Project ‘Redo’ — The AFC

By Phil Hecken

Back again with SMUW correspondent Terry Duroncelet who last week undertook the first half of a tremendous project to ‘remake’ the NFC teams with (mostly) slight tweaks. He’s back today to finish off the AFC. So, without further yakkin’ on my part, here’s TJ with the second half of …

. . .

Project Redo the Nike Football League
By Terry Duroncelet

Hello all, and welcome to the second part of this four-month adventure of tweaking every team in the NFL’s swoosh-era. Before we start, I want to address a point that was made in the comments last week: how some readers felt that I limited myself in a lot of my designs. While the points were fair, I want to say that this project isn’t intended to turn this into this or this, but rather, this was done to create a graphic representation of what I pictured the NFL would look like in 2012 before I saw any of the Nike designs, not knowing that Nike would build around the current designs of each team (Seahawks notwithstanding). I’m very satisfied with how each concept came out, and I actually already had plans for more far-and-beyond ideas working their way in my mind like a pinball machine the day after I finished my last design (but those won’t be up for a few months). With that out of the way, I decided to experiment a little bit for the AFC. A little bit. I can name only two concepts that I did the most changing on, and you’re about to see which teams. Without further ado…

. . .

AFC North

Cleveland Browns: Funny enough, as I write this on a cold Thursday morning (it’s 2:46am CST as I write this), this team feels kind of relaxing to write about, as they’re the team that I think of whenever I think of a chilly morning/afternoon football game. Well, them and the Packers. What I did here was simply added striped brown socks that matched the brown jersey’s sleeves to the home uniform. I also removed the Al Lerner “AL” memorial from the left sleeve (which — unless I have my dates mixed up, in which I apologize for my ignorance — they were already planning to do in 2013 [scroll down to the ticker]). Everything else stays the same. Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

Cincinnati Bengals: The move to Nike proved to be a huge upgrade for the Bengals, as there is no more of the inconsistent treatments for the sleeves, player names, and tiger stripes from the Reebok days. However, much like the new Seahawks uniforms (which I originally posted on various photo-hosting/social websites back on October 25th, 2012), the Bengals’ current uniforms still need some fine-tuning. What I did here was eliminate the white side panels from the black jersey, remove the ”˜B’ logo from the front of the jersey because it looked too out of place, and changed the color of the top-most tiger stripes on the pants from white to black. I also decided to reshape the pant stripe’s original shape to more closely resemble a tiger’s tail, which is an accurate description of the IRL design. Everything else stays the same. Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

Baltimore Ravens: The Ravens have one of the most underrated uniforms in the NFL, IMO. The small bits of gold really add some warmth to the otherwise cold color scheme of black and purple (side note: I really like that shade of purple that the Ravens use), the number font is interesting, yet it avoids being gimmicky. It’s fun and unique, yet still professional and readable. The whole uniform overall is to me, a modern classic. But there are some things that can be improved. What I did here was change the Flywire collars on both jerseys so that it’s fully color-blocked (like the collars for the 2012 Minnesota Golden Gophers football team, as well as the Midshipmen in the Army/Navy game from three weeks ago). I also changed the stripe on the white pants so that it reflects the numbers a bit more. I decided to keep the black pants because for a team called the Ravens, it makes sense. However, I revived the white socks that they used to use from 1996 – 2003, but changed the striping to match the stripe on the white pants. One last thing that I did was change the helmet’s design so that it mimics that of the Jacksonville Jaguars (the black-to-teal effect). The reason that I did this was that I think it would be a great fit for the Ravens, plus a raven’s feathers have a *very* subtle purple sheen to them depending on the lighting. The resulting helmet is still predominately black, but the right lighting can give it a dark bluish-purple look. Everything else stays the same. Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

Pittsburgh Steelers: With the move to Nike, the Steelers kinda upgraded this year and kinda downgraded this year. They upgraded because the Nike Speed Machine uniform is very much superior to the previous fabrics and cuts IMO, but they downgraded in one key aspect: the sleeve stripes. For this year’s uniforms, the sleeve stripes on both jersey tops look to be the same size as before; maybe even bigger, and the construction of the sleeve caps (or whatever they’re called) results in the bottom stripe(s) disappearing on almost all of the sleeves except for Big Ben’s and probably a small handful of Kickers, Punters, backup QB’s, etc. The seemingly easy thing to do is to blame Nike for making the sleeves so small, but I consider that to be an invalid argument, as most uniform manufacturers make sleeves so small, that they leave little room for stripes. It’s not just Nike. I ultimately blame the Steelers, because they had the most say in the transition from Reebok to Nike. They could’ve requested smaller sleeve stripes to remedy the problem. What I did here was just that: decrease the size of the stripes. I also put them in black cleats, as it should be for the Steelers. A small detail that some may miss is that the Steelers’ numbers are closer together this season. I don’t hate that look at all, but I prefer the old way of doing the numbers, simply because it’s *slightly* more legible to my eyes. Everything else stays the same. Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

. . .

AFC South

Tennessee Titans: I was around for the last eight seasons of the Oilers-era (who would eventually become the Tennessee Titans). Looking back, I loved those light blue uniforms (but then again, I already have kind of a fetish for light blue), and they were definitely a highlight of my childhood. Moving on to the Present, the Titans are one of those teams that have the potential to look pretty damn snazzy with some changes. What I did here was not much really, just paired the white pants with the blue jersey and kept the current road uniform as is. I changed the helmet stripe to a conventional NFL stripe, because the whisker stripes from before were starting to look a bit dated. Everything else stays the same. Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

Houston Texans: The Texans (along with the Ravens and Titans) have one of the most underrated uniforms in the AFC. However, they keep marring their road unis with the stupid navy blue jazzercise-look (the home unis also suffer from the same problem). Why would you do that when you have a fantastic white jersey/blue pant/red sock look to wear (to be fair, they haven’t worn that look since 2008)? Also, they were one of only two teams to go for the Speed Machine collar without the Flywire technology for their primary uniforms (the other being the Steelers), but the Texans are the only ones to use this look with a contrast collar, which is completely color-blocked. What I did here was keep the home uniform relatively untouched, but I put the Texans in red socks when wearing the white-over-blue look. Not a bad road uniform, if you ask me. Everything else stays the same. Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

Jacksonville Jaguars: The Jaguars used to have such nice uniforms. Then they mucked them up in 2009 by going with random pipes, eliminating the gold (which makes the current uni look really cold), and starting what would be the systematic destruction of their identity. The only good part of their current uniforms is the “two-tone” helmet. Still, a lot needed to be done. I guess I was able to stay in range of the current uniforms, but I definitely dipped my hand deep into their history. Not really something that I wanted to do, as I’m going for cleaner upgrades of the current uniforms without changing too much, but it had to be done (and with the news that came out a couple of weeks after I had finished this uniform that they would be making black their primary jersey color, I’m glad I did this). What I did here was use the classic sleeve cuff striping on both jerseys, removed the apron back and butt stripes from the pants and jerseys, changed the pant stripe to the classic-style while maintaining the Jaguar head logo that’s on the current pants, moved the T.V. numbers from the shoulders to the sleeves, and reinstated the gold back into the numbers using the current font. Obviously, I wanted to keep that awesome helmet, but I wasn’t getting the full effect from the original helmet rendering from the original graphic, so I painted the main shell white in MS Paint, created a gradient using black and teal in GIMP, saved it as a png, opened it in MS Paint, copied the “white” Jaguars helmet, pasted it over the gradient with transparency turned on, and there you go (I also used this process to create the Ravens helmet from earlier). Everything else stays the same (eye-roll). Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

Indianapolis Colts: The Colts were another one of the teams that received a monumental upgrade from the move to Nike. No more Laffy-Taffy fabric and no more nubs for shoulder stripes. Although, I was expecting the stripes to be a bit longer (like what LSU had when they wore their Nike Pro Combat uniforms in 2011 against Auburn). Also, the Colts promo photo on the Nike Football Facebook page featured a player wearing striped socks, but it was not to be IRL. That sound you just heard was my heart breaking. What I did here was lengthen the shoulder stripes a bit so that the ends are significantly closer to the underarms, but not going completely around (unfortunate, but until a top-tier uniform manufacturer figures how to get this look with this cut, this is the next best thing). I also added the one thing that they should’ve added back to their uniforms this season: striped socks. They honestly pull an already classic uniform together to create something truly amazing. Everything else stays the same. Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

. . .

AFC East

Miami Dolphins: Out of all of the uniforms that I’ve done for this project, this was probably the only one in which I can see that there’s still a lot to be improved on. If you know my uniform tastes, you’ll know that I HATE Athletic Block (that’s what Nike calls it on their Team Uniform Builder), and I hate Athletic Shadow Block (which is what the Dolphins actually use IRL) even more. To me, that poor number font sullies an otherwise solid look. What I did here was change the numerals to a real block font that doesn’t look amateurish (same thing for the player names), changed the collar on the white jersey from aqua to white, and added the striped cuffs from the aqua jersey to the white jersey. I REALLY didn’t want to keep the navy, but again, the goal here is to create a realistic tweak of each current uniform, so I left the navy intact. Like the Cowboys, the Dolphins have a tendency to wear white at home, which is why the white uniform is on the left-hand side (where a uni with a dark jersey would normally go). Everything else stays the same. Home/road uniform is on the left, aqua uniform is on the right.

New York Jets: The Jets have a pretty solid look, but the move to Nike proved to be an awkward one. For starters, the primary shade of green in some lighting looks to be an Army-like green instead of the Hunter Green that we’re accustomed to. Also, if you look closely at the shoulder stripes, you will see that they don’t exactly match the green of the jersey, which wasn’t a problem in the past. What I did here was change the shoulder stripe color to match the green of the jersey. I also made it so that the helmet’s greens matched each other (SIDE NOTE: you’ll notice that a lot of the helmets and helmet graphics here are slightly darker than the rest of the uniform, as plastic dyes tend to be darker than fabric dyes). You’ll notice that the Jets logo patches on the jerseys are a different green than the rest of the uniform. I tried making it the same color as the uniform, but I didn’t like the effect, so I left it as is. I guess it looks more organic this way. Two more things: first off, I added two white stripes to the green home socks. Secondly, even though Rex Ryan loves his snow white look, the Jets look a lot better with green pants on the road, so I made those the de facto road pants. You’ll notice that I used the olive/Army green. For some reason, I felt that it was appropriate for the Jets, but I understand if some of you disagree. Everything else stays the same. Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

Buffalo Bills: The Bills are part of a trend that is sweeping teams across the Big 4 or major North American sporting leagues: the trend of the harkback (I think The Jeff coined that phrase). “What’s a harkback” you might say? A harkback is a sports uniform that closely mimics that of a previous uniform style from the franchise’s history, but at the same time, tweaking specific things as to give it a new spin, instead of being an outright throwback. Some of the teams include the 2009 San Francisco 49ers, the 2010/2011 Golden State Warriors, the 2010/2011 Utah Jazz, the 2012 Toronto Blue Jays, the 2013 Houston Astros, and the 2011 Buffalo Bills (and probably a few other teams that I’m forgetting). The move to Nike proved to be good in some cases, because now they have “dedicated” sleeve stripes, instead of that weird half-sleeve/half-shoulder stripe thingy that they wore in 2011 (actually, that didn’t look too bad). It also proved to be strange in some cases, like the situation with the collar. What I did here was eschew the Flywire technology, but kept the Speed Machine collar base. This allows me to create a full collar. I know that they look ENORMOUS here, but keep in mind that should the Bills ever find this design and use it, that the collars will only be about half of the thickness shown here (or at least, that’s how I picture it in my head). I also changed the socks so that the stocking portion (that’s the colored section that stops at the white part of the sock near the bottom) doesn’t have that strange half-blue/half-white stocking insert with the stripes on the white part (and vice-versa for the alternate socks worn last year). The socks are simply blue home socks with blue jersey sleeve stripes, and white road socks with white jersey sleeve stripes. Oh, and blue pants on the road, please. Everything else stays the same. Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

New England Patriots: This is probably my second most-revised tweak out of the entire project (1st going to the Jaguars), but I made sure to not go nuts. What I did here was eliminate all of the silver (except in the logo), because for the one team in the NFL that has the ability to incorporate the U.S. flag into their graphic identity and possibly get away with it (should they choose to do so), they should focus on the colors of the actual flag, which does not include silver. Plus, silver on any team post-1994 just seems sort of dated to me. I also eliminated the extra outline in the numbers, got rid of the side panels on both jerseys, and changed the stripes on the white socks to include red where the white used to be. This gives the socks more color, and it effortlessly cuts the socks’ ties with Adidas (Adidas made the last three Patriots uniforms [1999, 2000, 2001] before the Reebok/NFL partnership of 2002, with the current “Tom Brady-Era” uniforms coming along in 2000). As for the pant stripes go, there is a funny story behind those. When I was bringing the stripes of the blue road pants closer so that they don’t look so wide, I noticed that the pattern went white/red/blue/red/white. Then a thought came to me: if I change the sliver of blue to red, then it would look like the stripes on the U.S. flag. Plus, it would (sorta) match the sock stripes. Yeah, kind of uneventful, but it makes for a great pant design (which I repeated on the white pants). Everything else (miraculously) stays the same. Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

. . .

AFC West

Kansas City Chiefs: Now that we’re in the home stretch of this whole project, we can get started on what I (used to) call the ”˜White-Shoe Division’: the AFC West. The Kansas City Chiefs are one of the few teams who’ve literally kept within arm’s length of their uniforms, only adding minute changes in their 52-year history such as adding small striping to the sleeve cuffs, changing shoe colors from black to red to white, sock stripe size changes, etc. Of the top of my head, the four biggest changes that they’ve done is: 1) changed their name from the Dallas Texans to the Kansas City Chiefs in 1963; 2) added red pants to their uni-rotation in 1968; 3) added the AFL Lamar Hunt patch in 2007 (which then became a perma-memorial); 4) a change that happened this year (2012): the moving of the cuff stripes to the sleeve caps. Not a big fan of that look, personally. What I did here was move the stripes back to their proper location on the cuffs. I also changed the stripe on the red pants to match the stripes on the red jerseys and socks. If all of the stripes match on the white uni elements for KC, then why can’t the stripes on the red elements match? I know that the actual pant stripe is supposed to be exactly the same on both the white and red pants (red/yellow/red), but it doesn’t make for a good effect on the red pants, IMO. Everything else stays the same. Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

Denver Broncos: As someone who has fond memories of watching John Elway in the orange uniforms as a little kid who had no comprehension of the environment around him, you could tell how excited I was when I heard that the Broncos were making the orange jersey their primary home top (regulating the blue top to alternate status). YES! That’s the way it should be. While I’m not crazy about the design that they’ve been wearing since 1997, it’s not a bad uniform, and the move (back) to Nike this season has only upgraded the look. However, I would like to see something slightly different. What I did here was that I removed the side panels, in addition to changing the tapered pant stripe to something that was more linear, but still somewhat echoes the tapered stripe. I also moved the T.V. numbers to the sleeves. Everything else stays the same (including that awesome mane stripe on the helmet). Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

Oakland Raiders: Something extraordinary happened this offseason, guys: the Raiders changed their primary shoe color to black! YES!!! I’ve been clamoring about this for a long time now. Turns out they can do something right. How can a team that calls themselves the Silver and BLACK wear white shoes for such a long time (not counting the black cleats they wore for their AFL throwback uniforms in 2009)? I decided to add on to this classic uniform (a bit). What I did was changed the jersey top so that it follows the Nike Speed Machine template, and has the Speed Machine collar base without the Flywire technology. The pants are still made of the shiny fabric (as depicted by the lace-up fly), but I added the padded belt chambers for protection (and because in my head, the padded belt chambers would be a non-negotiable standard on the Nike pants). The last thing that I did was something that either will be welcomed with open arms, or get death threats sent to me in my inbox: changing the facemask from grey to black. I played around with the idea, and felt that I was an appropriate addition, because half of the time, the IRL helmet looks too silver while the rest of the uniform is well-balanced. Everything else stays the same. Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

San Diego Chargers: Chargers in powder blue. What more needs to be said? Yes, I understand that Alex Spanos (owner of the Chargers) really likes the navy, but c’mon! True Bolts = Powder-Blue Bolts! Then a thought came to me: why not split the difference? It works well for the Giants (blue-heavy at home, red-heavy on the road), so there’s no real excuse as to why it wouldn’t work for the Chargers. What I did here was make the current alternate home uniform the primary home uniform”¦ as it should be. But that’s not all, as I also removed the background stripe on all of the bolt graphics. I changed the road pant from navy to white, because the navy dancer tights that they currently wear for road games look dumb. The last thing that I did was something that I think will make everyone happy: T.V. numbers on the helmets once again (in the current font, to boot)! Everything else stays the same. Home uniform is on the left, road uniform is on the right.

. . .

Well, that brings this project to a close. I hope you enjoyed what I had to offer, feel free to give your opinions in the comments, and I’ll see you soon with the college bowl game uni observations.

+ + + + +

Thanks TJ! Tremendous job with this project. OK, readers — let’s give a big hand to Terry, and fire away with your thoughts.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~Uni Tweaks Concepts

We have another new set of tweaks, er…concepts today. After discussion with a number of readers, it’s probably more apropos to call most of the reader submissions “concepts” rather than tweaks. So that’s that.

So if you’ve concept for any sport, or just a tweak or wholesale revision, send them my way.

Please do try to keep your descriptions to ~50 words (give or take) per image — if you have three uniform concepts in one image, then obviously, you can go a little over, but no novels, OK? OK!. You guys have usually been good with keeping the descriptions pretty short, and I thank you for that.

Like the colorizations, I’m going to run these as inline pics — click on each one to enlarge.

And so, lets begin:

~~~

First up is Jed Herrera with a new look for the Suns:

Hey Phil:

Seeing how the Phoenix Suns will have new jerseys next year, I came up with this concept blending the past and the future. Looking at their court design signals the end of purple in their colors. So in this concept purple is replaced with grey and designated as a secondary. The primaries are orange and black. The font is based off the new court design as well. Since adidas seems to be implementing the half piping on new jerseys, it’s also on this concept.

Thanks!

-FWPS

. . .

Next up is Ed(die Atari) Westfield with a Brooklyn Islander tweak:

Hi Phil:

Here’s some items on Brooklyn’s future hockey team:

I came across this cheekily-tweaked Isles logo in this article about the move to Kings County. The skyline looks like the view from the Brooklyn Heights Promenade.

This inspired me to take a crack at redoing Islanders’ crest with an anatomically-correct map of Long Island. I made this at work using only Microsoft word and MS Paint so it is a little crude. The Island is a little fatter and stubbier than the actual scale, but at least all four counties are represented. Also, notice the white star over the approximate location of Barclays Center.

Thanks! Hope all is well.

–Ed

. . .

And last today is Skyler Thiot with some tweaks for the Brew Crew:

Phil,

I figured with the Brewers putting up a template, I would make a new uni set for them. I love the classic logo (maybe the greatest sports logo, ever) and took that over the whole uniform. I think colored nameplates would look great on a lot more unis.

Skyler Thiot

. . .

And that’s it for today. Back with more next time.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

5 & 1 – Bowl Edition

Now that we’ve moved from the regular season to the “post” season (aka Bowl Season), our 5 & 1 decider Catherine Ryan is back to bring us her list of the Best 5 and One Worst looking Bowl matchups for the ‘first half’ of the Bowl Season (which takes us from the Gildan New Mexico Bowl through the Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl).

As always, these are just one lady’s opinion — and you may disagree — of the good and the ugly of the post season so far. And there have been some good games and a couple of doozies, to be sure, so there will no doubt be some controversy. It’s all in good fun though.

OK, lets see what Catherine has picked thus far:

. . .

Happy Holidays, UniWatchers! I’ve been waiting in the wings to reappear and ruin your New Year! Phil gave me the task of choosing 5 ”˜good’ games and 1 ”˜bad’ game out of the 19 bowl games we’ve seen so far. After I decided which 2 or 3 I liked best, it basically become a countdown of the games I hated the least. Let’s see what you think!

. . .

5. San Diego County CU Poinsettia Bowl: SDSU vs. BYU: All-black (sans helmet) on all-white. Not a huge fan of SDSU’s uniforms but, as a match-up, it’s pretty solid.

4. Advocare V100 Independence Bowl: Ohio vs. ULM: I thought Ohio and ULM both looked great in this match-up.

3. Valero Alamo Bowl: I love Texas and I think Oregon State looks great in the orange tops.

2. Bridgepoint Education Holiday Bowl: UCLA vs. Baylor: It’s hard to beat UCLA’s classic uniforms and I actually liked Baylor in the all-whites with the matte lid.

1. Sheraton Holiday Bowl: SMU vs. Fresno State: I thought this was the best looking game so far. SMU looked fantastic and I love the Bulldogs in the red pants.

…and the *bad* one…

+1: Bell Helicopter Armed Forces Bowl: Rice vs. Air Force: Yikes, Air Force.

——–

So, there’s the countdown! I’m excited to hear what everyone thinks. Overall, I thought it was a pretty underwhelming first half. Let’s see what the next batch of games brings us! Happy New Year, Uni Watchers!

. . .

Thanks, Catherine! Well, readers? What say you?

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Uni Watch “Question Time”

Occasionally I will receive an uni-related E-mail from a reader for which I have no answer. Rather than disappoint the reader, I thought I’d pose the question to the greater uni-verse, since group-think and crowd-sourcing is much easier than the google.

Here’s today’s question and it comes from Mark Peterson:

Hey guys, Mark Peterson / concealed78 here,

I wasn’t going to ask until I completely exhausted Google searches, but…

Do the Steelers treat their helmet with something to dull the finish to take the shine off? Or was that just an assumption by somebody? I can’t find any evidence mentioning the process online & I could have sworn Uni Watch reported it once.

Hope all is well.
Happy New Year

Mark

Mark also posed this question to Paul, who did not recall having covered that.

So dear readers, can anyone answer today’s Question Time?

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Shipwreck vs. Skipper

Shipwreck had taken a 2 game (8-6 vs. 6-8) lead over Skipper into yesterday’s bowl games (of which there were five), and they had picked the same on four, meaning the wreck will lead heading into the big bowls this week. Let’s see how they did and get the down low on the costumes worn yesterday:

. . .

Bell Helicopter Armed Forces Bowl: Both boys picked Rice, who came out in blue/white/blue, and you can see they wore a special hat for the game (featuring the Owls “R” logo as an American Flag and a Stars and Stripes design running down the middle of the helmet). Aside from that, they looked great. Air Force, on the other hand, wore their black stealth bomber costumes, featuring those little flying bombers on their domes, shoulders and pant legs. Really Air Force? That’s fine to wear in-season against Navy (which they did on October 6th), but you don’t wear that in your bowl game. The uni gods were NOT impressed, and it showed — Rice scored 28 unanswered second half points to win, 33-14, easily covering. Both Skipper & Shipwreck had the Owls. Shipwreck 9-6; Skipper 7-8

. . .

New Era Pinstripe Bowl: Meanwhile, back in NYC (top o’ the food chain, yo), the cornmother provided a game Jim Vilk lives for, and a right pretty one at that. Not sure how old-school the leaf snow blower is however. The unis were as beautiful as the weather, with classically attired orange-blue-orange ‘cuse running roughshod over the blue/white/white ‘eers in the Boogeydown. The only thing that could have made the game better was if WVU went with blue britches, but alas, twas still pleasing to the uni gods. Both Shipwreck & Skipper had Syracuse (who won 38-14), as the cornmother intended. Shipwreck 10-6; Skipper 8-8

. . .

Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl: The only game in which Shipwreck and Skipper differed featured uni-shenanigans galore, with ASU going with white hats and black shirts (plus white pants) — unbeknownst to Skipper, but not-so-secret to some uni guy. Although Skipper took ASU (a wise decision in retrospect), knowledge of this affront to the uni gods may have changed the pick. Not to be out-hijinxed in the uni department, Navy decided to reuse the A/N game duds, making for a very white-dominate game, which was neither close nor visually appealing. No matter. ASU dominated from start to finish, winning 62-28, and easily covering the 14.5 point spread. Skipper needed this one to pull close, and he got it. Shipwreck 10-7; Skipper 9-8

. . .

Valero Alamo Bowl: Both Shipwreck & Skipper think OSU looks great when they go black/orange/black like they did yesterday, they also love the Horns in road whites. So they were both on Texas. It was a great looking game (no one can do all-white like Hook ’em), closely fought down in San Antone. OSU took a 10 point lead into the fourth, but a ferocious defensive effort by the Horns capped a big comeback, with Texas emerging victorious, 31-27. Shipwreck 11-7; Skipper 10-8

. . .

Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl: The final bowl of Saturday featured Skipper on a 5 game winning streak, and both Skip & Wreck picked Sparty (getting 2.5 points), who went green/green/white (and sporting the Nike-signature wraparound stripe pants), versus TCU, who we knew going in would have two possible helmet choices (“Satin Purple” or “Purple HydroChrome”). They went with the chrome dome. Meh. Thankfully, Sparty didn’t reprise their own shiny shell worn earlier this year. Not a bad looking match-up, all things considered. The Frogs jumped out early, going up 13-0, but Sparty stormed back to go up 14-13 — only to have Texas Christian hit a 53-yard FG to retake the lead. MSU wouldn’t quit either, matching TCU with a 47-yarder with 1:00 to play. It would hold up. Sparty won 17-16. Shipwreck 12-7; Skipper 11-8

. . .

There you have it kids — Skipper went 5-0 yesterday and Shipwreck had an almost-as-impressive 4-1. No bowls today, but a crap-ton this week. Can Skipper catch Shipwreck? Can either Shipwreck or Skipper stay over .500 this bowl season? Stay tuned.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

WELCOME our newest Uni Watcher!
Click to Enlarge

Clara Jane Hick. Born to Marty & Holly Hick on December 27th at 8:56 pm. She’s tipping the scales at 7 lbs. and is 19 and a half inches.

Congratulations Marty & Holly!

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

And that’s a wrap for this last Sunday in 2012, and my final post of the year! A few very important games in the NFL today, as teams jockey for the few final playoff spots still available. Big thanks (once again) to Terry for that tremendous undertaking, and to Catherine for her 5 & 1 return.

Everyone have a great Sunday, and a fantastic end of 2012 — be SAFE and don’t be stupid on amateur night, k?

. . .

“It’s 12:34a. ”˜Cuse just scored again…”
–Joe Sewash