Getting the Red (and Blue) Out

By Phil Hecken

I’m back today with Tim E. O’Brien, who recently brought us his concepts for the new Brooklyn Nets and a makeover of the Oklahoma City Thunder. Tim’s been a busy beaver since that time, and he has a boatload of new concepts for the NBA. With the playoffs tipping off now, interest in the NBA is probably as high as it will ever be.

Tim will describe this below, but he’s noticed the extreme number of blue, red or blue and red teams in the NBA. Now, some of those teams are fairly iconic in uni-stature, so they should remain in their current red or blue iteration. But there are a number of teams who might improve their look simply by ditching the red or blue. That’s where Tim comes in.

Let’s see what he has in mind.

~~~

R and B in the NBA
By Tim E. O’Brien

No I’m not talking about this year’s All-Star halftime show or the Space Jam soundtrack (though, I did own it…), I’m talking about the duel epidemics in the NBA: Too much Red and too much Blue.

A while back, a few of us in the comments section noticed something significant. Specifically, how rampant red and blue are as main colors in the NBA. Here’s the breakdown by the numbers:

Eighteen NBA teams wear blue as a main color, that’s 60 percent of the league. Twelve NBA teams wear red as a main color, that’s 40 percent of the league. Now, 17 percent of the league overlap these categories by wearing both red and blue but with this possible Wizards recolorization leak and the assumption that the Kings are going to become the Royals again after their move to Anaheim, it is safe to assume that two more ‘red and blue’ teams will added to the league in 2011.

That would bring the totals up to 20 blue (67%) 14 red (47%) and 7 red and blue (23%).

That’s way too much.

In the spirit of diversity and individuality, I have commissioned myself to rid the NBA of (some) red and blue.

Now, I did come up with some rules. First, certain teams are iconic and wont be touched. Other teams are iconic but can be adjusted to move either red or blue to just an accent color. Next, teams can be rebranded but I decided not to contract or relocate any teams (with the exception of the Kings, because their move to Anaheim seems like a foregone conclusion).

With those stipulations set, let’s get straight to it:

Bobcats — (Home, Road and Alternate) — A blue team, the Bobcats uniforms take on the Marquette/Syracuse look from recent years and the blue has been replaced with brown (orange and brown is underused in the NBA). If they insist on their NASCAR unis, this uniform template allows a nice transition — (Home and Away).

Clippers — (Home and Road) — A red and blue team, I went back to their uniforms from just last year [not this new jazz] with a few tweaks: minimal blue, Los Angeles on the road and no blue alternate.

Federals — (Home, Road and MIB Alternate) — I know what you’re saying, “who are the Feds?” Well, I rebranded the Wizards because the fans hate that name and the organization is too timid to call them the Bullets. A blue team, I gave the former Wizards a very monetary themed uni, the Feds is just too good of a name to pass up for the Capitals team (and it has been pointed out to me that the MIB Alt looks like John Wall joined Slytherin).

Grizzlies — (Home, Road and Alternate) — Last time I checked, bears were brown, not blue. Replacing the shades of blue for those of brown, I kept Memphis’ uniforms pretty much intact.

Hawks — (Home, Road and Alternate) — A red and blue team, the Hawks have some history as red and blue, but their best history in Atlanta came in red, white and yellow. I got rid of the blue and went back to an old logo and an old stripe pattern (with some alterations).

Heat — (Home, Road, Yellow Alternate and Fuchsia Alternate) — A red team, the Heat may not have history with fuchsia, but Miami does. They may want to skip using their alternates though…

Jazz — (Home and Road) — When the Jazz decided to go to their new retro look, I couldn’t’ve been happier. Unfortunately, they three-quarter assed it and changed the original purple to a dark blue. WEAK. Real men don’t fear purple. I go the full retro and bring on the purple.

Mavericks — (Home, Road and Alternate) — A blue team, I tried to reduce the amount of blue while incorporating a (slightly) new logo and their awesome alternate jersey for this uniform template.

Nuggets — (Home, Road, Home Alt and Road Alt) — Nuggets of gold are gold, not yellow. And what’s more opulent than purple, the color of royalty? Certainly not sky blue. Hence my combo that throws back to an earlier time and logo.

Orange — (Home, Road and Alternate) — Another rebrand, the Sacramento Kings / Anaheim Royals (a probable red and blue team) are getting a new name: The Anaheim Orange. Fairly plain unis but pretty loud colors. Orange is a pretty underused color in a game where the ball is that color, just don’t miss my double entendre.

Raptors — (Home and Road) — I sorta modify their current red unis to go back to their “glory days” in purple (Paul hates me for sure ’cause of all this purple) with some minor changes and sans-black.

Thunder — (Home and Road) — My Thunder Bison is back (this time, with a Thunder Ball as well) and I renamed them the Oklahoma Thunder (this was a surprisingly popular request from Oklahomans visiting my site). And as Paul put it when the Thunder unveiled their unis, what is more idiotic than a team named the Thunder wearing the color of clear skies?

Timberwolves — (Home and Road) — Timber is either brown or green. Since green was already in the scheme, let’s make that the main color and push blue into the background.

Well, that’s it. Not too bad, right? A little more diversity never hurt anybody.

If you were keeping track, my tweaks make eight teams with blue as a main color (27%), nine teams with red as a main color (30%) and three and a half (LA Clippers are the half) red and blue teams (12%).

Much more reasonable, no?

Ok, now I gotta Fly Like an Eagle.

~~~

Nice job with that Tim! What say you all? Did Timmer nail a long-range three or did he air-mail a shot from the charity stripe? Somewhere in between? Let him know.

~~~~~~~~~~

Colorize This!

Occasionally, I will be featuring wonderful, high-quality black and white photographs that are just begging to be colorized.

Very small set again this week. It’s the G&G Boys to the rescue.

~~~

Leading off is George Chilvers, who begins with this tweak of Bobby Davies of the Rochester Royals. Terry Proctor, enjoy!

Early one this week.

Hope a few more colourisers get to work – it’d be nice to see others’ efforts :)

Best wishes

George

~~~

Next up is the other half of the G&G tandem, Gary Chanko, who took on the tremendous task of the 1913 Cubs. Check this absolute beauty out:

Phil

Presenting your 1913 Chicago Cubs. This image was a killer – 25 players, ballpark spectators, chicken wire everywhere…

One positive outcome though, the Cubs finished in third place behind my Phillies.

For those interested in the individual players’ names, you can find that here:

Gary

~~~

Moving along, we have a suggestion for a colorization from Chris Bisbee — Gary Player & Arnold Palmer at the 1961 Masters:

Phil,

In honor of the Masters I’m sending in this 1961 shot of Gary Player. Hope someone likes it enough to colorize.

Chris Bisbee

~~~

Thankfully neither Gary nor George were through. Gary came back with a late-week submission that is also drop-dead gorgeous. It’s called “Boys Of Summer, 1923”

One more submittal that I always thought was a great image. The B&W original is available on Shorpy.

Gary

~~~

And, not to be outdone, George came back with a late one of his own. A cricketer. Paul, eat your heart out.

Hi Phil

Here’s a colourisation of a cricket player.

The picture dates back to 1974 and is of Ray Illingworth who was a former captain of England. He spent much of his career with Yorkshire, but this picture is of him in his Leicestershire sweater later in his career.

The original can be found here.

Best wishes

George

~~~

That’s going to do it for today’s colorizations. Huge thanks to the G&G Boys for their supreme efforts, again. I realize that George and Gary have set an extremely high bar but the rest of you colorizers shouldn’t be discouraged — there are thousands of gorgeous black and white photographs out there just crying out for colorization. If interest is there, I’ll see if I can’t get a few of the colorizers to share their techniques with the rest of us in a future column — if this interests you, please either shoot me an E-mail or express a thumbs up in the comments down below.

We’ll probably take a week off from the colorizations next weekend. If you would like to submit me something, or if you would like suggestions (I have many B&W’s saved on my hard drive) please contact me at the above address.

In the meantime, we’ll leave it “open” — for any submissions — there have been several photographs featured in the past several weeks that no one has colorized, and if you need inspiration, visit BSmile’s pages over on Baseball Fever, search the Shorpy archives, or (if they’ve fixed it) the Life Photo Archives.

OK all you colorizers — show us what you’ve got.

~~~~~~~~~~

Benchies

by Rick Pearson

~~~

Back to the park for some extra hitting. Stay loose. Work on timing. Find…the zone?

And the full-size.

~~~~~~~~~~

Uni Tweaks

We have another nice of tweaks today.

If you have a tweak, change or concept for any sport, send them my way.

Remember, if possible, try to keep your descriptions to ~50 words (give or take) per tweak. You guys have been great a keeping to that, and it’s much appreciated!

And so, lets begin:

~~~

Up first is Christopher Burks, who has a cheesehead idea for the Bucks:

Hey Phil,

Here is a mock up of the Milwaukee Bucks jersey with a new Packers color scheme!
I think all of wisconsin teams should switch to Green & Yellow, Green & Yellow!!

Chris

~~~

Next up is Tim Moore, who has a Bobcats revision:

Hey Phil,

I’ve been sitting on these for a few months, but after seeing Charlotte’s NASCAR again alts the other night, I decided I had to submit these.

My home and away tweaks tone down the uber-modern current designs and add a bit of a classic touch. The alt I’ve created implements their already classy alternate logo into a simple and clean design.

-Tim Moore

~~~

In the three spot is Charlie Charnigo, with a J-E-T-S…Jets Jets Jets tweak:

Hiya,

Going through my Photobucket I came across this Jets uni I did a few years back.

No big long story, just hate the current logo, and wanted something unique but classic.

Thanks,
Charlie Charnigo

~~~

And finally we have Mark Peterson with a gorgeous Padres tweak:

Phil,

Never really understood the 1985 Padres logo treatment that was very similar to the San Francisco Giants 1983 uniform & logo change, but did a “What If” concept on how it would have looked of a 1991-style update to the 1985 set. Had to move the Ray Kroc initials to the right sleeve to accommodate the left sleeve patch.

–Mark Peterson

Thanks everyone. More tweaks next weekend.

~~~~~~~~~

Parting Shots

✔ After getting rained out on Friday, the Mets and Braves wore their “42s” yesterday, in the first game of a double-dip. Have I told you this is a beautiful uniform, but with NNOB, it’s even better. Now, if Larry Jones would just start ruppin’ again.

✔ The Mets also look good NNOB. But as Mark from Shiga is so fond of pointing out…those numbers are set too damn low. They need to be closer to the collar piping.

✖ There really aren’t too many times I’ll argue with lower leg stylings. This is one time. Pants are bloused too high, the rups are black (and 7″)…and DJ is wearing hi-tops. Just not a good look.

✖ I must honestly confess I don’t really ever read “Bleacher Report.” After reading yesterday’s comments, I doubt I ever will again. Apologies to anyone who took umbrage with my critique — I actually was under the impression it was a serious sports website.

✌ Everyone have a great Sunday. Peace.

~~~

Proving once again that at Purdue—as at virtually any other college campus—some kind of head is enough to satisfy most students. — Richard Pearson