Monday Morning Uni Watch

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By Phil Hecken

Week 2 of the NFL season was a pretty quiet one, uni-wise, with no teams wearing alternates or throwbacks, and not a lot of awful combinations for the usual suspects. In fact, one of the most uni-notable aspects of Sunday’s games was the Eagles wearing white at home, thereby *forcing* the Cowboys to wear their blue tops. While it’s always somewhat odd (less so now than a few years ago) to see the ‘boys in blue, I’m always struck by how good those blue jerseys (and corresponding gray pants) are in comparison to the regular white tops and bluish-silver pants the Cowboys wear for most of their games.

Not only do the blue jerseys look good (very good, in fact), as most of you know, the Cowboys wear a different set of pants with the blue tops — pants that actually almost match the helmet in shading and striping. The white jerseys, as we’ve documented, also suffer from nikelace bleed — but the blue jerseys don’t have that problem. In fact, the blue jerseys don’t have the nikelace at all. I know all about the “curse” of the blue jerseys, and the fact that way back when, Cowboys GM Tex Schramm wanted the Cowboys to wear white at home (so fans would be treated to different colored jerseys on their opponents) each week. But damn, they really should think about wearing the blue tops at home for at least a few games.

But it’s just one of those Cowboy uni-quirks. In fact, John Horton asked about the Dymo tape on the back of the ‘boys helmets yesterday (another of their quirks). I was reminded of one of my favorite ESPN/Uni Watch columns Paul ever wrote, way back in 2007, which dealt with a ton of uni-eccentricities the Dallas team has had over the years. That is highly recommended reading if you’re not familiar with it.

Now then, in other developments yesterday:

• The Steelers’ DeAngelo Williams is still sporting pink in his hair. It’s a practice he began last year with the Carolina Panthers, in support of his late mother, who died of breast cancer.

• The Seattle Seahawks go white/white on the road a couple times a year, but it’s a good look they broke out against the Pack last night.

• The Packers’ Aaron Rodgers recently switched from Nike shoes to adidas — but he totally low-keyed it with basic black cleats yesterday night. Looked great.

• The New Orleans Saints wore white jerseys at home (in the Superdome, so it’s not a *heat* issue — something they seem to do at the beginning of the season the past couple years), but paired the white tops with the black, stripeless pants and black socks, giving them the dreaded leotard look. They played the Tampa Bay Bucs (who went red/pewter) — and it was easily the worst-looking game on yesterday’s docket.

• Here’s a good look at the Ravens’ 20 Seasons patch on the white jersey. Here’s what the patch looks like up close.

• Speaking of anniversary patches, here’s a nice look at the Dolphins 50 seasons patch on the aqua jersey (the Dolphins patches are color coded for jersey color).

• The answer is probably self-evident, but what’s the orange “strap” flying around from Jarvis Landry’s helmet?

• Worried Browns fans can rest easy — your team wore its best combo yesterday — white/white/brown. It’s still a shitty uniform, especially with the HUGE “BROWNS” down the leg and stump of a stripe. It’s interesting (and I think THE Jeff may have picked up on this in the comments), the “BROWNS” is always the same length, but guys who wear shorter length pants seem to also have a shorter stripe, which makes the pants look even more high-schoolish. Still, white/white/brown is not a bad combo.

The Browns Barkevious Mingo was wearing gloves featuring last years helmet (h/t JM Ledgewood). Also, notice how Cleveland has contrasting color stitchng. Who thought that was a good idea?

• Reader Drew McClintock saw an interview yesterday morning while watching the Chargers vs. Bengals game, and noticed a guy still wearing Reebok hat on the sideline.

• The Chargers’ Keenan Allen has an interesting mouth guard (h/t Eric Malinoski).

• A Bengals fan yesterday reminded us that Ickey Woods wore #30, but he was #44 on the deli line (h/t JP Trowbridge).

• Even thought the Eagles wore white, their end-zones were black (h/t Dirt McGirt).

• Both Pat Rooney and Nicole Haase noticed the “S” in the Bears wordmark was askew yesterday.

• Check out the Kam Chancellor holdout-themed jersey at Lambeau Field last night (h/t Andrew Darkow).

And that’s about it for today — if I missed anything you should have tweeted or e-mailed me, post it in the comments below. Thanks to the readers/tweeters who contributed today.

Too Good…

for the Ticker

Paul received an e-mail from Richard Craig, who happened upon an traveling exhibit near Levi’s Stadium (which is hosting Supe 50) and who took photos of several of the exhibits. It’s too long for the ticker (and too good to chop down), so I’ll repost it here. Click on any photo to enlarge.

Here’s Richard:

. . .

Paul:

First, thanks again for everything you do — I love Uni Watch and Permanent Record and all your projects, and really ought to tell you that more often.

I live just a few miles from Levi’s Stadium and the pre-Super Bowl hype is already in full swing around here. Yesterday I saw a little piece of it that might interest you. The Niners have a mobile exhibit called “The 50 Tour” that’s visiting assorted locations and events around here, and was at the Santa Clara Art & Wine Festival over the weekend. Among other things, they show off all eight of the Super Bowl trophies from the Niners and Raiders:

More appropriate to Uni Watch, however, is an exhibit called “Evolutions in Equipment,” which allows fans to hold and examine football equipment from different eras:

Two guys from the 49ers Museum were there to talk about all this and were amiable and informative, though they overhyped the Niners’ “moisture-wicking and waterproof” (butt-ugly) new jerseys:

Of more interest, though was the clear helmet in the middle of the table:

This is a transparent version of the helmet you may have read about with sensors that measure head trauma, used by some college teams:

I find it interesting that the exhibit is touting this technology even though the NFL isn’t using it yet and some in the league have questioned whether it’s reliable. FWIW, the guy there was straightforward and honest about it, just saying this is something the league has looked at and may use in the future.

Maybe you’ve covered this already, but I thought I should pass it along. If for whatever reason you’re interested in talking to the main guy who was explaining all this to fans, here’s his contact info:

Matt Hovik – matt.hovik@49ers-smc.com

Feel free to use all or none of this. Thanks again for all your hard work.

Richard

Thanks, Richard! Great stuff.

OK. Now, onto the ticker…

Uni Watch News Ticker
Compiled by Mike Chamernik

Baseball News: I guess I’ll go with “Baseball News” on this one: Chiefs S Eric Berry was honored at his alma mater, Tennessee, and he wore a Brooks Robinson throwback jersey for the occasion (from Douglas Ford). … Paul, who’s on vacation, found this print featuring some nice uniforms at an antique shop in Vermont. … Brewers 3B Hernan Perez wore striped socks yesterday (from Blake Geschke). … Tim Caisse is trying to find out when this Pony League uniform was originally worn. He received the uni when he was a kid. “I believe my uniform falls in between the early 1950s (black tags with bronze lettering used in the 40s and early 50s) and early 1960s (cleaner white and blue tags with red lettering),” he says. “Most recently, I came across a similar style adult uniform with the same style of tag that claimed to be from the 40s, however; I can’t confirm that based on the one example. The tag reads as follows: ‘Empire Sporting Gds.; Union Made; MFG., N.Y.C.’ ’36; 100% Cotton; Sanforized.’ Since Empire seems to have disappeared without much of a digital trace, manufacturing information has been difficult to come by. I was hoping someone might be able to reference this uniform against others to establish a more accurate date.” Anyone know more? … Royals P Yordano Ventura’s teammates put a wad of bubble gum on his head.

College Football News: The numbers on UCLA’s Adidas jerseys can get distorted and scrunched up (from Joey Breeland). … One UConn player had an odd alteration to his helmet decal this weekend. … Arizona will wear red chrome helmets against UCLA (more here (from Andres E.).

Hockey News: New mask for Flyers G Steve Mason (from @thompucks). … The Red Wings have block NOB letters for the preseason, which isn’t new. What’s notable is the gray Reebok box above it (from Mike Bendert). … Gilles Meloche, who played goalie for the Seals and Barons, had an excellent mask.

NBA News: The banner on top of NBA.com shows the WNBA logo in red, white and blue. The league’s logo is actually orange, and it was red, white and blue before 2012, with a different silhouette (from Daniel Carroll). … Someone created some nice past-meets-present jerseys for a dozen or so teams (from Phil). … Sixers center Jahlil Okafor was a guest at Sunday’s Eagles game and in a twist, they presented him with a custom Eagles basketball jersey (from Michael Preston).

Grab Bag: In soccer, Hearts unveiled a kit that features all 8,000 names of supporters who saved the club from folding (from Mark Coale). … Here’s a nifty collection of vintage menus from Seattle.

That’s it for today. Hope everyone had a great weekend. Back with one more tomorrow, then Paul returns on Wednesday; thanks to all who submitted for the ticker or MMUW, Richard for sharing photos of the exhibit, and Mike for the Ticker. Catch you tomorrow.

Follow me on Twitter @PhilHecken.

Peace.

.. … ..

“Orange-white-white is probably the Browns’ best look.”

–Skye McLeod