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[Editor’s Note: A few days ago I asked webmaster John Ekdahl, who’s much more golf-knowledgeable than I am, if he wanted to write something about the U.S. Open. I also mentioned that Rory McIlroy’s Oakley belt buckles made it look like he was wearing a transistor radio on his belly. From such humble beginnings came the piece you’re about to read. ”” PL]

By John Ekdahl

"What is that?" Tiger Woods once asked Anthony Kim, referring to the gigantic "AK" belt buckle the rookie was wearing in 2007. "Well, Nike hasn’t put my initials on anything yet", Kim responded. Kim is widley believed to have started the custom belt buckle trend that has swept the PGA Tour by storm in recent years (some also credit Rory Sabbatini). While Kim’s buckles have certainly garnered plenty of media attention (and not always positive), it was actually Jesper Parnevik who began wearing a branded J. Lindeberg belt buckle nearly a decade ago.

As buckles have become more popular, the major golf companies have gotten into the act. Generally, these corporate-branded buckles are worn by golfers that have full sponsorships. Paul Casey and Stewart Cink are with Nike, along with Michelle Wie on the women’s tour. Adidas seems to have the most golfers wearing branded buckles. Among them are Dustin Johnson, Jason Day, Justin Rose and Sergio Garcia. Puma has made a big splash with Rickie Fowler. Oakley has started to invest more money into golf, as anyone who watched Rory McIlroy’s victory on Sunday probably noticed. His playing partner that day, Y.E. Yang wears a Le Coq Sportif buckle along with his sponsorship.

There are some single buckle sponsorships on the PGA Tour. It’s difficult to estimate exactly what it would be worth (mainly because buckles are still a rather new phenomenon and most of the buckles you see are part of blanket sponsorship deals). Hunter Mahan has worn a Monster Energy buckle and a Hermes buckle, but now appears to have switched over to Under Armour. Travis Mathew sponsors a number of golfers, including Bubba Watson (although he couldn’t wear one in this outfit). Watson also owns this buckle made from $25,000 worth of pink sapphires and black diamonds. Lee Westwood wears a Druh belt and buckle, which is the same company that created John Daly’s custom buckle. D.A. Points has worn a Lego buckle. Luke Donald has a Ralph Lauren buckle that matches the logo on his right sleeve. Even celebrities are now rocking them on the course.

After Graeme McDowell’s win at U.S. Open last year, it looked like he might join the ranks of the big belt buckle brigrade when Callaway/Odyssey presented him with a sterling silver and gold buckle. McDowell ultimately jettisoned Callaway/Odyssey as corporate sponsor before he ever wore it, but in this interview Graeme mentions he does wear an understated custom buckle:

"House of Fleming in Atlanta do my belts. They do a lot with the guys’ belts, in a colorful way. I’ve got a great blue gator one that I enjoy wearing. House of Fleming makes belts for Darren Clarke, Ian Poulter and Lee Westwood. They do a lot of the guy’s stuff and have some really, really cool skins. I actually have my own buckle that the guy designed, it’s quite plain but it’s a classy looking buckle and stuff. There aren’t any big G-Mac logos or anything but just a nice classy looking buckle."

Ross Fisher sports a buckle with his personal "fish" logo which was designed by same company behind McDowell’s. It appears he has to wear his Under Armour one occasionally, though. Here’s Fisher talking about getting his personal buckle made:

"I was staying at Lake Nona the week of Bay Hill and went out to dinner with some of the guys and met Bobby the Bell and Rusty, and he was kind of designing belts at the time for G-Mac. So I said to him, you know, this is my signature, and I’m kind of known as the Fish. So what could you do? And he literally designed it then and there in the restaurant. I thought it was pretty cool and decided to go for it and asked how soon can you get it ready. And he got it ready about 13, 14 days later for my first appearance at the Masters."

Last but not least is the resident master stylist of the PGA Tour, Ian Poulter. Poulter has turned the outlandish golf attire he wears on the course into an apparel company of its own – IJP Designs. His website allows you to track his outfits and location day-by-day. And of course, his company logo belt buckle is for sale.

There are even some belt companies that allow you to design and produce your own custom buckles if anyone is interested is shelling out a few hundred bucks. It appears this golf fad might be here to stay.

———

Paul here. Nicely done, John. As for McIlroy, this is the belt he wears. Check out that ad copy — someone actually got paid to write that?! Meanwhile, in case you missed it over the weekend, here’s a really good piece about how golfers’ outfits are scripted by the athleticwear companies.

+ + + + +

Uni Watch News Ticker: The O’s and Bucs wore 1971 World Series throwbacks last night, but it was a mess. Too much bagginess and logo creep (sleeves, caps, pants, the works), not enough high-cuffery or whistling Irishman, buttons on both teams’ pants were the wrong color (a small detail, but an easy one to get right if Majestic actually gave a shit), Buccos’ uni numbers were sitting too low (but it’s cool that the batboy was wearing No. 71). I do love that old mustard tone the Pirates used to wear, though. ”¦ Meanwhile, Outmania hit New York last night. I believe that’s the first time the A’s have (a) worn a solid green road cap with a gold jersey and (b) worn their current gold alt on the road. But as Phil pointed out in last night’s comments, they’ve worn other gold jerseys on the road over the years. In fact, they’ve even worn them in New York against the Mets (although not with true gray pants like they did last night). ”¦ Also, prior to the game, Mets skipper Terry Collins had some fun by giving all the players Jose Reyes-style tams/snoods/skullcaps/etc. Not really sure what the point of that was supposed to be, except maybe to keep everyone loose (thanks, Phil). … Here’s a buncha shots of the new U.S. women’s soccer team in their new uniforms. “Man, is that black USA jersey even crappier than expected or what?” asks R. Scott “No Funnel Cake for Me” Rogers. “As a fan and a patriot, I don’t even know how to root for team USA in black.” ”¦ Boston’s Mayor to Nike: Your lifestyle sucks (with thanks to Trevor Williams). ”¦ Steve King asked Alan Hahn, who’s Newsday’s Knicks beat writer, if the team had any uni changes in the works for next season. Hahn responded that he hears there’s nothing in the works, which runs counter to what I was told by a source a while back. But keep in mind that many beat writers don’t consider something like removing black trim to qualify as a uniform change — they don’t think it’s a change unless there’s a new chest logo or something like that. We shall see. ”¦ Speaking of NYC beat writers, Larry Brooks of the Post is reporting that the Rangers will be in the Winter Classic, which is already leading to some uni speculation (with thanks to Matthew Robins). ”¦ In a very interesting move, the Rams are letting their fans vote on when they should wear their throwbacks. Also, note that the beginning of the fifth graf: “According to league rules, teams must wear any throwback uniforms within the first 10 weeks of the season.” That confirms the information I reported a few weeks ago. ”¦ Someone at the Cards/Royals series had a good idea, but sloppy execution (with thanks to Gary Streeting). ”¦ “I’ve compiled some photos from the Boston Public Library Collection that chronicle the 1930s evolution of the Red Sox uniforms, from their early white with red trim look to the look we’re more familiar with today,” says Steve Murphy. “I think it’s pretty interesting, even in black and white.” ”¦ What do you call T-shirts with NOBs and numbers on the back, like a jersey? Jake Fehling calls them shirseys, and he’s created a new site devoted to them. ”¦ Here’s an extremely thorough and in-depth look at the story behind Brian Gordon’s synthetic glove (big thanks to Thomas Boorstein). ”¦ Yesterday’s piece about baseball diamonds as viewed from the air prompted Calvin Farris to send me this collection of aerial views of Brazilian soccer fields. ”¦ The Predators will unveil new road jerseys this weekend. ”¦ I’m still calling it Rutgers Stadium. ”¦ In a related item, Brandon Vogel reports that a T-shirt vendor at the College World Series should be giving kickbacks to me and No Mas. ”¦ I don’t keep close track of college baseball unis, but Mark Lum says this is the first time in recent history that Cal has worn navy stirrups and gold sannies. ”¦ Great cover design on this Colts sheet music (big thanks to Bob Andrews). ”¦ When Notre Dame and Michigan unveiled their throwbacks, I was surprised that the Irish didn’t have special gloves. Well, that didn’t last (with thanks to Kyle Ostendorf). ”¦ Riddell is introducing a new shoulder pad technology called RipKord, which is basically a quick-release system to make it easier and faster to remove an injured player’s pads without wrenching his neck or spine. ”¦ Kyle Speicher recently visited Buccaneers HQ and took lots of pics of the various prototypes and other items of interest they have on display. ”¦ Hey, Chance Michaels and John Okray, have either of you been traveling in Hawaii lately? The reason I ask is that Brendan Shriane was driving around in Hawaii and noticed that someone had made an old Brewers logo out of coral (here’s another view).

 
  
 
Comments (181)

    I can’t speak for Chance, but I have been here in the Dairy Land and not in Hawai’i. Although that is something I would do, I would probably have made a Packer “G” with a proclamation that they were/are Super Bowl champions.

    Nope, wasn’t me. Wish I could claim that!

    I was in England recently, and did see a guy wearing an old ball-and-glove logo cap around Cornwall.

    Obviously, the logo still resonates.

    Also, is this the first time a national team (of any nation) has gone BFBS? Imagine if the Italian soccer team trotted out black unis? Ridiculous.

    El hey man, I’m wearing a Chicharito BFBS shirt today.

    …they were on sale and I couldn’t afford a proper Man United shirt at the time.

    There is no such thing as BFBS with regard to soccer kits.

    The change strip (or away kit if you prefer) is almost always in colors that are not part of the traditional color scheme.

    For example, Arsenal traditionally is in red and white; their change strip this past season was yellow. This coming season, Manchester United (normally red and white) will wear a change strip of blue and black.

    The black Mex shirt is their away shirt. Chelsea has had black away shirts at least in 07-09. The USWNT shirt in question is their away kit, not change. That’s textbook BFBS.

    Re the USA women black unis: take a deep breath and stop being so literal. Soccer has a decent tradition of primary strips not matching the flag colors.

    Australia (R,W,B): yellow and green
    New Zealand (R,W,B): black and silver
    Italy (G,W,R): blue
    Germany (Black, R,Y): white (even the alt is traditionally green)
    Holland (R,W,B): orange
    Japan (R,W): blue

    Furthermore, the black is the alternate strip. There’s even less reason for the color scheme to match the flag’s.

    But those are all historical colors for those countries. Black doesn’t fit with the US at all…ever. I’d prefer them to wear “dollar bill green”…

    link

    I was looking at this version, which at least to my eyes looks like the snake is black.

    /the black jerseys are stupid, I was just being a smartass anyway

    Besides, the snake on the Gadsden Flag was originally link. It’s only black on modern flags because Chinese factories are cheap and sloppy, and the American flag companies that’ve jumped back into the market since the start of the Tea Party movement are too lazy to improve on the crappy screen-printed imports.

    I’m not sure whether link is the work of a Tea Bag zealot or a D-Backs fanatic, but I love it.

    The point is that most countries have traditional sporting colors. Sometimes those colors match the national flag; sometimes they don’t. America’s sporting colors are, and have always been, blue, red, and white. In that order. My objection to the black isn’t that it doesn’t match the flag. It’s that it doesn’t match 120 years of American sporting tradition. America has sporting colors, like Australia, and black isn’t one of them.

    Black and red are, however, are sporting colors of Germany, who are (A) the reigning Women’s World Cup champions; (B) the 2011 host country; and (C) since 2002 the primary nemesis of American international soccer, men’s and women’s. So not only are the new black jerseys a mismatch from American sporting colors, they amount to dressing American athletes in the colors of our worst sporting enemy. It’s almost incomprehensibly wrong on every conceivable level. There is no imaginable aspect by which the black jerseys are anything other than an extraordinarily, maximally bad idea.

    I agree with everything you said – plus the fact navy is a traditionaly sporting color for the US makes black an even more ridiculous choice.

    The whole thing is disgusting.

    I am sure we will wear black as much as possible. It’s all marketing of course. They are selling warmups, sweats, and shirts in black. When the players were on ESPN for the live team selection announcement they were wearing black.

    In all of the pictures from training during the past week we are wearing black.

    Just this morning the US WNT twitter avatar changed to black.

    It makes me sick to my stomach.

    Just this morning the US WNT twitter avatar changed to black.

    So it’s no longer the US national team. It’s the Nike corporate team. I might have to root for Canada, England, or Norway instead.

    No if it was the Nike corporate team they’d be black with that neon yellow trim.

    I think these are even worse than Mexico’s BFBS piece of shit uni’s, because at least those had red and green and somewhat looked like, well, Mexico. Black and red looks straight up like Germany. They look like futuristic German nurses.

    Strip? What is ya, some kinda furriner? In America, that’s something we do, not something we wear.

    In a parallel universe where the Bucs keep Bucco Bruce, that silver helmet with just the skull & crossed swords logo would have made a decent Raiders update.

    My thoughts exactly. Although I liked the look, it was too close to the Raider look.

    Nonetheless, great pics. Interesting to see the process the Bucs went through to get their current logo/uni set.

    That is the first time I have ever seen the A’s wear gold jerseys with grey pants and that goes back to the 1980s. The white pants look better with the gold.

    Funny, but Cal wore grey pants with gold jerseys yesterday too. They wore white pants with gold jerseys on Sunday and were the visiting team in both games.

    The gray pants look like crap with the yellow jersey. The white-home/grey-road “rule” does not need to be followed when you’re wearing colored jerseys.

    I have to agree. I thought the Grey with Gold looked great, but I think black shooes would be even better.

    Yellow and gray is one of the absolute best two-color combinations out there. It’s the green that makes it just a bit inelegant in the A’s case. But even so, it’s still a great look. I’m usually a bit of a stuck-in-the-mud about baseball unis, but there are a few solid-color jerseys I could accept becoming a team’s full-time uni, and this is one of them.

    And speaking of gold, that Pirates cap is also a thing of extraordinary beauty. If Pitty won’t bring back the pillbox, at least bring back the gold cap.

    Uproar in regards to the shoes, I mean. I agree on it being a full-time road jersey too. Looks greats with the green/gold stirrups/sannies combo, but I love the A’s current home uni. Green and white is gorgeous

    Teams did not start wearing colored jerseys with gray pants until the early 1980s. Cleveland (1983) and the Mets (1982) were the first teams I saw do it.

    The A’s wore their green jerseys with gray pants a lot in the early 1980s and I recall seeing Dave Stewart pitch for the first time in that uniform. But I never saw the A’s wear gold jerseys with gray pants; they only wore them with white pants. After 1986 they got rid of the gold jerseys utnil this year.

    I have an informal rule that the pants should always be equal to or lighter than the jersey. Something looks “off” when the shirt is lighter than the trousers.

    It’s a good rule. But is gray lighter than gold or vice-versa? I don’t know.

    Oakland’s home white on white uni is still the best in baseball in my opinion. I’ve never been a fan of stirrups worn with any color ‘sanny’ other than white.

    The Pirates and Orioles should have worn throwback helmets too. The new helmets just mess it all up.

    Did anyone else catch the fact that the Orioles sleeve stripes were incorrect? They were upside down. Should have matched the pants. It is also wrong on the Dressed to the Nines site.

    I imagine no one else caught it because I was wrong…dead wrong. Looks like this poor guy got a jersey that wasn’t quite 1971 WS game used.

    link

    The Pirates did wear the black batting helmets in 1970, the first half season for the mustard uniforms before switching over to the style which matched the hat.

    Overall, the ’71 throwbacks worked well, and were certainly a major upgrade over the ’79 throwbacks. The size of the team name was perfect, along with the banding on the sleeves. I didn’t notice the front uniform number being significantly lower than the real thing, the back number looked great.

    Interesting. Didn’t know that.

    Of course, last night was not a 1970 throwback game.

    I’m hopeful there will be something done for the 40th anniversary of the Bicentennial, so we can see the Bucs with the mustard pillbox hat and those unis against another NL team who occasionally wore pillbox hats in ’76.

    Obviously, the Pirates wore that style 100% of the time in ’76, guess we’ll never know which NL team came in second.

    Didn’t the Cardinals wear them that entire season, even adding three white circles to their batting helmets?

    The 40th anniversary of the Bicentennial?
    Well, yes, I know that’s traditional, but why not just wait 60 more years and celebrate the Centennial of the Bicentennial?

    ;)

    That would be interesting if the Cards were the other team to wear pillbox hats on a more than occasional basis. Last time this subject was broached, I thought the consensus was that teams like the Cards, Phillies, Mets, only wore the pillboxes rarely in ’76.

    Thinking back, it’s difficult to remember, since only NBC had the game of the week, with ABC having Monday Night Baseball.

    Oops, need to finish my thought on that last post.

    Talking about the scarcity of televised games in 1976, and the Cardinals having a bad year(5th place), I don’t recall seeing the Cards in the field with those hats.

    It would be helpful to hear from a diehard Cards fan on this matter.

    Well, pretty much no one outside the Cardinals organization or the photo desk editors at the wire services saw what the Cardinals wore every game in 1976.

    But, as a uni-concerned baseball fan, it was my impression that the Cardinals and Pirates wore the pillboxes all season, and that they were the only teams to do so.

    That is to say, during the year I never saw a photo or highlight that showed them NOT wearing them.

    That’s been my contention with the entire throwback thing in MLB from the beginning. If you’re going to go all in for the uni, spend the extra cash and do it right (with the helmets).

    It’s not like they couldn’t auction them off, or even use them for the next throw back game.

    … and have won 6 in a row in them (including the first on the road last night) — after losing 13 of 14.

    I expect they’d wear ’em with pink pants at the moment — at least until they lose. Paul: maybe worth a call to everyone’s favorite equip manager to confirm?

    Kinda disturbing that someone could take a picture of you while you’re at the urinal. Decent thing to do would be to wait for Mr. Buthols to finish his biz, then ask him if you can take a picture.

    I want to see a golfer bust out the COCKY belt buckle like David Boreanaz on Bones

    Re; Boston Mayor Tom Menino takes on Nike T-shirt window display:

    “..T-shirts that combine ‘Just Do It’ ‘Get High’ with pictures of pill bottles are a more than unfortunate twist on your corporate slogan, and I urge you to remove them,” he wrote.

    In a statement, a Nike spokeswoman said the company doesn’t condone the use of banned or illegal substances.

    “These T-shirts are part of an action sports campaign, featuring marquee athletes using commonly used and accepted expressions for performance at the highest level of their sport, be it surfing, skateboarding or BMX,” the statement said.

    I would have liked to sit at the table where the damage-controllers hammered together that “statement” issued by that “spokeswoman.” My favorite part is the insinuation that fossilized losers who don’t know shit about “action sports” and who are totally clueless about “accepted expressions” are in no position to judge a marketing campaign. How much does that spokeswoman make per year?

    My first thought was that these were fake, and the store was caught selling counterfeit shirts. The fact that this is being spun as an “action sports” campaign is just incredible.

    Oh, what will those crazy Oregonians do next? A Nike line of performance enhancing supplements? Legal of course, because it has the swoosh on it.

    Ironic moment of the day thanks to Oakley . . .

    From the Oakley belt buckle web page:
    “. . .and we went ballistic with color options to let you embrace style with a chokehold.”

    The only colors listed for sale are white and black.

    “Any customer can have a car painted any colour that he wants so long as it is black.” – Henry Ford

    Hey Paul–

    Forgive me if this was already posted, but did you see this chart on the Bruins bar tab: link

    I’m not sure which is more depressing: all the Red Bull, or all the Bud Light.

    The big question: Who ordered the one cognac?

    What really confuses me is why so much Bud Light specifically?

    I mean… no Miller Lite, Coors Light, etc.

    Yeah, its all crap beer… but I’m just curious why such an affinity to one brand?

    wait…am i reading this wrong or on the next to the last line is there ONE bottle (must be champagne) that costs $100,000?

    wtf?

    nope you are reading that correct. and they, or at least Zdeno Chara, drank it out of the cup

    There’s a great story about the time Lenny Dykstra (pre-Wall Street days but with hints of major assholery already quite apparent) went to a French restaurant and ordered an impossibly expensive bottle of dessert wine. The whole thing is even funnier/sadder based on what we now know about Nails:
    link

    That’s just depressing. They’ve just achieved the pinnacle of their career, they’ve got a $150,000 open bar, and there were exactly 6 drinks worth drinking consumed in the entire night. And that’s being generous; Patron Silver is good tequila and all, but it’s wasted on a shot, and that’s how it looks like it was drunk. You’ve just won the Stanley Cup; at least order the reposado, you know?

    The banality of the choices bugs me much more than the excess. If you’re gonna live a little, then savor it. Don’t just order twice as much of the same old crap that you’d have on a normal night out. And I get that you’re celebrating something so special that you probably aren’t in like a connoisseur moment, but just because a 64-year-old single malt would be wasted on you at that exact second, it doesn’t mean you have to settle for Crown Royal. (Even if it was the XR, which at $300 a bottle, I sure hope it was.)

    To this drinker, Vancouver’s Stanley Cup reaction suddenly looks a lot classier by comparison. ;-)

    When I saw “Pyrat” on the receipt, I thought it was a misspelling of link and I was mildly hopeful until I realized that it probably was actually Pyrat rum.

    That’s fine, I guess. But I’m really not much of a rum drinker anymore.

    Pyrat is a stupid “lifestyle” bottling by the folks behind Patron, but it’s actually pretty decent sipping rum. I wouldn’t mix it in anything, and there are far better sipping rums out there at the same (or lower) price point, but at least it’s not both a stupid “lifestyle” product and bad. That shot of Pyrat made my list of the 6 worth-drinking entries on the list.

    I’d have a lot more respect for them if those were all straight shots of Jagermeister, and not Jager bombs. At least five guys (or one guy five times) got it right.

    These are, after all, hockey players. I’m thinking the goal of this outing wasn’t to savor the quality of the spirits consumed.

    They ordered $150K worth of booze and got ONE bottle of champagne comped?! Wow, tough bar.

    I will once again point out that throwbacks tend to be made baggier than normal uniforms. It’s like the people at Majestic don’t get it that just because most people who buy throwback jerseys want them in an oversized, baggy cut, it doesn’t mean you have to make them that way for the players. That being said, the Pirates’ and Orioles’ uniforms from last night don’t look that baggy at all to me by today’s standards. I agree that the players should get in the spirit with some high cuffs and trimmer-fitting unis, but these at least seem to be consistent to what the players normally wear, which is better than you can say for most throwbacks in recent years.

    Both teams in ’71 had magnificently striped stirrups which were completely absent last night.

    According to Okkonen the O’s should have been all Orange (grain of salt, etc). They were wearing the snap waist set on the far right last night. Mark Reynolds was the only Oriole I saw wearing stirrups (or high socks) last night and his were the current all black.

    Here is a used 1937 Red Sox road uniform with blue lettering and piping.

    link

    The b & w photos of 1936 version look like the lettering was red for that season.

    That first 10 weeks thing for throwbacks, is it only throwbacks or alts in general?

    Yes. Yes they do. Well, actually people want BASEketball jerseys but those don’t seem to exist outside of DIYville. So the “shirsey” is the next best thing.

    Its Old Gold not ‘mustard’

    If the color appears more yellow in the sunlight then that’s a problem with the dye process, not with the color they were going for. I’ve never seen a pic of the Predators 3rd jersey from a few years back looking like mustard (at least not any from a game, I’m sure it can tend to look like that form outside), its always looked old gold to me, and the fact that they never play outside just furthers the reason the colors should be called by it real name (it looks gold on the ice so why give it a nickname for the color it looks like in direct sunlight). And I understand many teams have used the old gold and gotten a mustard look in certain lights (i.e. Georgia Tech in 2008), that’s when its appropriate to use the term mustard, not when it appears gold (predators/ nearly every pic of the pirates from last night (there were a few instances where they striping on the jerseys looked yellow but the caps and letter outlines all looked gold)).

    Absolutely, Douglas, the Pirates of that era wore—technically according to uni industry terminology—Old Gold.

    Rightly or wrongly, “mustard” is getting used as a stand-in for this discussion. That’s because the point those of us who actually saw those unis keep trying to make (over and over and over, unfortunately) is the same as yours…

    They were NOT “Athletic Gold”…no matter what some skewed old images might appear to show us.

    The bumblebees were, yes. Not the set that preceded them.

    link

    I dunno, mustard seems to be pretty close.

    The only issue with “mustard” as a color name is that too many people want to use “mustard” in place of yellow (aka “athletic gold” *cough*stupidname*cough*) whenever it’s paired with brown – Padres & Broncos throwbacks for example.

    News flash. That Preds jersey is very, very close to what the early ’70s Pirates wore.

    Now, you can debate it all day if you want, and google a hundred different old photos, but the fact is…it’s true.

    As I said last night, the vagaries and inconsistences of pre-digital photography and printing apparently bamboozle the snot out of some UWers, especially those groping for some of “discovery”.

    It looks closer to Old Gold to me

    1970s Old Gold Georgia Tech uniform (inspiration behind the 2006 throwbacks):

    link

    “Non-metallic Old Gold”?

    Gold’s a bitch. It being a precious metal for so many recorded cultures, we’ve found the need to depict its many shades and variations from medium to medium.

    And I agree with The Jeff…athletic gold, when paired with brown, suddenly becomes “mustard”. Same damn color the Packers and Steelers wear, but they never get described as “mustard”.

    “Cheddar”, maybe. ;)

    I thought the distinction was, if you’re an American, it’s “old gold,” and if you’re a Brit, it’s “mustard.” Mustard, as a color, has a bit of a history in link, and I’m here to tell you, that color is old gold.

    That’s what I’ve been trying to say.

    The non-metallic (or fabric) version of Old Gold often gets labelled Mustard. In that context they essentially are interchangeable. Synonymous, even.

    And that Preds jersey is pretty much exactly the same color as the crown on the early 70’s Pirates hats. Argue it all you will based on whigged out old photos, but that’s the fact.

    Also, you know what’s awesome? Cheddar cheese and mustard, with a glass of rich Pilsner beer. Eat that while wearing a Cerveceros jersey and a Bucs throwback hat, and it will all be the same color. Mind = blown, right?

    It’s very simple if you use the term gold for what the A’s wear and old gold for what the Pirates in 1971 wore. Yellow is what Oregon wears on its shoes, and mustard is what you put on hot dogs (and it too comes in various shades — Gulden’s or French’s, for example).

    There you go. Yellow also is the color of Michigan’s pants, but not the Packers’. In uni terminology, that is. Don’t really give a shit what a bunch of guys at the bar call them, cuze they’re not here discussing uniforms, their history, et al.

    Such a simple solution you offer, Geeman, one that worked from, as near as I can tell, about the 1920s until a couple years ago. That’s when, rather than learn those simple distincitons, the guys from the bar wanted to call the Packers pants yellow.

    And they can. At the bar. Because the guys at the bar don’t know better.

    No Ricko, Michigan calls it Maize.

    You see, sports uniforms use their own special color names which don’t apply anywhere else. The word “yellow” is not allowed to be used. It’s like sports uniform profanity. Little kids aren’t supposed to say fuck and sports uniform makers aren’t supposed to say yellow.

    It’s not bright yellow, it’s volt.
    It’s not yellow, it’s maize.
    It’s not golden yellow, it’s athletic gold.
    It’s not mustard yellow, it’s old gold.

    Whatever.

    In the rest of the world if it ain’t metallic it ain’t gold.

    First and foremost, this-here site right here ain’t the rest of the world. That’s where that mythical “bar” is located…out in the world, which also includes living rooms, man caves and anywhere else where people should feel free to call the Packers’ pants “yellow” until the beer goes flat and the Fritos get stale.

    Secondly, sporting goods catalogs call Michigan’s and Oregon’s generic pants color “Yellow”. Have for years, far longer than UW has been around. And, as Geeman noted, it’s different from Gold (also called “Athletic Gold”) and Old Glod and, more recently, Old Gold’s lighter cousin, Vegas Gold (actually, the first time I saw “Yellow” as a catalog color was in reference to the WHA Cincinnati Stingers uniforms, whose colors were lised as Black & Yellow, about 35 years ago).

    We don’t wander onto a gearhead site and tell them some of their automotive terminology is wrong and they should change it.

    We might be right, but the lexicon of the area under discussion is what it is.

    Oh, and this…
    “In the rest of the world if it ain’t metallic it ain’t gold.”
    …isn’t totally true. At all.

    For centuries or more, in non-process-color printing such as Sunday comic pages, book illusrations and basic newspaper advertising where a metallic finish was unavailable or impossible, the Steelers/Packers color gold was commonly used for, say, gold coins or gold jewelry. Still is.

    From the Boston Public Library Collection on 30’s Red Sox uniforms, amazing Holy Cross jacket: link

    I did a double take originally, thinking the jacket said “HOLY CRAP” across the front.

    Interesting. I kind of though they were moving toward the alternate blue & black logo full time

    link

    and possibly away from gold all together. Surprised to see gold accented more. Was expecting them to go with this look full time next year (with a white jersey along with it).

    link

    “What do you call T-shirts with NOBs and numbers on the back, like a jersey?”

    I call them a big part of my wardrobe. I’m bookmarking that Shirseys site!

    Bill Simmons calls them J-shirts, FWIW. I too own a significant number of them. But why the hell do the NFL ones have radially-arched NOB’s? Looks so incredibly wrong.

    I don’t get that, either. The NHL ones have the link NOB link, so it’s not necessarily even a “Reebok thing.”

    (I like “shirseys” better.)

    The NFL seems to go out of its way to keep their shirseys from looking too much like a jersey. They know a lot of people would buy those instead if they looked the same. I’ll stick to the NBA ones. Wish they had NCAA ones, too.

    do they need a name? “Name and number” tees isn’t good enough?

    J-shirts? Is that like J-school?

    “I call them a big part of my wardrobe.”

    ~~~

    to the surprise of no one…

    “The O’s and Bucs wore 1971 World Series throwbacks last night, but it was a mess. Too much bagginess and logo creep (sleeves, caps, pants, the works), not enough high-cuffery or whistling Irishman, buttons on both teams’ pants were the wrong color (a small detail, but an easy one to get right if Majestic actually gave a shit), Buccos’ uni numbers were sitting too low”

    Yeah, everything you said is true. But oh, what a glorious mess it was! I loved it anyway and I want to see both of those unis full-time.

    imagine how good throwback games could look if majestic actually did give a shit?

    many UWers give nike (legitimate) grief for a lot of stuff, but i’ll be honest with you — maybe nike should get the MLB contract (so long as teams dictate terms to them instead of the way the NC2A game is played)…they wouldn’t be fucking shit up like majestic constantly does

    Oh, I agree. It could have looked much better. I was just saying this attempt at a throwback was an improvement over link

    I don’t really agree. Bucs and O’s are two of MLB’s better-looking teams. Nothing wrong with the way they dress now.

    My big thing with the current Pirates is the font. It works on the letters, but looks bad on the numbers. I also like the trim on the ’71 unis better. The black hat looks great, but I really love the old gold hat.

    Yeah, with the O’s it’s almost six of one, half-dozen of the other, but if forced to choose I’d take the ’71 look.

    So, you’re correct. There’s nothing *wrong* about the current look (except Pittsburgh’s numbers). But they could do better.

    Call US Soccer and let them know that the USA is proud to be the Red, White and Blue! (312) 808-1300 (Facebook page under construction: “Team USA should only wear Red, White and blue”

    So I had the privelage of going to the Portland Timbers season ticket holder fan appreciation night yesterday and had a blast. I went on a guided tour of the locker room and to my uni watch delight my guide was the equipment manager. I’m sure a lot of people in our group would have rather been a part of the group ahead of us that had the team’s technical director(think GM) as the guide, but I was totally stoked to have the equipment manager. So the first question I asked him was about the upside down american flag that showed up on Rodney Wallace’s uni in the first game. He said that the patches come from Adidas already manufactured onto the jerseys. He said it was his fault for not catching the error when he was printing the numbers and when he saw it on the field from the bench he was a bit mortified. He tried to get the player to change the shirt at halftime, but the player was in a funk because of his poor first half performance and didn’t want to change the uni. He said each player gets 5 sets of unis at the beginning of the year and they rotate them. This also allows them to throw a jersey into the stands and maybe trade a couple of them with opposing teams after the games in traditional soccer fashion. He also showed us the “boot room” which was pretty much a closet where all of the players got to hang their cleats on pegs. He mentioned that with endorsement deals several of the players could get pretty much whatever they wanted from either Adidas or Nike. He also mentioned it was up to the player and certain guys, like Darlington Nagbe, have essentially worn the same shoe all year. However, others will get new ones as soon as a scuff mark shows up on them. He mentioned that when the companies come out with the new models they really push the players to wear them over the previous year even if the player prefers the old one. Typical corporate garbage. Best moment was when he mentioned that last week when a player dislocated his shoulder during the game and the medics cut the uni in half to get it off of him that he was about to punch someone in the face when he saw the destroyed shirt. Yeah, he definitely takes his job seriously. I wish I had pictures to show, but they had a no photography policy in the locker room area.

    I don’t know if this is OT, but last night on the Mets telecast (Yankees were rained out), Keith Hernandez gave a thorough demonstration on how to properly score a game. By the end of the game, his card pretty much looked like a piece of art. You could look at that card, and almost do a play by play from it.

    I “kept the book” for my high school baseball team. In part because, as much as I love sports, I’m also that unathletic. It was a fun experience, and I think I could sit here ten years later and still keep score if I had to. It’s something every baseball fan should know.

    “There are even some belt companies that allow you to design and produce your own custom buckles if anyone is interested is shelling out a few hundred bucks.”

    Hmmm…belt buckle…polyester jersey…decisions, decisions….

    Meh. For the same price I could get nine or ten shirseys!

    Oh, and that youtube golf video was surreal.

    Some of the buckles featured today look downright dangerous. No way I’m wearing that link

    “I’m still calling it Rutgers Stadium”

    Me too. High Point Solutions Stadium? That may be the worst yet. The only ones that come close are where the field has a separate name from the stadium.

    Sorry, but “solutions” is one of the most hackneyed terms in corporate-speak. It’s like Oregon’s unis: the first business who used the term can have it, but everyone else needs to stop being a clone and come up with your own buzz word.

    Great piece on the golf buckles.

    Since golf will (hopefully) never allow giant advertisements on the back of golf shirts, the advertisers found the next best placement. Think about it, most “action” shots from golf are post swing. If there is a giant logo in the middle of the pic, that’s where the viewers eye will go.

    My prediction is that the buckles will continue to get larger and more eye catching (eye sore) going forward.

    tigers/dodgers in throwbacks this afternoon… detroit all high-cuffed and looking sharp!! dodgers in their evening-wear..

    Yeah, clearly the Dodgers are bored with the throwback games and all of the hard word it takes to go the high cuffed route!

    Just sent you a note on Twitter, Did you see Knicks logo revision? Got rid of the black, hope they do on the jerseys too link (via @AzazNYK)

    You can also see the revised logo on NBA Store link

    Belt buckles have traditionally been trophies in link and some of the link. And similarly decorative belts are, or course, the traditional trophy in link. Now with the rise of big buckles in golf (golf!), could this previously very niche bit of Americana be going mainstream?

    A belt buckle is the traditional finishers medal at the Calgary Marathon

    link

    (I happen to have that medal from 2006, but that’s not my picture, just a random GIS)

    Looks like Morton Ranch High School in Katy, Texas uses an old Brewers logo as their football helmet logo.

    Brewers: link

    MRHS: link

    Re:
    I don’t keep close track of college baseball unis, but Mark Lum says this is the first time in recent history that Cal has worn navy stirrups and gold sannies.
    Ticker of March 9, 2011 included the Cal gold sanitaries under navy stirrups:
    link

    For those who care about this sort of thing: I’ll be on Dino Costa’s show (Sirius XM), tonight at 10:05 eastern.

    You can sign yourself up for a free 1-week online trial subscription.

    What channel is that on, anyway?

    For those in the Pittsburgh area, Root Sports (formerly FSN Pittsburgh) is currently showing game 7 of the 71 World Series. Some true OG shit right there. Surprising variations in stirrup height. Goddam, does that field look awful (compared to today’s hyper-manicured diamonds).

    “They’re estimating a $20,000 payout for each winner, and $14,000 to $15,000 for each loser, so it’s a nice payday.” Oh my goodness.

    Too bad the complete games 1971 World Series isn’t available on DVD, unlike the 1979 WS.

    He’s been talking shit about Tiki Barber for the last 15 minutes.

    You got bumped for that?

    Cubs Catcher’s helmet just got hit with a foul tip of a 100+mph fastball and part of the paint (maybe more) just chipped and exploded off.

    I don’t have photos cause i wasn’t Tivoing the game. I know, I blew it guys. My bad.

    Back to “normal” today in Pittsburgh.
    link
    Still looks good, especially with Michael McKenry showing some socks.
    /yesterday looked better, though

    So it’s “www.uni-watch.com” (with a dash) now? None of my links would open the page, and I thought you were down for the day.

    The guy with the link has some great pics, but he’s making first timer mistakes like, “That’s got to be red!”

    Belt buckle is one of the most important accessories for all including kids and women. The above statement would have sounded a little out of the world if it was used in days when belts were associated mainly with men, a time when it was considered that men need it to hold their pants. It was then also considered to be a necessity and had nothing to do with fashion. Things then have changed a lot, today it is a need combined with latest fashion trends.

    Great to see a golf piece on uni-watch.com. Poulter’s website does a rather horrible job of tracking his apparel scripts, having not been updated since mid 2010. Admittedly inspired by uni-watch.com, I created
    link to focus solely on golf apparel, and do my best to keep those interested up to date on all things related to what the guys on tour are wearing.

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