/under for how long that lasts?

But Louisville won’t be wearing those uniforms when they tip off their season this Friday. That’s because they’ll be opening the season at the Armed Forces Classic at Coast Guard Air Station Borinquen in Puerto Rico, which of course means their uniforms will feature the official animal of Puerto Rico: the coquí frog. Kidding! They’ll actually be wearing Coast Guard-themed uniforms.

Those designs, and many more, are featured in my annual college hoops season preview, which is up now on ESPN. ”” Paul

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Baseball News: Remember that Majestic catalog that ran in yesterday’s Ticker, with what appeared to be some new BP jersey designs? An inside source tells me, “That catalog is for their team sales division (i.e., for rec leagues, Little League, etc) and is not the Majestic MLB catalog. I know the “Authentic Collection” logo appears there, but those look like dumbed-down versions of the real BP jerseys that they sell to amateur teams.” So there you go — at ease. … New Mets free agent signee Michael Cuddyer has provided our first look at the team’s new white (no longer cream) pinstriped jersey. … As you’re probably aware, a team of MLB players is currently playing a goodwill series in Japan. The MLBers are wearing their regular uniforms. I figured the Japanese squad would wear their WBC unis, but instead they’re going with these beauties — with striped socks! Man, why can’t our guys dress like that? (From Johnathan Kaszynski.) ”¦ Here’s a 1984 Pizza Hut commercial showing White Sox players Carlton Fisk and Rich Dotson, with the “6/46” memorial patch for coaches Charlie Lau and Loren Babe clearly visible (nice find by Bo Baize).

NFL News: The Dolphins will be wearing mono-aqua tomorrow night. … Wesley Eustis reports that a fan at Sunday’s Niners/Saints game was told to remove the American flag that he’d draped over the railing of his seats. I’m assuming it’s because his flag wasn’t made by either of the league’s official corporate flag manufacturers (which are, of course, Nike and Bose). ”¦ Colorado state senators celebrated their new majority by wearing Peyton Manning jerseys (thanks, Phil). ”¦ Here’s a weird one: NBC hides little Wikipedia articles in its Sunday Night Football graphics (from Yusuke Toyoda).

College Football News: A recent episode of Big Ten Treasure Hunters featured this 1930s Wisconsin uniform (from Chris Flinn). ”¦ Friday is the anniversary of the tragic Marshall plane crash that killed all 75 people aboard, which explains why the Herd will be wearing this helmet on Saturday (from Brice Wallace). … Holy Toledo! That’s what the Rockets wore last night. I really like it (thanks, Phil). … New helmet for Oklahoma State. … Let no cause go unrepresented: Minnesota will be wearing epilepsy awareness neck bumpers on Saturday. ”¦ Arizona State will wear solid white this weekend.

Hockey News: An NHL spokesperson provided some additional info on those poppy decals that some teams were recently wearing for Remembrance Day: “The NHL permitted all Canadian-based NHL clubs to place a poppy decal on the back-left area of their helmets for the Remembrance Day holiday. Clubs had the opportunity to wear the decal for all games from Nov. 8 through Nov. 11. Participation was optional and not a league requirement or mandate.” … Reprinted from yesterday’s comments: Here are the sketches for the year’s Hall of Fame inductee plaques (from Rob S). … Blues goalie Brian Elliott wore a new mask design last night for Veterans Day. ”¦ If you want to see Bill Hay of the 1964 Blackhawks put on his equipment and uniform, this video is for you (from Bo Baize. ”¦ Paul, who didn’t give his last name, notes that the Coyotes have very inconsistent helmet decal placement, perhaps because of the different helmet models.

NBA News: The Raptors went G.I. Joevember last night, forcing the Magic to wear white on the road. … Josh Nolan notes that LeBron James began Monday night’s Cavs/Pelicans game wearing white sneakers but them switched to gray in the second half. ”¦ The ugly sweater thing has spread to the NBA, wheeee!

College Hoops News: “The St. Paul Pioneer Press is holding a ‘Munch Madness’ tournament to vote on the best neighborhood for food, complete with a Final Four-esque logo,” reports Daniel Schneeman. … This is awesome: a story about former Purdue coach Gene Keady’s combover. “As familiar and recognizable as any uni or logo,” says Jeff Ash.

Soccer News: NYCFC’s inaugural uniforms, as expected, are being made by Adidas. The unveiling will take place tomorrow morning in Manhattan.

Grab Bag: “Tennessee is pushing the ‘Power T’ for all sports now, not just football, and they’re also using it as the main logo for the school,” says Adam Ingle. “They’re also dropping ‘Lady Vols’ from all female sports except women’s basketball. This is due in part to Nike taking over for Adidas in 2015.” Some of the initial reaction to all this has been negative. ”¦ Here’s a really good quiz on whether certain retail chains do or don’t include apostrophes in their names (from Richard Stover).

 
  
 
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Comments (91)

    RE: the pictures from the Japan series games – What does the logo on the Japanese jerseys & helmets mean (and why are they different)? And does anyone know why the infields in Japanese ballparks are all dirt?

    I would guess the N is for Nippon which is the Japanese word for Japan. The A might be something akin to All Star so the AN would be Allstars Nippon or something like that.

    The MLB team did not play the Japanese All-Stars yesterday (11 Nov). They played the combined Hanshin Tigers/Yomiuri Giants team. Today they played Japan’s national team (the Samurai Japan). Those uniforms looked like this:

    link

    Pretty much – “AN” stands for “All-Nihon” and the uni set is a replica of the one worn by Japanese all-stars when Major Leaguers visited in 1934.

    The Japanese players look like a million dollars compared to the baggy pants Americans. Even the one high cuffed U.S. player’s pants are too high, right at the knee. I also like the white on the socks emerging from the shoes. It gives a stirrup like appearance without the discomfort but the socks should have one more stripe on them. Is there any hope the next commissioner will do something about the sloppy look of today’s players? (As well as drop the home plate collision rule, the DH, Inter-league play, instant replay, the Wild Cards and uneven schedules.)

    You can see the original 1934 “All-Nippon” uniform link. I wish the visitors could coordinate and wear the “All-Americans” unis too, but alas, this is a branding exercise for the Major League Baseball.

    White Sox video (with the patch) isn’t linked.

    I got an audible Motorola ad on the site just now, couldn’t find it to mute it. Don’t recall anything like that here before

    Why would Toronto going with the lame camo “force” the Magic to wear white? Surely they could have worn blue or gray if they’d wanted to, right?

    Perhaps super Saint fan was asked to remove the flag cuz it was displayed wrong!!

    If only! More likely, there’s just a general rule against hanging anything over the railing. Which clashes with many Americans’ belief that their attempt to display “patriotism” exempts them from the normal rules. (Including, as we frequently see in the comments here, the rules about how to display the flag with respect!) Flags have been the subject of litigation by homeowners seeking exemptions from community rules and even legal permission to erect flagpoles on property owned by others. Many state legislatures have considered, and some passed, laws that override private contracts or even completely erase private property rights in order to enable people to erect flagpoles. For a lot of people, a flag creates an extraordinary sense of entitlement. “I don’t have to follow the rules, because flag goddammit!”

    More likely, there’s just a general rule against hanging anything over the railing.

    (emphasis added).

    Yeah, that. The linked article, perhaps deliberately, leaves that possibility out. People tend to try awfully hard to be outraged.

    Many years ago at Shea I hung a sign over the railing and was told to take it down, because hanging signs over the railing wasn’t allowed. This is the most reasonable explanation.

    I’m a Patriot, so I’m going to show I love America by putting Old Glory across my windshield. People that crash into me are godless commies who hate this freedom-loving land of ours.

    I was watching that Cavs-Pelicans game and noticed that with LeBron’s sneakers, but I didn’t tweet or comment because I thought I remembered him doing this regularly in year’s past? I could be wrong though.

    As someone who pays virtually no attention to the NBA, I still get excited every time I’m reminded that there is a team called the Pelicans.

    I’ve only ever heard ack-wuh in certain bits of the Northeast and the Great lakes. Far as I’m aware, it’s ack-wuh if you’re a Bears or Jets fan, ahk-wuh if you’re a Dolphins fan.

    The “ack-wuh” pronunciation is/was used in commercials for a certain after-shave:

    link

    I say “ahk-wuh” (though I often incorrectly refer to the color the Miami NFL team wears as teal).

    “Hold it now and watch the hoodwink
    As I make you stop, think
    You’ll think you’re looking at Aquaman”

    ~BNL

    Anyone interested in the state of higher education, the scope of multinational corporate interests, the diminution of markets for local and small-business designers, empty displays of consultation, all wrapped in some prime examples of neo-hucksterist prose — here’s an excerpt from yesterday’s press release from the University of Tennessee:

    “… During this process, Tennessee athletics conducted a comprehensive branding audit that utilized the talents of the NIKE Graphic Identity Group. The results of a study conducted by the University Office of Communications and Marketing in conjunction with industry leaders in higher education branding were also examined, with both audits recommending the consolidation of logos and word marks in order for better branding consistency, with the Power T serving as the primary mark for campus and athletics. The final decisions then were left to campus and athletics, respectively. Tennessee coaches and student-athletes are aware of the final results of the branding study and the upcoming changes.

    ‘Following significant branding studies by both our University and the department of athletics as well as conversations with head coaches and student-athletes, we will implement the related changes that resulted from this collaboration on July 1, 2015,’ said Vice Chancellor and Director of Athletics Dave Hart…”

    “neo-hucksterist prose” is the phrase of the week. I’ve gotta find a way to work that into professional correspondence ASAP.

    Wouldn’t surprise me. I mean, the company that uses three stripes as its logo prefers you to use all lowercase to spell “adidas.”

    And then there’s Adidas, which not only refers to itself in all lower-case (and insists its partners do the same), but in its proprietary font whenever possible.

    Don’t sweat it, Rob. I’ve done the same thing several times.

    It isn’t just apparel manufacturers and certain teams. A certain conference always refers to itself in all-caps: “THE BIG EAST.”

    And The BIG. Still one of the dopiest … I don’t know – names, references, etc. out there.

    B1G, assuming you’re referring to that, isn’t an official name, just a weird branding thing.

    I’m lost on why the ‘Lady’ moniker is still accepted and used for women’s collegiate sports. It feels like a relic of the 1950’s and reminds me of when bars used to have ‘ladies entrances’. Not necessary and should be banished, IMO.

    I don’t really see the problem… you have to be able to talk about the mens and womens teams without confusion, right? If you just say that Tennessee won last night, it doesn’t tell the casual fan anything… so you have to specify if it was mens or womens basketball. Or… you can say the Lady Vols won, and everyone knows what you’re talking about.

    If you just say that Tennessee won last night, it doesn’t tell the casual fan anything… so you have to specify if it was mens or womens basketball. Or… you can say the Lady Vols won, and everyone knows what you’re talking about.

    If you say, “Tennessee won last night,” that’s useless in any case, because you could be talking about the volleyball team, the fencing team, or whatever. You’re always going to have to specify the sport — so you can say, “men’s basketball” or “women’s basketball.” Which is better than saddling one of those teams with a name that implicitly confers a lower status.

    1) When one team is “X” and the other is “X with qualifier,” the qualifier almost always implicitly confers a lower status.

    2) “Lady” is not, and has never been, a term of equal status in our culture.

    Has any defender of the practice of labeling women athletes by their gender ever argued in favor of also always identifying every male team as the “Gentleman Vols” or the equivalent? If so, I have never once encountered such advocacy.

    Which is to say, yes, in fact, “Lady Vols” is about singling out women on the basis of their gender and treating them differently from men. Overtly and deliberately so.

    As a matter of linguistics, there’s also an interesting phenomenon at work here. When a general case with a single noun gives rise to an innovation in form or practice, we typically add an adjective to specify the unusual case. Thus when women’s athletics was new, the existing teams of men retains the nickname and stays just plain “Harpooners.” But the new women’s team is designated the “Lady Harpooners” to distinguish the exceptional case from the “normal” case. The men, in this instance, being normal and the women being oddballs who need to be labeled as such. But sometimes the exceptional case becomes the norm, and the old norm becomes the exception, and the situation reverses. So once upon a time, a baseball game was just a “game.” When stadium lights were first installed, we came to specify games played after sunset under the lights as “night games,” because they were both new and unusual. Eventually, most games came to be played at night. So now if you play a baseball game after sunset with the lights on, it’s just a “game.” But if you start a game in the middle of the day and play it under natural light, we specify that it’s a “day game.”

    I’ve always been intrigued by the Southern California Women of Troy. You wouldn’t think being a citizen of the ancient Greek city would be gender specific, but there you go.

    Or is it that “Trojans” implies a certain quality that the womenfolk can’t hope to achieve?

    Louisiana Tech’s male teams are called the Bulldogs, but the female teams are the Lady Techsters. Someone from the school once told me this is to avoid any issues with the female teams being the “Bitches.”

    “Lady Popes is hard to top.”

    Can’t decide if Conn’s comment is more suited to being the punchline of an in appropriate joke or the final line of an inappropriate limerick.

    Either way, 5th-grade me is giggling.

    And editor me is grinding his teeth at “in appropriate.”

    Grindgrindgrindgrindgrind …

    Hmm, interesting.

    When I was at Hofstra, the teams were the “Flying Dutchmen” and “Flying Dutchwomen,” but when I called the latter’s games on WRHU I preferred to use the term “Lady Dutch” (two syllables vs. five). Our opponents were always officially called the “Lady Lions” or the “Lady Pirates” or, oddly, the “Lady Blue Hens.”

    I’m sure there were times when I simply said “Dutch,” “Lions,” “Pirates” and “Blue Hens” on the air. It wasn’t deliberate, though. I almost never said “Dutchwomen” because the word is just too unwieldy.

    I should note also that at that time, women’s and men’s basketball usually played doubleheaders in conference play, and we’d broadcast both games (usually switching play-by-play and color-commentary roles for the second game). I suppose using the “Lady” version of the names was a way to indicate to the audience which game we were doing, but the names of the players (“Betsy” and “Tonya” vs. “Joe” and “Demetrius”) did that just as well.

    I’m a little ambivalent about this; I’d have to give it more thought. I recall a few teams where the men’s and women’s teams had different names; if memory serves, SUNY-Buffalo’s men’s teams were the Bulls, and the women’s teams were the Royals. It just never occurred to me that there might be anything wrong with using the “Lady” version of the mascot/nickname for the women’s teams, especially if that’s what the university was using.

    It just never occurred to me that there might be anything wrong with using the “Lady” version of the mascot/nickname for the women’s teams, especially if that’s what the university was using.

    That’s the problem with so many sexist or otherwise marginalizing terms — they’ve had official sanction for so long that it’s easy to take them for granted, and people look at you funny if you question them.

    But that doesn’t change the fact that they are indeed sexist and marginalizing.

    In this case, actually, it’s probably a “we came first” thing. I doubt many universities’ first sports teams were female, so when those teams were created, they needed to be distinguished from the existing men’s teams.

    Obviously, there shouldn’t be an argument about _____men team names changing to _____women, though it is unoriginal.

    Obviously, there shouldn’t be an argument about _____men team names changing to _____women, though it is unoriginal.

    The obvious exception would be UMass women’s teams, who should be nicknamed “Dissatisfied Women”.

    Is it at all possible that the terms are meant to be merely distinguishing, not demeaning or marginalizing?

    It’s not about what it’s *meant* to be, Jay — it’s about the insidious, often subliminal effect it creates. And that’s what happens when one group (women) is consistently the one that’s always “distinguished” by the use of a gender qualifier.

    In other words, I’m not accusing you of having done anything nefarious when you used the term “Lady [whomevers].” But the use of that term was nonetheless part of a systemic pattern of qualifiers that do indeed have a marginalizing effect.

    Great video of Bill Hay of the ’64 Blackhawks putting on his gear… but notice that the player BEHIND him is wearing WHITE hockey socks instead of red like the rest of the team… but they’re not even Blackhawks white socks – they look to be Boston Bruins white socks that they wore later in the 60s!! Those white socks don’t match any team’s design in 63/64 or 64/65, not even Boston’s!! But they definitely look like Bruins socks that they wore a few years later! WTF?!?!
    (the player in question is John “Pie” McKenzie who was on Chicago both of those years)

    -Jet

    Adidas is the exclusive provider of all MLS jerseys.

    link

    It seems odd to “announce” that they’ll be partnering with Adidas to manufacture the kits, when they’re already contractually obligated to use them. But hey, publicity.

    Then again, Heineken is already a league sponsor but just announced team-specific sponsorships with seven clubs.

    NYCFC has to use Adidas for their uniforms, but they don’t necessarily have to use Adidas for their academy. And that’s the actual news in the release:

    “We are excited to partner with New York City FC and are thrilled that not only their first team but their Youth Academy teams will be wearing the three-stripes when they take the pitch next year.”

    Confirmation not only that the academy teams will be up and running next year, but that Adidas will supply the kits.

    The Heineken announcement was interesting in so far as Red Bull has resisted any team-specific beverage affiliation in the past, for obvious reasons.

    The lesson here is that MLS does not limit itself to player movement or rules when it comes to head-scratching decisions and announcements.

    I’m in such ESPN.com comment mode. I only glanced at your comment and just instinctively tried to come up with a defense of LeBron.

    I’m in a bad place, man.

    The Green Bay Packers’ website has gone full Acme Packers mode this week so expect them to be in their retro unis this week

    The Epileptic Awareness helmet neck bumpers make sense for Minnesota, as their coach, Jerry Kill, has epilepsy and has actually had seizures during games.

    Jerry Kill has previously promoted epileptic awareness by having seizures during University of Minnesota and Northern Illinois football games.

    Re: Not easy being green. Woke up to a discussion on NPR this morning about colors in nature. One thing they pointed out is that green is a hard color to do. So when you see a green frog that’s not necessarily a green skin pigment, but a combination of a yellow pigment with a blue physical attribute.

    Maybe Joe Raposo was onto something with that song.

    Nike’s Tennessee is undergoing virtually the exact same thing that UConn went through last year. Gone are (most of) the sport-specific logos (interlocking UC for men’s BB, block C for football, italic C for women’s BB…they only kept the fancy C for baseball). A near-total unified look for all sports teams.

    Why all the left wing hate? Not just the military stuff, but putting down people in north Texas and north Florida? What for? Are you the same type that makes fun of Olive Garden because it makes you feel superior? Why don’t you sprinkle a few Sarah Palin rape jokes in now and then? Do you feel you must have to have a certain number of political statements per post so that you can stay friends with the cool kids? Just report on uniforms, I agree with almost all your opinions on what uniforms look good.

    I didn’t realize there was a connection between Olive Garden and Sarah Palin, but you learn something new every day.

    I’ll make you a deal: I’ll run my website my way, and you can run yours (if you have one) your way.

    Interesting if the NHL didn’t apparently give the American teams the opportunity to wear the poppy decal.

    More NYCFC news; I submitted this for the ticker, but just in case. In advance of tomorrow’s jersey reveal, the club posted its link.

    I like it, especially the subway font. It’s the same one used by link.

    Why doesn’t Louisville just sew in actual underwear into those shorts? Isn’t that the look they’re going for here?

    UMass white at home – too far from the field to tell if they’re going flag desecration on the helmets

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