Twitter-er Daire Carragher just posted what I believe to be the first photo of the full field design for Super Bowl LVIII (shown above; click to enlarge). No real surprises, but there are a few details worth noting.
Let’s start with this: As you know, this year’s two Super Bowl teams — KC and San Francisco — also played in Super Bowl LIV four years ago. For that game, the Niners end zone design featured a retro helmet with the team’s throwback logo and an old-fashioned two-bar facemask:
As you can see in the photo at the top of the page, this time around they’re going with their modern “SF” logo.
KC’s end zone appears to be the same as four years ago (and in their two other recent Super Bowl appearances): yellow, with the arrowhead logo and the team wordmark. Yellow is such a small part of the team’s visual program, appearing only on the sleeve striping, number outlining, and sock striping — has any other Super Bowl team given such end zone prominence to a color that otherwise plays such a minor role in the team’s look?
I have to say, I’m not a big fan of having just one logo and a wordmark in the end zone. Since the entire design is centered, the wordmark feels uncentered. I’d rather see the wordmark flanked by a logo on each side (particularly easy to do when you have two clubs with such short team names), which would make the whole presentation feel more balanced.
As for the rest of the field, it’s the usual: the NFL logo at midfield, flanked by a pair of Supe logos.
Speaking of fields, the 49ers aren’t happy with the one they’ve been practicing on. Hope that gets resolved soon. Go Niners!
There was an orange end zone for the Dolphins in XIX. The titans had a baby blue one in whatever super bowl they went too
XIX actually marked the first of three straight games where one endzone was red and the other orange (XX – Pats in red, Bears in orange; XIX, Giants in red, Broncos in orange).
Pretty cool that they can roll the field outside. I know the Cardinals play on a similar field. Are there any other teams that play on this type of roll out field? I hope the Bears do that with their new stadium, then they can use real grass…
The grass tray allowing for enough sunlight to get to all the grass. The Diamondbacks, who have a way bigger roof opening than the Cardinals, still couldn’t get enough sunlight and decided to replace their natural grass with artificial turf a few years ago. That, plus allowing them to keep the roof closed and the AC pumping before the games during the hot summer months. In Chicago I’m guessing it would be harder to grow natural grass during the late fall and winter, with less sun and cold temperatures. Many fields now have the field heated, both natural and artificial grass, but that might be harder if it’s on a moveable tray.
The Steelers certainly use yellow more in their uniform scheme than do the Chiefs; they also have a yellow end zone when they reach the Super Bowl. I think the Steelers and Chiefs keep it for tradition’s sake.
If memory serves, the Packers began with yellow end zones, and switched to green in their most recent Super Bowls.
The Patriots had a red end zone for SBXXX1. While that was their secondary color, the uniforms they wore in that era were much more defined by being blue to me.
AFC & NFC Logo in each end zone. Boom, centered.
Exactly. Wondering why they don’t do that.
They haven’t done that since Super Bowl 49. I’d imagine it has something to do with wanting to present the NFL as a cohesive brand, and not two competing conferences. In general it seems like you don’t see the NFC/AFC logos nearly as much as you used.
It is also likely due to the fact that the conference logos have been gone for a while. Most teams have updated their wordmarks and it is undoubtedly taken into account how the wordmark would fit within the space of an end zone. Adding the NFC/AFC logos would mean the logos would be smaller, more blank space and less legible. The current wordmarks are made with this design in mind, at least partly.
Part of me would say that the yellow endzones are due to 3 of their 4 recent SB trips being against red teams. But they were 1-1 with the yellow endzone prior to playing the Eagles last year, which gave them the opportunity to switch back to red and they didn’t.
I assume the league wants contrasting color endzones. Though if that is the case, how was the decision made to have the Chiefs in yellow initially? As noted, with yellow being a trim color, I would think the Niners with a gold endzone or Bucs with a dark gray endzone make more sense since those colors feature much more prominently with their respective teams.
Paul, are you aware of how the NFL comes up with these designs? I fully agree the current template, dating back to Superbowl L looks bad with it’s asymmetry. Throw the conference logos on the other side of the wordmark like they used to do.
I do not know the backstory on the end zone designs, unfortunately.
The yellow endzone happened initially for Super Bowl LIV with the Chiefs, as they were using the throwback yellow endzones throughout the playoffs in 2019, as a nod to their Super Bowl IV winning team. The Chiefs also had used yellow endzones in their early Super Bowls, along with their home fields from dating at least back to 1968 (that’s as far back as I got the Chiefs in the Gridiron Fields Database), up through 1971, before adding artificial turf at Arrowhead: link
The Chiefs used the yellow endzones for their home opener in 2019, and brought them back for their playoff run. They kept the yellow for the Super Bowl. Since winning Super Bowl LIV, I think they’ve just stuck with the yellow at this point.
If the Chiefs had beaten the Patriots the year prior, I fully would have expected the Chiefs to use a red endzone in Super Bowl LIII.
The Vikings in the 70s had yellow end zones and they probably had as much yellow in their uniforms as the Chiefs.
As someone who has a lot of experience painting fields, it seems awfully early in the week to have the field fully painted this far ahead of the game.
What effect does that have? It’s got to kill the grass, right?
The darker colors will kill the grass, but the paint also tends to fade from the sun and wash off with rain as the week goes on. Most teams paint their fields 2-3 days before the game. They will have to go over it again before Sunday.
Especially with the amount of rain Vegas is getting right now.
They paint them early for the same reason Mr. Lukas did this article:
BECAUSE IT’S THE SUPERBOWL!
People always want to get a first look at that years Superbowl field design.
Prior to moving to Arrowhead ( when they played at Municipal Stadium), KC had yellow endzones. Not sure why, but they did.
I miss the Municipal Stadium field, with the yellow end zones and both teams’ helmets at midfield.
I would prefer team logo on one side and conference logo on the other. Keep the team name centered. Not sure why in recent years they’ve done away with conference logos in the end zones at the Super Bowl.
Up until this year, the past 7 Super Bowls have had the NFC on the right endzone and the AFC on the left endzone. Not sure why they changed it this year?
That is a good question. I was wondering if it had something to do with the team with the better record, but a quick review of that shows its not right. It’s obviously not a “home team” thing because that alternates…
“Since the enter design is centered”
Did you mean entire there?
Yes, thanks. Now fixed.
I really miss the teams helmets painted on the 25 yard line
I always loved the helmet and the NFC/AFC logos on each side of the teams name in the endzones. The one I never understood was Super Bowl XL and XLI with the crazy conference logos.
Me too!
It doesn’t seem they have the end zone messaging (End Racism, etc) they’ve had for the past two Super Bowls. Perhaps they’ll add that closer to game time?
90s era Chargers used yellow for their end zone in Super Bowl XXIX, at that point yellow was barely used as part of their visual program (except for the lightning bolt itself).
My assumption is they started using the secondary colors to contrast with the team helmets.
Reminds me of the times Coca-Cola has leaned into yellow to just break up their mono-red history.
I like the Chiefs yellow. Both being red, albiet a different shade, would have been pretty stale. With yellow being an accent color, seeing this much is a nice change. Chiefs COULD have chosen red, but then the Niners would have gone white or gold.
“has any other Super Bowl team given such end zone prominence to a color that otherwise plays such a minor role in the team’s look?”
Giants had a red background for their Super Bowl end zones against the Broncos and Bills, at a time where red was only used on number outlines, helmet stripe, and pants stripe.
So from Super Bowl VIII until Super Bowl XXX, the classic era of helmets in the endzone, every single endzone contrasted with the helmet that sat within it.
The “worst” example of this was probably Super Bowl XV, with the Eagles in a silver endzone because of the green helmet.
My guess is this is where the general tradition came from, but once helmets stopped being used in endzone, you saw a switch for teams like the Giants, Eagles, and Broncos to their darker shades.
Also, I LOVED the Conference logos in the helmets, but grew to not like them alone in the corners of “modern” end zones. Seeing “BroncosA” or “NSeahawks” kinda cooled that for me personally.