Such a Nice Jewish Boy

Courtesy of Northwestern Athletic Communications

This is Aaron Liberman, the Northwestern freshman and Orthodox Jew who wears his yarmulke on the bench and plans to wear it on the court when he finally makes his college basketball debut (he hasn’t played yet because of a case of shin splints). My ESPN column today is about him, and about the larger topic of yarmulkes in sports — perfect timing, with Hanukkah just a few days away. I’m really happy with the way this one came out, and I think you’ll find it interesting. Here’s the link.

Me, me, it’s all about me: Last week I was interviewed by a reporter from Gothamist, who I thought was going to write a little article/profile about me. Instead, he transcribed our entire hour-plus interview, resulting in a huge-ass feature that was posted yesterday afternoon. I haven’t read the whole thing yet (the only thing I hate more than listening to an interview with myself is reading a transcription of myself), so I’m hoping I didn’t say anything too stupid. We talked about a lot of stuff — mostly uniforms, but also Permanent Record, Show & Tell, etc.

Meanwhile, one last reminder that I’ll be doing a lecture/slideshow presentation about the Permanent Record report cards tonight, 7pm, at the Housing Works Bookstore Café in Manhattan. Admission is free, and there’ll be several other presentations besides mine (one of which will be sports-related). Details here.

Also, there’s a new entry on the PermaRec Blog — the latest installment of Charlene Dodds’s postcard-rephotography project.

Uni Watch News Ticker: NC State wore Jimmy V tribute jerseys for the Jimmy V Classic last night. ”¦ Looks like the Hornets are going to become the Pelicans. When I ran a “rename/redesign the Hornets” contest earlier this year, there were three Pelicans entries — look here, here, and here. ”¦ Following up on an item from Monday, Chris Willis of Athletic Decals Inc. confirms that the Rams did indeed change the shade of their throwback yellow this season. “They asked for a change to their throwback helmet horns to match the Nike yellow that they were going to use on the unis, so we got a fabric swatch from them and matched it,” he says. … Alex Graber had a layover at the Denver airport and spotted a Rockies sweatshirt listing the team as being in the American League. … Back on Nov. 10, Abilene Christian’s football team wore red ankle bands in support of a local child with cancer, who has now died. Further details here (from Matthiew Mitchell). ”¦ How much do Auburn fans hate Alabama? So much that this T-shirt design has been floating around the Auburn campus (from Brig Slaughter). ”¦ Look at these fantastic Shell Gasoline/Patriots illustrations. “Back when these first came out (early ’80s), I would to ride my bike down to the local Shell station every week to grab the newest print,” says Michael Kearney. “I’d then spend all week drawing and redrawing them until the next print came out.” ”¦ Here’s the jersey patch for the Cotton Bowl. ”¦ Ugh, some upstate New York indoor lacrosse center is using purple turf (blame Connor Wilson). ”¦ Good story about two members of the Cavs who wear masks (rare non-Pittsburgh contribution from Jerry Wolper). ”¦ The Martinsville High basketball team in Virginia lists all of their state championships on their shooting shirts (from Adam Hainsfurther). ”¦ Stop the presses for this absolutely incredible Howell, Michigan, football jersey with killer tagging, circa late 1940s (that sound you just heard was me stealing this jersey from Dan Hutchseon). ”¦ “I was reading about the Republic of Ireland football team on Wiki and ran across this picture of Richard Dunne from September of 2011,” says Stanislaw Olechowski. “It seems like his number was written in marker. It’s not some one-off kit because you can see names of both of the countries playing written on the shirt on the left side. So was it a blood shirt or what?” ”¦ Was that a homemade Cardinals hat that Darnell Dockett was wearing on the sidelines the other day, or does the NFL actually sell that item? (From James Samsel.) ”¦ Pro football is coming to India. You can see uniforms and other gear in this slideshow. ”¦ Check out the second photo accompanying this old gumball helmet kit and you’ll see that the decal sheet includes the Browns’ old phantom “CB” logo (from Leo Strawn, Jr.). ”¦ As of early this morning, this was the lead photo on NFL.com. “That’s John Harbaugh’s head Photoshopped onto the body of a fisherman on the left, with his hat logo removed but with the headset sponsor still intact,” notes Matt Lesser. In addition, there’s Mike Tomlin with his hat logo removed. This is just plain odd.” Indeed. ”¦ Yesterday I wrote about the relatively uncommon phenomenon of contrast-colored NOBs, which prompted Rob Holecko to suggest a much rarer sight: contrast-colored TV numbers. One example that comes immediately to mind is the 1993 Patriots (plus the white jersey was also worn in ’94 and in the ’95 preseason). Any others..? ”¦ Two more weeks until the cast finally comes off.