Sorry, I Wasn’t Paying Attention, Did You Say Something?

You know what’s really great about college football uni design these days?

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Exactly.

Design considerations aside — and the design is pretty brutal — when the coach begins his remarks at the unveiling event by parroting the uniform manufacturer’s slogan (yes, those were literally the first words out of his mouth), you’ve pretty much abandoned any pretense of this being anything other than a corporate masturbation session, a retailing showcase, and a sham.

But me, I don’t cover retailing showcases. I cover uniforms. As soon as Maryland unveils a football uniform, I’ll be glad to write about it. If they’re determined to serve as corporate mannequins for costumes being marketed to children, that’s certainly their prerogative, but I’m not particularly interested. Let’s move on.

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Collector’s Corner

By Brinke Guthrie

This baseball uni is from the 1940s, it has the requisite stirrups, so Paul should bid on it. Or maybe this 1960s Mets pennant will do [both way overpriced, alas ”” PL].

But of course eBay is full of things that can appeal to all sorts of tastes, not just Paul’s. For example:

• Remember these 1970s NFL posters? I had a ton of ’em, and each one had multiple thumb-tack holes in each corner from being moved around.

• Reader Dave Rivitz contributed several items, including this 1950s Otto Graham-signed game program, and this set of NFL figures. That auction’s over, but I thought the figures were so cool that you needed to see ’em anyway.

• Nice-looking 1970s Jets sweater. Not Rex’s size, though.

• Here’s an entire display board of 1970s NFL helmet pencil sharpeners!

• Here’s another helmet display board, this time from the 1960s, promoting Kessler Whiskey.

Seen something on eBay that you think would make good Collector’s Corner fodder? Send your submissions here.

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Stirrups Club reminder: Robert Marshall has a new set of stirrups for sale. For details, look here.

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Uni Watch News Ticker: The Braves have finally started wearing their Ernie Johnson memorial patch. ”¦ Ten of the 12 teams in the WNBA are getting a new uniform sponsor. ”¦ The group looking to save historic Hinchliffe Stadium in Paterson, N.J., which I wrote about last summer, has received a grant (from Dave Rakowski). ”¦ The Padres retired Trevor Hoffman’s number on Sunday, and the ceremony included the team’s previous number retirees wearing throwback jerseys, plus Mat Latos wore a Hoffman tribute jersey. ”¦ Marvel Comics has done a lot of sports crossover promotions lately, but I didn’t realize they’d been working with the NFL way back in 1970 (nice find by Ronnie Poore). ”¦ Ho-hum, another flag-draped uniform. But here’s the weird part: That’s the jersey for the Orangeville Americans — who play in Orangeville, Ontario. “The team is full of American college hockey prospects,” says Will Leslie — hence the name. ”¦ Lots of great ballpark scale models on display here (from Joe Dotzman). ”¦ Can’t get enough of those stadium models? Check out the miniature Big A that this 16-year-old made (from Jeremiah Allen). ”¦ Still more about the stitching on Michael Vick’s shoulders: David Pealing points out that I Ticker-linked to this photo back in 2009, so this stitching pattern is nothing new for the Eagles. ”¦ Austin Gillis reports that his alma mater, Oglethorpe University, wore very interesting basketball uniforms in 1968-69. Dig the contrast-color sleeves, one with a star and one with an “O.” ”¦ Good piece on history’s silliest military uniforms (thanks, Brinke). ”¦ No photos, but an interesting note from Ken Guckenberger, who writes: “I lucked into first-row seats near the visiting on-deck circle at Coors Field yesterday, and we noticed many of Dodgers had huge repair patches on their pants. Two-thirds of the batters had patches at least two-by-three inches. They looked like a barnstorming team from the ’30!” ”¦ This is pretty good — a taxonomy of wrestler names! (From James McNamara.) ”¦ We may have covered this before, but just in case: 1954 was the Orioles’ first year (at least at the MLB level), so their uniforms had to be airbrushed into existence for that year’s baseball cards. But why did Bowman add an apostrophe to the insignia? Very odd (major thanks to Scott Little). ”¦ In a related item, Old Navy doesn’t know how to use an apostrophe (from Jonathon Binet). ”¦ New football uniforms for Western Carolina (from Greg McLamb). ”¦ Ryan Burns reports that Ole Miss has a really nice ticket design this year. ”¦ Tons of helmet variations on display at Arizona State’s practice the other day. “Some players had no decals, some had ‘fork’ decals down the middle, and it looks like at least one player even had the old Sparky decal on the black helmet,” says Joe Albano. ”¦ Georgia Tech is having an informal competition to see who gets to wear No. 9. For details, scroll down to the third item on this page (big thanks to Mike Rich). ”¦ EA Sports is shipping NHL 12 without Winnipeg Jets uniforms. “The NHL series has always delayed the release of the third jerseys until they all are announced officially, but this is unprecedented,” says Tim E. O’Brien. “I wonder if the Jets’ uniforms will look like this. Either that or Thrashers uniforms.” ”¦ Speaking of video games, Brett Paci appears to have spotted a Madden error: The stripe on the Bills’ helmet is straight, instead of getting wider toward the back. ”¦ Two notable things in this shot from last night’s Giants game: The Jints wore their road pants at home, and Eli Manning was wearing an old-style jersey with the red triangle at the base of the collar (the super-stretchies don’t have the triangle). I’ve asked Joe Skiba about both of these — will advise. ”¦ “My wife works for the U.S. Embassy here in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, so this is home for the next couple years,” says Matthew Algeo. “Joe Biden came to visit on Monday, and he was wearing a cap with the Vice Presidential seal. It was adjustable, not fitted. He gave one to the Mongolian prime minister, Sukhbaatar Batbold, who wore it pretty much all day.” ”¦ I’m not sure anyone needs another article about shorts no longer being short, although at least this one is reasonably well written. ”¦ The most pathetic sports site on the web (and I should know, because they’ve plagiarized from me several times) is making a weak stab at some semblance of respectability. … New uniforms for the 49ers’ cheerleaders (from Scott Winters). ”¦ Two new masks in the works for Ilya Bryzgalov — this one and this one (from Matt Pesotski). ”¦ Teebz did a nice little write-up on the story behind Gordie Howe holding a “President” jersey. ”¦ Martin Luther King is unquestionably the greatest American of my lifetime, and we should all be proud that he’s now represented on the National Mall. But this wise-ass critique of the new MLK Memorial isn’t just entertaining — it’s also a really sharp piece of design criticism. Too bad the guy who runs this here uniform site didn’t apply that approach to the Maryland costumes instead of just taking his ball and going home, right? ”¦ RIP, Jerry. You and Mike were the best of the best.

Programming note: I’ll be busy running to the mall to pick up some Terps merch doing some reporting for other projects today, so Phil will have the keys to the car. I know for a fact that he loves the new Maryland costumes, so be sure to tell him what you think of them. It’ll make his day! See you tomorrow.