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Olympics, Football, & Thriftspotting With Wafflebored

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Good Sunday morning, everyone. Hope you’re enjoying your weekend so far. I had a pretty nice day yesterday, which started bright and early when I got up to watch the men’s gold medal volleyball match between France and my guys from Poland. Unfortunately it was over quickly, as Poland couldn’t overcome an injury to their libero (the backcourt player in the red jersey below).

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France won in straight sets to win their second consecutive gold. It was a nice uni matchup, and it was a lesson that V-necks are always better than crew necks.

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Switch to V-necks, Poland, and next time the gold is yours. I guarantee it.

Then I had to go out and mow, which I normally don’t enjoy. The weather was nice, so that helped, and afterward I got in a little kicking practice.

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That means I missed the women’s gold medal soccer match, which was a real Color Palette Special between the U.S. and Brazil.

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So nice to see clearly visible numbers, unlike the other American team that won yesterday. I also missed the men’s gold medal basketball match between the U.S. and France.

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That might be my second favorite photograph of the Games, after the famous surfing photo from the opening week.

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I missed the basketball game because, one, I went to visit Dad. That usually means the Pirates are on, but we watched preseason football instead. And two, even if I could, I just really don’t like watching games with stealth numbers. France looked so much better, in my opinion, except for on the scoreboard where it matters.

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Anyway, congrats to both U.S. teams for their victories.

The game Dad and I saw the most featured the Raiders at the Vikings. That was a matchup of dueling memorial decals, as the Vikings honored recently departed rookie Khyree Jackson with a KJ sticker on the back of the helmets. They also are leaving his locker empty and not using his number this season, and they’re paying the remainder of his rookie contract to his estate. Very classy.

The Raiders, already wearing their perma-memorial Al Davis sticker, added a 00 sticker for the recently departed Jim Otto…one of the very few Raiders I liked.

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The most enjoyable part of the game was…you guessed it…the walk-off field goal!

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As I was getting ready to leave, I put the Pirates game on for Dad. When I got home I saw this play.

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I agree. So let them bat, Manfred!

 

 

 
  
 

Thriftspotting: Montana Golden Nuggets

Now I hope you’ll join me in welcoming back… the one and only Wafflebored! If you follow him on Twitter/X, you know he finds a lot of nice sports-related items while shopping. Mostly hockey, but he branches out sometimes, including today. Let’s see what he found for us.

I’m not doing much in the way of DIY projects these days. However my time now seems to be spent going to thrift stores, vintage clothing stores, and other places in search of vintage sports treasures. My personal collection of interesting stuff keeps growing as the vintage clothing scene here in Vancouver continues to expand, with more and more stores opening all of the time.

Once in a while I’ll find something really interesting and noteworthy. Such was the case when I came across this spectacular Montana Golden Nuggets vintage basketball warm-up top in a store located a few blocks from my home.

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I know very little about basketball, so I had never heard of the team. But the gorgeous yellow, brown, and burnt orange colour scheme grabbed my attention right away, as did the stripe design.

JV: I hadn’t *seen* the team before, so this grabbed my attention as well! I’d. Wear. That. I had heard about the Golden Nuggets, though, because that’s where George Karl coached before the Richfield…er, Cleveland Cavaliers hired him in 1984.

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Some quick googling revealed this to be from 1980-81 Continental Basketball Association season.

JV: Here’s a color photo, which sort of gives you an idea how the uniform looked, and a program that illustrates the jersey details.

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Fortunately, the Velcro name plate on the back remains in place so we know this was worn by Phil Taylor.

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The interior tagging shows both the Sand Knit manufacturer’s tag, plus a second tag of the local distributor who the team presumably ordered it from.

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The top remains in excellent condition, obviously as it didn’t face heavy use.

The question here is how did it wind up in a vintage clothing store in Vancouver? While Montana isn’t that far from here, the likely reason is that vintage clothing stores buy bundles of used clothing from large wholesalers in the States, and this one probably arrived here that way. But where has it been all of these years prior to winding up here? We’ll likely never know.

If you would like to see more of my thrifted sports finds, please leave a comment below as I’d be happy to share more of the interesting stuff I come across.

JV: I for one would LOVE to see more! Hopefully one day he’ll find a jersey as well. The home white is very nice, but what I’d really like to see is the road jersey, shown on one of Phil Taylor’s teammates. And maybe he’ll find a jersey from one of Phil’s other teams: the very Sonics-looking Maine Lumberjacks.

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I want to thank Wafflebored for bringing back memories of the CBA for me. While I never saw their games, I used to be fascinated with the names of the teams you’d hear when the NBA used them as a developmental league before starting the D-League. I’d hear about guys signing 10-day contracts after coming from the Golden Nuggets, the Albany Patroons, the Bay State Bombardiers, the Billings Volcanoes, the Wisconsin Flyers, or other exotic-sounding teams. I often wondered how the teams looked. Hopefully as good as the Golden Nuggets!

 

 

 

And That'll Do It For Today

I hope you have a great rest of your Sunday. If you have time and you haven’t checked out Greyson Roberts’ article on Olympic Canoe/Kayak unis yet, give it a read. I finally got to it yesterday and I really enjoyed it. Whatever you do, take care, and I’ll see you next weekend.

 

 

Comments (25)

    I have on occasion gone up to Gravelly Point, just north of National Airport to kick field goals on the goal post there. Nothing like kicking with an airliner on final approach. Perhaps something to consider including the next time you are in the DC area.

    That would be great.
    Usually I don’t have much time to wander off on family trips, but I may sneak my shoes and a ball in the trunk just in case.

    Wafflebored, great find! I am surprised by the amount of awesome sports stuff in the vintage clothing stores around the city.

    The Montana Golden Nuggets warm-up jacket is sweet. Back when basketball warm-ups had some creativity and individuality. Got me looking back at CBA info. Did not know this. I am surprised to find out the Alberta Dusters were based in Lethbridge, and not Calgary or Edmonton. Not a big city that is known for having pro sports.

    When it comes to secondary pro basketball leagues, I have much more memory of the old, quirky World Basketball League. It featured a few Canadian teams. Of course, we are getting new memories for a secondary pro basketball league in Canada since the CEBL starting play in 2019.

    thank you Jim for this write up, it brought me a lot of joy on a Sunday morning, especially the straight on kick!

    Glad you liked it!
    I’m hoping to get back to an actual field soon. Haven’t been on one since New Year’s Day, so I miss real goalposts.

    Browns looked great in their classic all-whites last night! Combine it with the Packers’ traditional unis and it was a very good-looking game.

    What a great warm-up top! I haven’t found anything like that in the thrift stores around me, but I’ll occasionally come across some on eBay. I’d love to see more Wafflebored finds!

    You missed the Olympic Aussie breakdancer, who besides having dance moves like Elaine on Seinfeld, or Michael on The Office, she wore the Australian team sweatsuit instead of the usual baggy breakdancer clothes the rest of the dancers wore.

    The CBA had one of the most unique way of keeping standings. Teams got one point for every quarter that they won, half points for tied quarters, and 3 points for winning the game.

    If I recall correctly, they had some Veeck level promotions too, like “Win a Ton of Money” where you could win a literal ton of pennies (equaling a little more than $3500).

    That Alberta yearbook picture lools like they were playing almost in the dark and the flash photo illuminated the court.

    The Oshkosh CBA team was named the Flyers. Oshkosh hosts the annual “fly-in” convention of the Experimental Aircraft Association, a group of enthusiasts who build their own planes, at its county airport.

    The team name was the Wisconsin Flyers but played its home games in Oshkosh, thus the jersey lettering.

    The decal for Jim Otto got me thinking… Does Otto own the record for most zeroes/the letter O on a jersey? He’s got 10. The nearest that comes up is Adam Ottavino when he pitched in Colorado..he had 7

    An occasional thrift-centric feature from Wafflebored? I can get behind that…especially if what he finds and shares is going to be as great as today’s offering.
    “Wearing the Mark Moseley jersey during Saturday’s quick practice session” – I never picture Moseley wearing anything but the ‘Skins white-over-burgundy…go figure.

    It would be cool to track down Phil Taylor and give that warmup back to him. I’m all for some thrift store treasure stories. Some of us Uni-Watchers are avid thrifters so it might make for a good column down the road.

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