Good morning, everyone. Now that we have seen all of the Houston Texans’ new uniforms in action, I thought today was a good day to hand out some grades for the different combos they’ve worn. While I’m at it, I’m going to eat a little bit of proverbial crow…but only a couple of bites.
As you may recall, our Editor Emeritus Paul Lukas had very little regard for these unis. Many readers thought he was way too harsh in his criticism, which led to a follow-up post, which got me involved in a bit of a… discussion. Without rehashing all the details, Paul was insistent that this new set wouldn’t make it past the mandatory five-year mark. I put all my Monopoly money on the Texans keeping these past that point. Well, as we approach the home stretch of the season, I’m hedging my bet. Slightly.
Let’s get into the different combos, beginning with the first one the Texans wore: the regular blue helmets with white jerseys over blue pants.
Grade: A-
Points off for no TV numbers, and half a point off for switching to NY Yankees/Chicago Bears darker-than-dark blue. Otherwise, I really really like this combo. The number font is functional as well as unique, the shoulder horns are an improvement over the old shoulder stripes, and the truncated pants stripes with the Texans logo are pleasing to me. Almost a modern classic.
Then there’s the regular helmets with white over white.
Grade: A-
Ditto what I said about the previous combo. Same as the aforementioned Bears, I like the blue/white/blue and blue/white/white combos equally.
Next is the regular blue/blue/white combo.
Grade: B+
What do you get when you cross-breed a Bear and a Falcon? This. Many readers drew comparisons between this set and Atlanta. Rightfully so. But that’s Bears Blue instead of Falcons Black. In spite of that, and in spite of the same logo on the sleeves that’s on the helmet (we need more cowbell…I mean, more bull horns!), that’s a fine-looking combo. And there are TV numbers!
Next is the “H-Town” uni.
Grade: H…for Have to see it again
Yes, I saw it in action. Well, I didn’t see the game on TV, but I watched the highlights last night on my computer. Paul thought the red was as bright as a safety vest and “just too much.” I thought, a red that bright *finally* might be the first red bright enough to go with a mono-black uni. Ian Eagle called the game, and I respect him enough to think that if there was a legibility problem, he’d say so. I didn’t hear anything in the highlights, and I didn’t have problems while watching. Let’s pull back a bit anyway.
That’s about how I saw it on the video. Buffalo’s numbers clearly are more visible, but I don’t have any problems with either team. I’d still like to see this combo again before I enter a final grade. I will say that whatever grade I give, it won’t be an A+, because the “H-Town Blue” was drowned out in that sea of “BFBS” (Blue For Black’s Sake?).
Next we have the Texans in mono-dark blue.
Grade: B+
I have WAY more problems with what the White Bay Packers wore. This is a good mono-dark uni I’m seeing here.
Finally*, there’s the mono-red combo.
Grade: F
Up close it looks fabulous… from the neck down. Remember last bowl season when I said Oregon State‘s orange helmets looked like Tootsie Pops? These helmets look even more like cherry Tootsie Pops.
And that is NOT a compliment. I barely could see the horns that I wanted to see on what I thought was an awesome helmet.
As for the numbers, they look great *up close.* Pull back a bit, though…
…and you can see why my new hero Mike Tirico was justified in calling out this combo.
“From where we are in the press box, with these uniforms, we’ve had a terrible time this first half here. We’ve been trying to guess at some of the numbers and look at body types here.” – Mike Tirico on the Houston Texans’ all-red uniforms 🏈🎙️ #SNF #NFL pic.twitter.com/WjrmWxyc2b
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) November 11, 2024
According to SI.com,
“Tirico deserves credit for doing something broadcasters rarely do: He admitted he was having trouble identifying Texans players because of the uniforms they wore last night. Viewers always appreciate honesty from people calling the games, so props to Tirico for giving us the truth after he had incorrectly named players a few times.”
THANK YOU, Mr. Tirico, for saying what I’ve been saying for years on Sunday Morning Uni Watch. It’s nice to have someone with actual influence on a national stage complaining about the same thing this schlub has been pointing out with even worse uniforms.
If you think he and I are overreacting, check out the crowd in the last photo. See the fans on the lower left wearing the new red jerseys? Their numbers are a LOT harder to read than the fans on the right…and harder to read than the guy about ten rows back in the dark number 51 jersey. The discrepancy you see there is pretty much what Tirico and Collinsworth (and the statisticians and PA announcer) were seeing in the press box. As I’ve said many times, sell or wear anything you want, but the only jerseys that should be worn on the field are ones with optimal contrast from any distance.
*I said “finally,” but there is another possible combo. Paul shared this photo of the red jersey paired with white pants.
Doesn’t matter, because the red jersey is an automatic fail. Please, please, PLEASE bring back the previous red uni after the five-year period has lapsed. Or sooner if possible, Mr. Commissioner.
So, I have to agree with Paul on one thing: if the red helmet and jersey are gone in five years, it’ll be no surprise to us.
Jim do you think your grade of the red uniform would be different if they had went white number blue outline instead of blue number white outline
Yes.
I still wouldn’t like the new helmet though, but I’d give the uni a passing grade.
That you gave the Texans’ white – over – white an A- has me…well:
link
; )
I usually aim to please. With you, I aim to confuse. ;)
We’ll have to disagree on the Texans new set. I think they downgraded across the board, going from a uniform that was simple and distinctive, to a bunch of ostentatious doo-dads that make for a complete mess. The horn stripes look ridiculous and forced. The Lions are the only team that got the new unis right this year.
“The Lions are the only team that got the new unis right this year.”
They sointenly improved, but it’s the Jets who absolutely nailed their new take on their old uniforms.
YVVM.
Sorry, yes. The Jets did well also, although I prefer their Namath era look.
The Texans new unis are growing a bit on me, but their best combo by far is their home jersey with white pants and blue socks.
The H-Town and Battle Red combos are terrible. I can live with the red helmet if it’s paired with the blue jersey and pants, like with last year’s CR combo: link
The H-Town uniform will never look good. Ever.
The white jersey has made me a believer that this design concept has worth. That the navy top doesn’t mimic the white is a mistake. The midnight h-town thing lets down a great new logo by being too much of a novelty. Were the uni regular navy blue and again kept horns on the sleeves, it’d be fine except that it only exists to squeeze in that baby blue, so it would seem unnecessary or it would overshadow the standard navy set. The red uni should make those numbers white with a blue outline. With these changes to the unis I then suggest the following: one navy helmet (regular navy) with the bull head logo, and one white helmet with the H logo. With that set of options they could mix and match almost without limits.
Save for one thing: I can’t stand the number font.
Great assessment of the Texans.
I will be the first to admit I initially panned these because frankly, anything less than them marching out in Oilers uniforms with the bull logo was going to be a letdown to me. But as time has gone on I think this actually looks far superior to their previous uniform set. I think the darker blue is stronger perhaps because the numbers on this jersey are white. The navy on their old uniforms looked so drab. Maybe it was the way it was paired with the red numbers. But this shade of blue looks so much better.
The red is a complete dud. I turned the game on Sunday night and immediately turned it off. I’m too old to sit through through that.
Hmm, maybe designing uniforms that don’t make it past 5 years is intentional now? Unless you have a timeless classic look (Packers, chiefs, bears, etc.) you might get more merch money if you change things up a lot. Taking a page out of soccer’s book with new designs every year.
The H-Town uniform is the same navy blue as the home jersey, not black…unless you meant Blue For Blue’s Sake :)
I think it might be a little bit darker (it certainly looked like it when they played in them), but to agree with you: it absolutely 110% is not black.
By the way, isn’t the whole idea of the Texans’ uniform based upon the Texas flag and therefore should use the same blue???
Blue For Black’s Sake:)
So, basically you came back to double down on being wrong?!? Those red helmets are . To each is own. Kinda hard to take any analysis seriously from someone who watches highlights on their computer versus the actual games. Tirico was covering up for his blunders during the broadcast, so crediting him is bogus as well.
Well, personally, my computer allows me to have better than TV resolution to watch my game or highlights and I can freeze it Zoom it isolate images and get a much better look at replays (and uniforms) than simply watching my TV from across a room.
Tirico did not simply complain about the lack of clarity for uniform numbers, he actually said it’s because they were “horrible uniforms”…
I think the problem is that each set already looks like another team…Chicago, KC, Atlanta. H-Town? Who knows.
His actual quote was “We’ve been trying to guess at some of the numbers.” That’s complaining about a lack of clarity.
Oh yeah totally agree, I just also wanted to point out that Mike went even farther than complaining about lack of clarity, he said it’s because of “these horrible uniforms”…
My overall point was that Tirico never complains about anything so that must have really bothered him.
“those red helmets are fire!!!”
You would think there would be a prerequisite to test prototypes of any uniform change in a stadium from a press box.
They’re too busy pandering to the tastes of teenaged boys to care about pesky details like function and legibility.
The red helmets look like that because of the Texans’ whole “re-connecting with Houston” theme of the new uniforms.
They’re painted a “candy red” that’s ultra-shiny in an effort to reflect and reference the car and hip-hop culture of Houston, where cars are painted in a similar fashion in all manner of colors.
I’m biased as a day-one Texans fan, but overall I really like the entire uniform set, even though I had no problems with their previous look. I don’t love head-to-toe mono colors in general (although white jersey/white pants looks okay to me), so I wish they’d pair the red helmets/jerseys with white or blue pants, but overall I’m happy with the look.
Ultimately, what matters is what the team’s fans think, and anecdotal evidence tells me Texans fans are pleased.
Thanks Jim and Wade for filling in the blanks on San Antonio CFL…quite an interesting story!
As for the NFL Texans…they had good modern classics that looked and worked well, but they lost their way with the new threads. The B/B/W/B is servicable, but the rest is just too busy and so unappealing. Hopefully they regain their senses and overcome their inferiority complex to the Houston NFL club that preceded them and get back to looking as good as they’ve been playing this season.
The San Antonio Texans uniform in 1995 was their own look with the San Antonio-theme but also an evolution of the Sacramento Gold Miners 1993-94 uni. Keeping the white helmets, teal jerseys, white pants.
I wonder how the 1993 Texans would have done if they went ahead? They would have had Mike Riley as HC. He had been an accomplished CFL HC before taking the San Antonio Riders job. This would have been beneficial to the success I feel compared to Sacaramento.
The Sacramento Surge were WLAF champs in 1992 and for the most part were the same team that transitioned to the CFL as the Sacramento Gold Miners in 1993. However, Kay Stephenson and staff were not particularly experienced with the nuisances of the Canadian game. Gold Miners ended up 6-12 and last in the West in 1993.
They made the playoffs in ’95 though, whipping someone before losing to eventual champion Baltimore.
I would have liked to see the Riders’ brown carry over to the CFL, but I also liked how the ’95 unis kept the Sacramento teal and added burgundy.
That ‘one day’ helmet would have been easily been a Top 3 as far as pro football efforts go/went in the San Antonio market…not Riders or Wings good , but light – years ahead of the Texans, ‘Slingers and Brahmas buckets.
Paul was correct — in theory: these unis SHOULDN’T last based on aesthetics and functionality. But because the team is on the verge of consistent success, they will live well past their pull-by date, just as the Patriots’ gawdawful set has. Now get off my lawn.
What bothers me about the red Texans uniform is that the horns on the helmet and the horns and sleeve go two different ways
I get that, but my bigger problem is why add these details if they’re hard to see from a distance? If I’m sitting in the upper deck at a Rams game, I can see their horns with no problem. If I were in the upper deck at the Sunday night game, I wouldn’t know there were bull horns unless I looked at the scoreboard.
Grade F on all of them because they can’t get Stroud’s last name kerning correct.
That game last week was a very hard watch for me. I just couldn’t take looking at the Texans’ unis anymore, especially those helmets, especially the glare on those chromed facemasks, and I went to bed, with the radio on for the Lions’ broadcast, and listened to the rest of the game (and the beautiful Lions comeback) just imagining the Texans in their blue helmets and jerseys and white pants (and the Lions wearing silver pants as they ought to).
I dont remember the rule, but are they allowed to match the regular blue helmet with the red jersey and blue pants? I have done this matchup on Madden and it looks way better. I just dont remember how the rule works with alternate jerseys and helmets. Obviously I know it wont make the numbers more readable, but at least it will help a little bit??
No.
The Riders had a fiesta uniform that the Spurs would have been proud of as a warmup suit. As for the Texans, it is all a downgrade from a maybe unspectacular but solid and recognizable set that they had.