When people ask me which NFL team is most in need of a redesign, the answer I’ve been giving for years has been the Cardinals. And now, according to the gambling website Compare.bet, it’s finally happening, with the new look to be revealed later this month during the run-up to the NFL draft:
Your long national nightmare is over. The Cardinals will have new uniforms this season, multiple sources told me.
Official unveiling expected to be in the lead-up to the draft, which begins April 27.https://t.co/UwnCD7jysN
— Kyle Odegard (@Kyle_Odegard) April 5, 2023
The article linked from that tweet provides no additional details but repeats that multiple sources have confirmed the new uni set.
The Cardinals’ last redesign was in 2005. The makeover included a slight adjustment to their primary logo and a ruinously bad uniform set that looked awful from the get-go and looks even worse 18 years later. By now you know all the problems — the laughably bad pants piping, the weird black trim on the sleeves and collar, the awful side panels, the incongruity of an old-school grey facemask on an otherwise newfangled uniform, and all the rest.
I’m pretty sure they’ll address all of that. The only question is what they’ll replace it with. (You can see the franchise’s entire uniform history, dating back to its days in St. Louis and Chicago, here.)
Some fans had read the tea leaves on this one by noticing that Cardinals and Panthers jerseys were recently discounted on the NFL’s online shop, which is often an indication that new uniforms are in the pipeline. Now that the new Cardinals set appears to have been confirmed, that lends credence to the notion that the Panthers will have new uniforms this year as well. I don’t have any inside info on that, but I suspect we’ll be hearing more soon — stay tuned. (If you have info you’d like to share, feel free to contact me here.)
(My thanks to Josh Pearlman for bringing the Compare.bet report to my attention.)
Do we think they can limit it to only one black alternate?
Didn’t you run a cardinals redesign contest? Any link to that would be appreciated. It would be fun to revisit it.
I don’t think I did (did I?), but Phil did:
link
How is a gambling site breaking this news?
The writer, Kyle Odegard, used to work for Cardinals website.
Is having a red jersey with the cardinal head on the sleeve just to basic or would y’all rather have the state flags instead
If it’s me, I’m doing a modern take on the original Phoenix Cardinals set. Solid red home, white numbers, white helmet and face mask with updated logo they have now. Where I would give it some jazz is on the sleeves do a subtle sunburst by using maroon. From far away they look like the traditional, up close you see its modern. Pants would be white with a solid red stripe, or for accuracy could do 2 thiner ones. Then just flip everything for the road whites, but here using off-white or grey.
The Cardinals unis have been the worst in football for a while, but I’m not convinced what they’ll be replaced with will be much better. (“How could it be worse?” you ask. I give you exhibit A link and exhibit B link)
I’m hoping against hope the team returns to somewhat fauxbackish unis, but I have a feeling they’ll be more in the Falcons/Rams redesigns than anything resembling the really sweet duds they once sported. (link)
If I were a betting man, I would bet dollars to donuts the unis will, if not be primarily BFBS, at least have a full black uni with shiny black hat, like their current CR crap.
At least we can probably cheer the departure of the worst striping/side panel design in modern uni history. Perhaps that alone is cause for some celebration.
And other than the Panthers going very heavy on the BFBS as well (ok, technically they aren’t — but really, their colors should be the beautiful blue they sport, with only black for accents), I don’t hate their current set. Never liked the center stripe that gets wider and fatter as it progresses backwards on the hat, but for a team that debuted in the mid 1990s, it’s a design that held up surprisingly well over the years.
I’d also heard unconfirmed reports the Lions are redesigning. No matter what they do, their look will be improved 100% by ditching that monogray monstrosity (link).
Something like this for the panthers
link
Phil,
I wish the Lions would have paired the gray jersey with the blue pants. I think that would have been a good look.
Phil some of me thinks the lions will keep the all gray look as ugly as it is
The phrase “long national nightmare is over” implies they’re going to have a good redesign. I’m highly sketpical they’ll pull it off. Their current uniforms are abysmal though, so maybe they can improve slightly to hideous.
Nike will find a way to mess it up.
Such an attractive looking bird with gorgeous colors, it would take a genius to screw this uniform up.
If the uniform people would like some ideas, I suggest they check out the Blue Jays, STL.Cardinals, and the Orioles as prime examples.
They’re still gonna stink. Look at the Falcons.
The rumors I’ve heard is that the new uniforms will have a lot of yellow, with the new draft hat indicating this. I like the Arizona flag, but if they go that way I hope it isn’t just slapping it on the sleeves and calling it good.
Option #5 from your previous AZ Cardinal uniform mock-ups, please:
link
Maybe find a way to place the rising sun on the helmet, though.
Like the Bengals did when they finally redesigned after a similar stretch in their worst-ever uniforms, the Cardinals should keep the day-in/day-out helmet as-is.
Go minimalist/modern rather than full retro (though that would appeal to my classicist nature) or worse…”Full Falcons”.
Yes, even the gray facemask should stay, even if nothing from the neck down uses that color.
The Falcons are so frustrating. They have a perfectly nice retro design just sitting there, they even use it as an alternate sometimes! That said, the new set is still an upgrade from the previous set.
I won’t breathe a sigh of relief until I see that the new design isn’t BFBS, has no gradient, no truncated stripes, and isn’t BFBS…..it’s gonna be BFBS huh! Uggghh
No need to overcomplicate it. Red jersey, white numbers. Write Cardinals in white above the front number. Inverse for the away. That’s it. That’s the uniform. Don’t need to do anything more or less. The best uniforms, in my opinion, are the simplest. You can even keep the “updated,” logo. Just make the uniforms way less busy, a slightly updated version of what they had in the 90s, but maybe sans the state flag on the whites.
For the Panthers, I’d argue only change really needed is to remove the sash thing on the shoulders. So the main black set you have just black, white numbers outlined in teal, Panther logo on the sleeve. Again just removed the stuff from the shoulders, rest of the uniform is fine. Maybe pair the black helmet with black jersey and pants for 1 game per season and make it a “blackout” game. Life a MNF or SNF home game.
Rumors are strong that it will be a darker shade of red (closer to Maroon, which is great), with orange stripes, and silver numbers. Yeah, you read that right…
And now the Panthers are *confirmed* as well link
Apparently they’ll be “dropping silver” from their colorscheme. Which basically guarantees a black (and possibly blue) helmet in addition to the new kits.
If the Panthers remove silver from their color scheme, any game they have with the Jaguars will end up being the football equivalent of the Spider-man meme:
link
Hopefully the cardinals don’t mess this up, but they probably will. As for the Panthers, I actually don’t mind their look. And other than a few tweaks, they’ve mostly stayed the same since their inception. I kinda hate to see them change. And no silver? That sounds like a really bland uniform waiting to happen.
Most of the Broncos jerseys are also on markdown. Dare we hope they get something done in addition to the probable white helmet?
I actually don’t hate the Broncos uniforms either. Admittedly, it’s partly because their best years came in those uniforms. Weird, but that matters to me. But also because those uniforms were so different when they came out in the 90s. Ditto the Panthers. It’s a boring league when every team just does standard stripes. We need a few outliers.
I always loved the old school Cardinals white jerseys. The reds were too plain, but the whites with the sleeve stripes were classic.
I’d be satisfied if they just got rid of the black alternate and all traces of black. Not my favorite uniforms, but not my least favorites either. I wouldn’t mind a return to the Jake Plummer era unis.
My hope: maroon or white jersey with the bird on the sleeves and plain block numbers. monochrome pants with the bird on it somewhere. Yellow accents on sleeves are OK if it does not resemble the Chiefs.
My fear: BFBS monochrome set (with hard to read maroon numbers) and helmet with all the players loving it. Monochrome white with black numbers as alternate. Practice fodder.
Not sure if this means anything either but on the Philadelphia Eagles website, every jersey is on sale as well. Probably nothing to it but I found it interesting. They are also on sale on the NFL shop.