Since the Patriots introduced their new uniform set (Flying Elvis 3.0) in 2020, they haven’t had much on-field success. For the first two years (2020 and 2021), the team wore their Elvis 3.0 uniforms (blue jersey/blue pants and white jersey/blue pants) and those alone. After two mostly losing seasons, in 2022 they reintroduced the glorious Pat Patriot throwbacks, and for one game — against da Bears — broke out a pair of silver/gray pants with the blue jerseys.
Unfortunately, whether or not this was to be a one-off or not, they lost that game, and promptly shelved the silver/gray trou. Last year, they twice wore the silver/gray pants — against division rivals Buffalo (at home) and Miami (on the road) — and beat the Bills but lost to the Dolphins in those games. So, for the three games in which the Patriots looked like the Patriots, they sported a 1-2 record.
Whether or not the Pats had only planned on wearing those only twice last season, or whether they might have worn them more often, the team never revealed. But going 1-2 in them probably didn’t help their cause.
But what about this season? Will the Patriots continue to make them a one or two-game wonder again? Buried in this article on ESPN by Mike Reiss (you’ll need to scroll down a ways to Point #5 “Fashion Report”), is this nugget:
5. Fashion report: The Patriots have had internal discussions about possibly wearing silver pants (instead of the standard blue) for a game(s), which would give its game-day uniform a different look. But there is no confirmation at this time when/if it will happen. Also, as expected, the team plans to wear throwback jerseys during the 2024 season, with an announcement on a specific game(s) to come in the future.
This is kind of a cryptic quote. I saw a couple other sites interpreting this as a return to full-time wearing of the silver/gray, but I read that differently — to me, it sounds like the Pats are only discussing wearing the silver/grays for a game (or maybe two). But at least it opens the door to the possibility that the silver/grays will return again in 2024.
I know players and fans are a suspicious lot, so saying the silver/gray pants are “unlucky” or that the team doesn’t win while wearing them — while possibly psychologically valid — has no basis in reality. The pants have nothing to do with the team winning or losing. At best it’s a coincidence. And I think most of us can agree that the team looks 1,000 times better when they do NOT go silver/blue/blue. I’m fine with the team pairing the blue pants with the white jerseys…but if they’re going to wear the blue tops, the silver/gray pants are the way to go. It’s not like the team was doing a whole lot of winning in the mono-blue look either.
Let’s hope the Patriots come to their senses and make the silver/gray pants a permanent part of their wardrobe, and wear them with the blue tops. Sure, go mono-blue for a game or two, but let’s make those silver/gray pants the standard pants for the home uniforms.
If you’re counting, 2024 will be the fifth year for this redesign, so the team is free to go with another look for 2025 and beyond. It’s never too soon to start thinking about that either.
Your thoughts?
A friend of mine plays for the Patriots and I sent him a DM about their uniform preferences.
He said they (thenplayers at least) prefer the mono-navy look because it seperates themselves from the Tom Brady era.
Mono-navy is a bad look. But this justification is illogical. Why would anyone want to distance themselves from the greatest 20-year run in the NFL? That would be like the Yankees ditching the pinstripes because
Hunter, you didn’t necessarily imply this, but my first thought was that maybe they let the players decide what pants to wear. Could that be?
I followed up and he said that player’s do not have final say on jerseys or helmet options, but the veterans in the locker room do have enough pull to dictate “minor” details like pants.
Imagine Aaron Judge or somebody telling you that “we wanted people to stop expecting greatness and thinking about Mantle, Ruth and Gehrig so now we wear orange and green.”
Sure. Who would want to be associated with championships and glory and dominance?
The thing that separates them from the Brady era is , they have sucked since he left.
The Patriots beat the Bills in gray pants last season. They won 29-25.
Yes. Post now updated.
3.0 with silver in an improvement over the Brady years look. If they would complete the shoulder loop it would be even better. Same for The Colts
I really want that center stripe to be white, though.
Right? How’d they miss such an easy opportunity to make a more cohesive look by simply matching the shoulder stripe?
This iteration of flying Elvis would be perfect with gray pants and tv numbers.
Yes.
In fact, as great as Pat Patriot was, Elvis 3.0 with gray pants is (in my opinion) their best ever look.
Love the new font, love the blue, which makes sense for a colonial soldier (let the Bills be red instead).
I don’t mind them going silver/blue/blue in this set, but I really love the gray pants.
…because they wanted to make a clean break from the stodgy past.
Yes, definitely, wear your ugliest look while playing your worst football. Really makes a strong statement.
I believe pairing the silver pants with the white jersey for the Patriots would be a strong look as it would allow for the stripes on the jersey and pants to match which only happens with their all blue ensemble.
The siler pants look great and they should try them with the white jersey as well then the would look a lot like Dallas. Sometimes teams wear bad uni combinations and keep doing it because they had a few wins and maybe got lucky. The Jets did that with those ugly black pants a few years back and wouldn’t stop wearing them until they finally lost. The Browns also did that in 2019 with the color rush mono brown and even wore them on the road once in Denver and both teams wore colored jerseys.
With the Browns at least I believe it was the first Baker Mayfield game where they broke the 17-game losing streak. And they still had their crappy previous uni set so the color rush ones were actually an improvement. So it makes a little more sense that those became sort of a sentimental favorite.
They should really wear them with the white jerseys as well. The blue pants wouldn’t bother me as much if they added some silver to them to go with the helmet and the silver on the numbers on the jerseys.
The Monochrome look is bad-and even worse when the helmet is a lighter color than the jersey/pants. Growing up near Boston a long time again I prefer the “Pat Patriot” unis (preferably the 80s-early 90s version). Red pants optional with the white jerseys. Red pants were never worn with the red jerseys and never should be (Looking at you Chiefs).
I’m a Patriots fan and have been clamoring for this move since this awful set has been introduced, and I know I’m in the majority. Look at the Instagram comments of any post from @Patriots with a picture of a player in the home uniform…a striking number of comments are “SILVER PANTS”, “PUT AWAY THE STUPID SCUBA SUIT BLUE PANTS” or something to that degree.
It’s absolutely baffling to me that they continue to wear the mono when the fan sentiment is so strong and obvious. It takes it from a bottom 5 home uniform to a top 10, in my opinion.
If you can get in contact with the uniform decision maker in New England, that would be a fascinating interview.
Much better look than the mono-blue, but the red/blue/red isn’t working for me. It looks purple from far away. Make that middle strip white and we’ve got a winner.
There are times I look at uniforms and wonder who in the world can think it looks better than the alternative; this is one of them. The silver pants look SO much better. The mono navy makes them look like a minor league team imo.
I also can’t stand the silly “superstitiuous” rules people put on things like this. They’re 1-2 so they are bad luck? They have been terrible in the all navy…that makes no sense at all.
I think they should go with a modernized version of their classic colors and use the Brady era uniforms as an alternate.
Woah, Big News. Jets will be wearing Super Bowl III throwbacks (basically their uniform thru 2018) once this season!
Wouldn’t it be Flying Elvis 4.0
1.0-The first gen with first blue into red stripes on the pants and then with just a blue/red stripe
2.0-Shoulder flying Elvis
3.0 Brady years
4.0-This crap
I mean, technically it should be Flying Elvis 5.0, since the original royal blue jerseys introduced in 1993 had red numbers, which were removed for 1994, and then the sublimated stripes and italic font were added in 1995.
Because these changes happened in a 3-year succession, I group them all into “Flying Elvis 1.0” — maybe they could be “FE 1.0, 1.1 and 1.2” but still first gen, at least to me.
The silver pants with blue tops is clearly the superior look. All they’ve done is drawn a clear delineation between their dynastic era and their now sub-average rebuilding phase. Maybe that was done on purpose?
And my goodness completing those shoulder stripes all the way around seems like such an obvious improvement to make with this current design. I truly dislike any of these teams that go with the half-loops on the shoulders. We’ve been told there are some “limitations” to what jersey manufacturers can do with the templates they choose to go with but it seems this can be resolved by putting the stripes a little further outside the shoulder on the sleeve as some teams have done. This halfway done striping hurts the Patriots throwback look as well. It’s unfathomable that modern jersey manufacturers are somehow more limited in accommodating team designs than they were 50 years ago.
Silver pants should be the standard, both home and away. I do not even mind the striping inconsistency.
If you go back to the early 90’s when Parcells was there the Pats always wore silver pants but with a royal blue jersey. The silver pants had a blue and red strip. It was a pretty good look. There were no mono unis back then.