Good Monday morning, Uni Watchers, and welcome to the final edition of MMUW for the 2024 season. I hope everyone was able to get to sleep a bit earlier last night than is usual after a Super Bowl.
So who saw that one coming?
First off, congrats to the Eagles. Sheer and utter dominance in last night’s game. I wasn’t necessarily expecting the Chiefs to pull a Brady-over-the-Falcons comeback in the second half, but it would have been a better game to watch if KC could have mounted even a semblance of a comeback until it was waaaay too late. I honestly felt the Chiefs were going to three-peat going in, but even before half time it was clear this wasn’t to be their game. But we’re not here to discuss the game — it’s about the unis.
In terms of the unis though, there’s not a lot to say — it was a surprisingly good looking game for the Superdome; I thought the lighting was excellent (and far better than it seems for Saints games). Both the Eagles and Chiefs have good-looking uniforms. I’d have preferred the Eagles to have worn black hose, and I prefer the Chiefs in white pants with white jerseys (which look incredible) vs. red pants (which still look very good).
As is usual for big games, players had special cleats they sported in warmups and some were, um, really bright.
Eagles standout Saquon Barkley actually sported a pair of silver cleats in-game. Not sure whether or not a fine is coming, but I’m sure he won’t mind paying it.
Most of the Super Bowl entertainment is scripted dreck, but it’s always nice when local bands and musicians are given a bit of the Super Bowl spotlight. And New Orleans, of course, is where jazz was born, so of course that deserved some exposure.
Not only were the uniforms almost carbon copies of those worn two years ago in Super Bowl 57, the fields looked very similar as well.
2023 (Super Bowl 57):
2025 (Super Bowl 59):
The 2025 image doesn’t show the end zone writing. As you can see, in 2023, “It Takes All Of Us” was in the Chiefs end zone and “End Racism” was in the Eagles end zone. Those were modified for this Super Bowl. Since 2021, the NFL has had “End Racism” in at least one of the end zones. However, “Choose Love” and “It Takes All of Us” were the end zone slogans this season.
The reason for the change, per NFL spokesperson Brian McCarthy:
The Super Bowl is often a snapshot in time, and the NFL is in a unique position to capture and lift the imagination of the country. “Choose Love” is appropriate to use in the Super Bowl as our country has endured in recent weeks wildfires in southern California, the terrorist attack here in New Orleans, the plane and helicopter crash near our nation’s capital, and the plane crash in Philadelphia.
One cool moment occurred when Chiefs CEO/Owner Clark Hunt, GM Brett Veach, and President Mark Donovan all posed for a photo on the field before the game.
If you’re wondering why that’s cool, it was clearly an homage to the great Chiefs coach Hank Stram, whose actual sideline attire included a blue blazer with a Chiefs logo embroidered on the left breast pocket.
Speaking of those early Super Bowls, I’ve always loved this photo of Chiefs quarterback Len Dawson rifling a heater and pounding a Fresca in Super Bowl I. Different times, different times…
Also — possibly the biggest surprise of the evening involved FOX’s new scorebug. Apparently everyone hated it, but I actually thought it was pretty good.
I could be doing something else, quickly glance up at the screen, and see the score, time and the teams were clearly marked. Everything was simple and legible. Down and distance and time outs remaining were pretty much the extent of the graphics. If you are one of those (and I believe there are many) who doesn’t like the new bug, what don’t you like? Maybe I’m missing something, but I thought it was one of the best football scorebugs we’ve seen.
One last note about the unis. Both teams wore SB LIX patches, of course. But I thought they showed up much better on the Chiefs’ white jerseys than they did on Philadelphia’s greens.
If I missed anything, I apologize.
You can see additional photos here and here.
And here’s something Paul would never show you…enjoy Jalen Hurts departing for the Superdome :)
The Super Bowl fit reveal 🟣@JalenHurts | #FlyEaglesFly pic.twitter.com/wM7FjlcWeM
— Philadelphia Eagles (@Eagles) February 9, 2025
What did you guys think of the Super Bowl? Did you watch till the end? In terms of overall viewing experience, how would you rate this game?
Of course this means the Eagles will never go back to Kelley Green full-time. I generally don’t like darker shades on uniforms – Navy that’s almost black, pewter that’s almost black, green that’s almost black…
A real shame, the Kelly Green and silver looks much better.
Every time I see a group of Eagles fans, it seems half of them are wearing Kelly green. This was true on Saturday at Elk Mountain – of the skiers and boarders wearing Eagles jerseys, about half were wearing Kelly green.
In which photo here, or any of the images you saw last night, does the Eagles’ shade of green look like black?
Their helmets almost always look black, especially indoors/at night
This one, for instance.
link
Domes make the Eagles’ colors look especially dull/dark. Like, that leg stripe starts blending in to one shade pretty quick indoors.
That’s fair. I should have been more specific. You can find photos in a variety of lighting situations to make any uniform look different to its actual colour.
The pants leg stripes (dark green and black) are nearly indistinguishable to my eyes
I despise the midnight green. It looks so dated, and frankly, I’m shocked it’s as popular as it is on this site. That said, I think we are going to be stuck with it forever.
The midnight green is dated, but not as much as the numeral/NOB font. If they could update that and make the wings/screaming eagle logo less cartoony, the uniform might look OK. Not as good as the Randall Cunningham-era unis, of course, but better than what they have.
Midnight green is basically a mix of black and teal. It’s less dated than pure teal, but still dated. It’s less black than pure black, but still an example of a team looking worse because they darkened their color (see Broncos)
The complaint I heard about the scorebug was the team labels looked really amateurish, since they aren’t logos but rather simple KC and PHI in team colors. I tend to agree with you. It’s not aesthetically pleasing, but I don’t need the logos. The simple format makes it really easy to gather all the gave info at a glance.
That was my complaint. It looks like if a non-licensed movie was trying to put on an overlay. Even just adding a small logo or using team-issued wordmarks would have made it pop without adding the complexity they were clearly trying to avoid
It looked like the font used for KC and PHI was the same font FOX uses for their logo. It was just too minimalist for my tastes but that is the current trend, making things minimalistic and flat. The Chiefs and Eagles logo would have been perfect with the arrowhead facing to the right and the eagles head facing to the left.
I could perhaps see there being a problem with two teams with roughly similar colors. Obviously green and red will be easy enough to sort out, but what happens when the Rams are playing the Chargers?
I cannot for the life of me understand the criticism of the score bug. It was big, bold, clear, and concise, exactly what a score bug should be. I loved it, and I hope they keep it.
I liked it too. It didn’t take up much of the screen, and it provided all the necessary information. I guess most of the critics don’t remember the old days when there was no score bug, and you had to wait until the commercial to know what the score was.
The Super Bowl is probably the only game of the year when less than half the viewers are football fans. It seems like an odd time to withhold logos.
GTGFTS: 1956 NFL Championship game, 12/30/56 @ Yankee Stadium, NYG 47, Bears 7.
Forget Brian McCarthy’s vacuous, mealy-mouthed gobbledygook. I think it’s obvious why “END RACISM” was deleted/supplanted this year. The question is, did the individual in attendance to whom this is attributable request or demand the change, or did the NFL preemptively defer to that individual?
Felt a lot like obeying in advance by the NFL here. At least that individual’s least favorite team won. :-)
Yup. I’m not sure who they thought they were fooling with that load on BS explainer.
**load OF**
Agree %100
GTGFTU: October 26, 1962, SF Warriors 132, Detroit Pistons 131 in OT @ USF Memorial Gym. Second game of the 1962-63 season for the Warriors, both home games but this was the first home game in San Francisco (first game was at Cow Palace in Daly City, three nights earlier).
*first home game EVER in San Francisco
Any idea why that Pistons player is wearing a warmup shirt on the court?
Great question. When Paul sent that photo, his first question was whether that was an NBA game, and if the player was wearing a sleeved jersey. I was able to find out the game and date but couldn’t answer him as to why the Pistons player was wearing what looks like a shooting shirt.
An educated guess, but said Pistons player either had his jersey stolen or it got misplaced, possibly getting left in Detroit. I recall the Sports Illustrated cover shot of the Bullets’ Elvin Hayes in 1978 with an exuberant dunk, with at least two Spurs players in the background and one with a Bullets road jerseys turned inside out. I remember reading somewhere that he had his jersey stolen, so the Bullets’ equipment staff offered that as a replacement. Also, Michael Jordan had his jersey stolen, I believe shortly after his return, and had to wear a No. 12 jersey. So, perhaps something similar happened to the pictured Pistons player.
It looks like the guy sweats a ton, so maybe that had something to do with it.
I noticed in the ESPN 30 For 30 doc about the Celtics and Lakers rivalry, that a Pistons player was wearing his warm-up during a game at the Boston Garden in the 60s.
Speaking of misplaced jerseys, Phil had a story on the Baltimore Bullets a while back, which showed him wearing #14 because his usual #10 was missing.
Whoops. I left out Earl Monroe’s name. Sorry
I like the new scoreboard bug! Great for my middle aged eyesight! It was a subject in my FB feed. Most we’re complaining it. Of course the same people had the usual gripes about the halftime show, Taylor Swift, and the how the commercials weren’t entertaining them enough. I think I have Taylor Swift fatigue fatigue!
Is anyone going to talk about the Jimmy Johnson AI tribute they showed yesterday? It showed Johnson and Jerry Jones wearing their NOB on their uniforms when they played at Arkansas. It’s reminiscent of the Dewar’s whisky ad that showed a soccer goalkeeper wearing NOB because the advertiser wanted to make sure viewers knew this was the main character. None of the other Razorbacks have NOB. And is that a black player wearing #72?
Personally, I don’t really like the new scorebug because it almost feels too simplistic.
I thought the score bug was great. It likely wouldn’t happen here, but if the two teams had logos that didn’t necessarily match their uniforms (I’m thinking of the Jaguars and Steelers), it might be harder to identify them based on the logos.
For me it was the size of the graphics and how part had color behind it and part did not instead of one uniform rectangle. It felt chunky. I get though that they’re trying to make a single graphic that works for those watching on their phone and those watching on giant screen tv.
I think The Eagles have great duds. The green is a little off and the NOB font is wonky but overall they flat out look good on the field. The Chiefs white over red set set is imo way overrated. Fries with that? They look like Ronald McDonald clown school. Hopefully they are on the downside of their dynasty era now.
I thought the score bug had great visibility, but I prefer logos instead of city names.
I thought it was a good looking game overall. I tended to surf my phone during commercials and was listening to music, so I can’t comment on the total home experience, but I had no complaints.
Do we have a coming NFL season with zero announced uniform overhauls? I can think of a few teams that qualify.
I agree about the scorebug. It does the job well. I love it. Color, contrast, clarity. I hope other networks copy it. I think people just had a kneejerk reaction to change.
I thought the scorebug was too blocky, flat, and cheap looking. It would be fine with a little polish.
I thought the game looked pretty good. Like so many of us I’d rather see the Eagles in Kelly but the Midnight Green has grown on me. Scorebug was fine, easy to see from across the room.. which is where I watched from. I paid more attention to host our family gathering (first in many years) than to the game.
Like Phil I thought KC would put on a better performance but whatever. I don’t pay attention to the commercials. As for the halftime show, I’m not the target audience but the younger ones here yesterday enjoyed it.
And we watched to the end. Jalen Hurts grew up a few blocks away from here so we slogged through the postgame until we saw him get the MVP award
I really liked the score bug. Simple, clean, told me what I needed to know. No BS. I realize that’s not to everyone’s taste, but to me it worked well. My only thought to improve it would be to have the background for KC in white with a red KC to match their jerseys and numbers. I wish every score bug would have colors that match jerseys and numbers.
I opted not to watch the game, as I just didn’t have much interest to.
Looking at that scorebug, though… it looks to me like they decided to use the Fox Network logo’s typeface. The aesthetic I would ascribe to the new scorebug is “brutalist”.
For the Eagles, even though I prefer and love their kelly green, I think their dark green is unique to them and I like it. I wish they’d have less black, and I’d actually rather they went with dark green socks.
For KC, I grew up loving the all white below the head, but I actually prefer the red pants with the white jersey. I usually like the pants to match the helmet when a team is wearing a white jersey.
The scorebug was fine, but it needs to be reduced in size by about 10-15%. As it was, it was jarring and competed with the action on the field. Distracting. -C.
I think the scorebug design was fine, if unremarkable. However, I was annoyed that the player stat updates appearing on the sides were almost exclusively Hurts/Mahomes passing stats updates, even on running plays. I went into the game curious to see whether Barkley would break the season rushing yards record, but I only found out this morning that he did because those dang stat trackers only showed two players’ stats.
I usually don’t complain about commentators (I like Collinsworth, Buck, Aikman, etc.), but Brady’s performance was truly unbearable. He struggles even in good games with lots to talk about. The game being over by halftime left him with only himself to talk about. Burkhardt, who I also usually enjoy, seemed to fall into the pit right along with him. A bad broadcast all-around by Fox. Weird vibe the entire night.
lol I’m on vacation in South America currently… sounds like having only access to the “ESPN world feed” with Mexican announcers turned out to be a blessing in disguise.
Chiefs management was also shouting “what the hell’s going on out there!” In those spiffy outfits!
They really struggled to matriculate the ball down the field.
It was 65 Toss Power Crap last night.
I’ve never been a fan of full-color socks. I don’t like all-white either (preferring the colored-calves/white ankles look of the past), but if the choice is full white or full color, full white looks better.
Also, I didn’t have a problem with the new score bug, except I wish the network had given us a few weeks to get accustomed to it. As for its large text size, I suspect the thinking was that the Super Bowl is watched by lots of people at crowded, noisy sports bars and crowded, noisy living rooms, with some people far away from the TV, so larger text makes sense, so even the non-NFL-crazy fans can sneak a peek from the kitchen.
The scorebug was simply too big and intrusive. I didn’t like it at all.
Since the Jets have gone back to kelly green, I don’t have a problem with the midnight green. I just wish the jersey and pants had silver in place of the gray.
Scorebug was great and easily readable! It did what it was supposed to do – convey pertinent information -, and without the fussiness of other iterations. It doesn’t require logos or team-specific fonts. It just needs to be legible.
Did anyone notice that “Verizon” was on the coaches’ headsets during Super Bowl 59? During the regular season, the headsets only had the NFL shield logo on it. Is “Verizon” going to be on the headsets moving forward?
Thanks Phil for a wonderful season of Monday reviews! I really enjoyed this year and the focus on the overall aesthetics of the matchups! Looking forward to next year!!
Thank you!
I miss the behind-the-scenes coverage of the Puppy Bowl.
I know, right? I believe Paul used to refer to that as a “cutegasm”. I would gladly cover it if they ever extend an invitation to me.
I found myself losing track of the down and distance perhaps because it was offset to the right or left and rendered in the same font/colour as the team name. Making the down and distance more distinguishable would have been preferred.
I don’t mind the eagles wearing white socks with white pants. They have the green helmet and jerseys with the white pants and socks which keep it uniform to 2 colors where the black socks adds a 3rd color. I don’t know what it is but the white socks trend is kind of growing on me especially if the teams have stripes on their white pants.