Good Monday morning, Uni Watchers! I hope everyone had a pleasant weekend.
Week Seven of the NFL season saw the debut of the Packers’ new white helmet. Which also meant the Packers were going for that icy white look as the team asked its fans to wear white. They billed it as their “Winter Warning” game. It was so cold it turned the Packers’ center helmet stripe white.
It’s almost impossible for the Packers to look bad, and yet, they somehow managed it yesterday. Having a green/white/green helmet stripe pattern, when the team has gold stripes on the jersey and pants made no sense and looked completely disjointed. It looked as bad as we thought it would.
And in a pleasant surprise, the Patriots wore white jerseys with their silver/gray pants, which looked very good. Unfortunately, they chose to wear white hosiery instead of blue socks. The last time the Pats wore silver/gray pants with white shirts was a quarter century ago.
Here’s your full Week Seven uni rundown:
This game was never going to be particularly good looking, what with the Broncos going mono-white below the neck. And of course, you have the shade of gold on the Saints helmets not even coming close to the gold anywhere else. Still, everything from the neck down looked better than anything else the Saints have worn this year. I gotta ask though: what would you call that color the Saints are wearing? It’s almost like a Tennessee orange. And I’m okay with that. Just somehow get the helmet color to match and the team has the makings of a decent uniform.
Yes, those were silver/gray pants the Patriots wore yesterday! How rare was that? The last time the Pats wore silver/gray pants with their white shirts was 1999, two uniform sets ago. It’s a fantastic look, marred only by white hosiery, but I’ll allow it. The Jaguars, for their part, went black/teal/black/black, which at least meant there were no contrast issues. Even though they lost in the gray pants, I hope we see the Pats in silver/gray pants more often, especially with the blue jerseys.
Would you believe this is the first time all season the Browns wore their orange pants? They need to do that more. And thankfully, the Bengals went orange/white/black/white. For a game that could have looked like a scrimmage, especially for two teams with orange helmets, it looked anything but.
This game had potential. Imagine, for a second, if the Lions were wearing silver/gray (or even blue) pants. Woulda looked great, yes? But nope. Yet again, the Detroiters went mono white below the neck. That’s a terrible look made worse by stripeless pants. For their part, the Vikes looked good, but when paired with the Lions? Not so much.
Welp. The Packers debuted their white helmets and called for a Winter Warning and fan whiteout, for a 70° degree day at Lambeau. The Texans countered by going mono-dark navy. It wasn’t quite a Spy vs. Spy game, but the Texans’ unis almost look black. I will never understand why the Packers’ white helmets don’t have a gold center stripe. It’s hard for the Packers to look bad, but yet they managed to do so yesterday. Will the Packers actually see the bad side of the Five and One? At least the fans were into it.
Dolphins vs. Colts
Normally I hate the Dolphins in aqua pants and socks, but against the Colts, it’s probably their best combo. White socks for the ‘phins would have looked better, but it was still a surprisingly good matchup with their old-old AFC East foes.
The Eagles switched things up a bit this week, wearing black pants against the G-men. I’m not a big fan of that look, but at least they wore white hosiery. It’s not a terrible combo, and there is plenty enough black elsewhere in the uni, but I guess they wanted the black pants mojo (it worked).
We don’t get many overhead views of the Falcons stadium, but it’s a cool look when they open the roof. Anyway, the Seahawks broke out their “Wolf Gray” pants, and they are so light they almost look white. Sadly, there’s not much to say about the Falcons preferred home look. It’s just … bad. While I liked the Seahawks in gray pants, they’re so light that they should have worn navy socks for better contrast.
The Bills really do have a fantastic home uniform, especially when they wear white pants and blue socks. On the other hand, is there any team more in need of a redesign than the Titans? Between the two-tone “sword” yoke on the shoulders, to the pit stain “stripe” to the odd 45° angle “stripe” on the pants, there’s nothing redeeming here. The least they could do is not go mono white below the neck on a bright sunny day. The Titans have had this set for seven seasons already. Time’s up.
For a team with overall crummy uniforms, the Commanders continue to make the best of things, and the gold pants make a huge difference. And all the Panthers had to do was not wear Process Blue socks with their blue pants. White pants with blue socks would have been so much better. But at least the game was colorful.
It’s hard to believe it took until Week 7 for the Rams to finally wear yellow pants with their royal tops. And what a difference it makes. This turned out to be a quite pleasing matchup. My only real complaint is not every Raider wore black hose. Most did, but (like the Patriots), their silver/gray pants aren’t especially dark, so the black socks make a big difference.
They swapped home and road uniforms, but this was a matchup featuring last year’s Super Bowl teams, and it did not disappoint. The only folks who might not like this matchup would be those who don’t like the color red. But other than that, this one was drop dead gorgeous.
Oh, sooooo close. This one was almost perfection. I’m not sure why the Jets chose to wear white hose, but it was the wrong choice. The Steelers were honoring the 50th Anniversary Season of their Super Bowl IX winning team, so they busted out their ’70s throwbacks. I know some of you like the futura bold italic numbers, but I grew up seeing the Steel Curtain in their block font and gray cages, so this was a super-sweet look to me.
So who do you think made the Five and One? Read on to find out…
I still don’t understand why the Saints/Lions are hung up on those plain white pants? Especially when they play teams that wear white pants.
I really do love the shade of blue the Rams switched to. It looks really good in the sunlight.
I love the white pants are you kidding me they stand out the best especially Lions and Packers best all white uniforms definitely this guy who wrote this article is nuts no taste White pants are the best
Loved seeing New England and Seattle ditch the navy pants. Seattle looks great with the gray pants paired with both the navy and white jerseys, ditto for New England with their silver pants. Ideally I’d like to see the Pats with a red jersey to go with silver helmet and pants, but their away whites with silver as close as we’ll get for now.
I don’t see it, the grey pants barely stand out from the white and they just look off. If the pants were more metallic like the Raiders’ pants (and they wore colored socks) it would work much better. But those pants are too close to white to pair with a white jersey
Great to see the Patriots in silver pants – although the effect looked a bit washed out & that may have been the socks.
However, looking at the detailed shots, it really feels like they are missing a helmet stripe! I’ve not really thought that about them before, but I like the way the current unis hark back to the Pat Patriot era with the UCLA stripes, and one of the keys of those unis were matching helmet/UCLA/pants stripes, so yesterday’s look was just left feeling a little unbalanced.
(Actually – not much that different a criticism than the big flaw with Green Bay’s look!)
Panthers in the process blue pants made me double take to make sure this wasn’t a Cowboys/Washington matchup from yesteryear.
This can’t be serious… That process blue POPS. I was at the game yesterday, so maybe it was something about how it looked on TV.
We can send the WS uniform tracker to the printer — Yanks and Dodgers will wear their usual uniforms all games. No alternates. No BP shirts. No City Connects. No poopcrap.
Comme il faut!
Will the Dodgers wear the “Los Angeles” road jerseys or “Dodgers road jersey? Or both?
The Titans just need to go back to what they had. They’re the textbook definition of “It if aint’ broke, fix it till it is.”
Agree. The old duds weren’t great, but ooof the newer ones are TURRIBLE.
If by going back to what they had , you mean this :
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…by all means, YES!
Slap the current helmet sticker on there and BAM! Problem solved.
The Titans All white uniforms were smokin very nice loved them Alot
Sat down to watch Sunday football for the first time in ages, and I agree that the Packers’ missing helmet stripe, and all the mono pants/socks looks were by far the most distracting.
The only thing I disagree with here is that to me, the Browns and Bengals match up really did look like a scrimmage.
Agreed. The Bengals should have gone with white pants for this one.
GTGFTU: 1973 World Series Game 1: October 13, 1973 at Oakland–Alameda County Coliseum in Oakland. New York Mets (1) at Oakland A’s (2).
Game 2.
The whites were the Sunday jerseys, but they did not wear them in Game 7.
I’m not of fan of the Patriots striping pattern at all. They would look a lot better with blue/red/blue striping on the white jersey and gray pants instead of red/blue/red. It just doesn’t look good at all.
The lack of cheddar stripe on the Packers’ helmets is stupid.
The lack of stripes on the Lions’ white pants (and arguably the blue pants as well) is stupid.
And more teams should bring back striped socks.
On the down side, both World Series teams have sullied their iconic uniforms with ad patches. On the up side, neither stadium in this Series has a corporate-bought name!
White over silver will always look awful to me.
No way White over silver is way better looking your nuts Maybe silver over any dark colors ugly White pants are always going to be the best by far
I feel like I am usually in agreement with the majority on what uniforms look good on here, but I cannot for the life of me see how that Patriots combo looks appealing. To me it’s all very blah, and the socks may have been the issue with that. While watching the game I was already thinking the Patriots needed a new lid, the helmet and jersey just look like two mismatch pieces from very different eras, and the pants made it worse.
I feel like that Pats uniform is fading away as I look at it. Although the symmetry of the stripes is pleasing, I really want them to be red-white-red. Maybe a navy outline. to match the numbers and hypothetical socks.
I’ve mistaken the Texans for The Falcons more this year than any two teams I can think of in the recent past. I’m just gonna say it, and all you white over dark fans will ignore it, but sets like what The Bengals wore (white jersey/Black pants) looks like a day at the office in business drab polos over chinos. I like white over white or white over a lighter color at best ala Pats yesterday..
yes, Texans/Falcons mono darks are hard to distinguish at a glance now. It’s a shame the texans redesign culminated in their primary darks giving off the same vibes as one of the worst sets in the league.
I hate the Steelers, but I have to agree this is their best look. Scrap the futura font. Steel Curtain > Bettis / Big Ben / Troy. If you must have the black facemask, so be it. But the numbers just pop so much more with the throwbacks.
Hate the team but they do have a good look..
All dark uniforms especially All Black are super ugly
Agree 100% on author’s take on The Titans. Only plus of the newer sets is the helmet, which could still be a little more blue and less navy, especially after what The Texans did. I predict they’ll drift towards a more Oilers look with next do-over, which can’t come fast enough. Keep it clean and classic.
It’s close, but the Titans might have my least favorite uniform set currently. Almost every design choice they made with that rollout is just embarrassing to look at. Swords? Swords. Everywhere.
Wow, those grey face masks for the Steelers look really bad. I get that a lot of people like them for nostalgia, but if they were new now, they’d just be ridiculous.
I’m generally not a big fan of teams opting for the olde-timey gray facemasks – (the Colts for some reason trigger me…blue would be so much the better!) but it works for the Steelers on this occasion since it ties to the logo border color and their look for that particular SuperbOwl W.
Is it somehow possible they had to use the stripes from the green helmet? Only logical thing I can think of. Cowboys do a similar thing, where a blue/silver/blue stripe would make more sense and align with the pant stripe, but they use the blue/white/blue stripe from the silver helmet.
That’s it exactly. They used the same decal from their traditional gold helmets, perhaps for the sake of continuity. I’m not as worked up as (seemingly) everyone on the planet about the lack of a gold stripe. Their numbers are solid green (with no gold outline) so from certain angles it looked perfectly aligned with the rest of the uniform. I almost PREFER the gold-less center stripe as it offers a nice clean look.
Re: Steelers throwbacks
In recent years, when the Stillers have worn the block numbers, they didn’t look right. I’m thinking the thickness was wrong, or maybe the kerning was off. Or maybe it was simply the modern tailoring of the jersey. I don’t quite know, but they just looked “off.”
But last night, they looked spectacular. And count me among those who loved the gray facemask. I think it complemented the black, gold and white palette perfectly as their pre-1978 look.
-C.
Part of it was the context of the game, pushing the Jets around, but I think that’s the Steelers’ most intimidating look, which for them makes it the best look. Not so much a sleek Batman costume, just a bunch of tough guys you don’t want to play against.
GTGFTS: June 10, 1979
Dodgers @ Cubs, Wrigley Field, Cubs win (it pains me to say that) 10-3
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Looks like a miserable day! “57° F, Wind 18mph in unknown direction, Overcast”
The Packers all white looks like white corn to me, lol, I agree a yellow stripe wouldn’t have hurt.
I slept on the steelers grey facemask, not my favorite team but that was a good look. Loved the pats white on grey, especially against the jags best look. hope they wear that again this season.
Daniel Ekuale on the Patriots had blue socks which made him look better than most yesterday.
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Wow, blue socks definitely help the Pats’ look, and the overall color palette for the London game. Thanks for posting that, Sean; too bad Daniel Ekuale was the lone wolf in them.
Agree with all the comments made by Phil and his 5&1: Niners and Chiefs looked the best yesterday, but for me Washington and Carolina came close in all their dazzling colors.
I love the Niners the week before The old All white uniforms were great looking they should have them as a regular set definitely
Really a shame that the Lions are finally legit contenders but insist on looking like a high school team with the generic white pants and white socks.
Any game that features the Browns in orange/brown/orange/brown needs to be in the top 5. Doesn’t even matter who they are playing. Best uniforms in the league.
The packers of all teams ruined a week where could have had all eligible seven teams wear gold pants (this assumes chargers are still wearing gold tonight).
There were a couple Pats players that wore navy blue socks and it looked so much better
Sorry, Phil, but I couldn’t get through the rest of this after your first takes on NE and GB.
I’m a NE fan and they looked hideous on Sunday in white shirts with dirty white pants. And that was before the game even started.
And GB looked awesome as always. Yeah, matching the helmet and pants stripes would have been better, and I do prefer their normal look, but this was fantastic.
I just think there’s so much more to a good design than color choices, but I know we disagree about that. I’m waiting for inevitable name change to “Uni-Color-Watch.”
Maybe the Adams family (and we’re this close to Halloween!) is waiting until the new Titan-dome is finished to redesign the unis. But, yeah, even a slash of silver/gray would help their road kits so much.
Agree with you, Phil, on the Chiefs-Niners being simply the best for the weekend! Tonight’s Ravens-Buccaneers game has potential for uni charm. In the stream-only game, at least the Chargers will be in gold pants.
Green Bay, please stop messing with perfection.
Yesterday was Green Bay perfection them uniforms were great looking All around Omg my parents were like what team is wearing them great looking uniforms my Dad said there glowing They gotta keep them trash the road ones now gold pants Ugly compared to these smokin jerseys anyone that don’t like them is whacked out on something It just was the perfect look head to toe What a combo the White Helmet wowwwwww Number 1 uniform ever my Opinion
Bengals new All white uniform combo with the white Helmet is the best in the league And Eagles gotta stop wearing them ugly ass Black pants with the white tops All white uniforms are great what the hell they doing look like crap on TV All white please All the other teams are wearing them
The Chiefs always look awesome in red/white/red….. except for when they play a team with red jerseys. That’s when going red/white/white would be the better move for the Chiefs imho.
Ditto for the Bengals. They should have just gone orange/white/white.
I think all teams should apply that approach. I’d rather have mono-white to create high contrast than two teams with same/similar colors smashing into each other every play. Ah well.
“…what would you call that color the Saints are wearing? It’s almost like a Tennessee orange.”
The Saints’ older gold is not Old Gold–which is the shade of their current helmets and looks good except with this uniform–and though I wasn’t able to properly identify it, it is close enough to Brown Mustard that only the colorblind would mistake it for Volunteer Orange.
Someone in the comments section recently referred to that color as “brass”…I’ll go with that!
I think that was me. That was the best color connotation that I could come up with.
Dolphins should be wearing coral socks with those pants.
I’m wondering if the Falcons will ever wear red pants. They were introduced with this current uniform set but to my knowledge they’ve never worn them. I believe they went black/red/red back in 2017 in the Color Rush era. Would be weird to have that option and never wear them.
Washington is looking (and playing!) like the Washington of old. That game against Carolina was a thing of beauty. Personally, it’s my number 1 this weekend.
White socks are really killing some of these uniforms as mono white looks awful right now.
I was pleased with most matchups as the Bengals and Browns was a good one too as Browns look better in orange pants.
Lions continue to kill the aura of their new road uniforms with this trash white practice uniform they keep wearing. They got new uniforms that are supposed to celebrate the Barry Sanders era, yet they’re not even wearing silver pants with them. I usually like the Lions/Vikings games in Minnesota because we know the Vikings will wear their traditional home uni combos while the Lions would wear silver or blue pants. Yet, they messed this up with the white pants.
Two things need to happen, Lions need to start losing in mono-white soon or Dan Campbell who bought the white pants in, needs to finally go. Lions need a coach who prefers sliver over white pants. I think the Lions will ditch the white pants under a new coach deep into the future.
Packers all white is terrible, they don’t need white pants or a white helmet at all. Let me say this, though, I’m glad the Packers only wear white pants once a season. Something the Lions need to learn from.
I wish the Broncos wore the orange pants with the white tops, it’d look a lot better than all whites and with the Saints, can those stay as the regular home uniforms. It sucks they lost like they did in them because they’ll use it as an excuse to go back to ugly all black.
Washington’s burgundy on gold uniform is pure perfection as I salute Dan Quinn for upgrading their combinations unlike Dan Campbell. Yeah, I really hate Campbell for bringing in white pants to the Lions. LOL! I actually like Carolina’s new blue pants with the white jerseys, but the socks needed to be black.
I like the Eagles black pants a lot with the white jerseys.
My favorite uniform yesterday was the Patriots as it looked so clean with the silver pants. When you look at the Patriots current uniforms, they’re actually pretty good. The problem is the home uniforms need to abandon the mono blue look. Keep the silver with the blue tops permanently.
Seahawks shouldn’t wear white socks with the Wolf Grey pants. See this is the thing for me with silver pants teams, you don’t need white pants when your silver color already looks white. Wolf Grey pants should be with blue socks. Seahawks need to adopt their throwbacks as regular uniforms.
Dolphins need white socks with stripes on them. We need to get back to stripes on the socks. White socks aren’t bad with stripes on them when paired with colored pants.
I like the Jets all white uniforms just needs green socks, though.
Lastly, Raiders-Rams and Chiefs-49ers is pure perfection. Rams actually have good uniforms, they just need slight modifications to keep them looking less busy and they’ll be classics.
My only concern since most teams are superstitious that they don’t give up on perfect combinations due to losses. Lions keep wearing mono white because they win in them, but they’re terrible.
Are you kidding me Packers All white uniforms yesterday were the best uniform combo I’ve ever seen especially the White helmet The uniforms actually glowed Even My Parents who are in there late 80s were saying WOW what team is wearing them great looking uniforms n you are saying you thought they were awful you have no taste whatsoever N the Eagles ugly black pants gotta go They gotta start wearing their All White uniforms they look the best not them ugly ass black and green pants Dark colors just doesn’t look good on TV doesn’t stand out depressing All white look great professional Clean Nice Ther the best uniform combo with every NFL team Lions 49ers Falcons Saints Giants panthers titans Buccs Bills Miami Browns thriwbks Jets are smokin etc alll the teams So you need glasses buddy Packers All white uniforms with white helmet won the fan poll so it’s not just me
Off-topic, since I can’t find a contact email:
When did NFL players stop wearing mouthguards? This season, I’ve seen players with with guard strapped to the facemask letting it fly free during plays. I’ve seen other players with a small guard halfway in their mouth.
Has the mouthguard just gone the way of things like thigh pads?
And do they have them just for some sort of perverse fashion reason?
Last comment All White uniforms are definitely the best looking Combination in the NFL The Dark colors are awful terrible looking on TV depressing no class looks like going to a funeral not a Game it’s so unprofessional Trash them burn them Crap on them They Suck