By Phil Hecken
‘Murica.
I have to confess — I didn’t watch a single minute of College Football yesterday — spent most of the day at the Brooklyn Uni Watch Gathering (while a smallish crowd, it was excellent — to everyone who was there yesterday: great seeing you and meeting some new UWers, like TBC and Ben. Good times — I’m sure Paul will have a follow up on that later this week). Anyhoo…
Since I didn’t see any of the games (but was well aware of what was the theme for many — flag desecration and dishonoring vets via garish costumes), I’m just going to turn it over to TJ right now.
Sunday Morning Uni Watch
By Terry Duroncelet
Around this time of year, I can’t decide what’s worse: the inevitable flag desecration and hyper-pandering, or having to watch through the LSU/Alabama game because I literally can’t choose between the two.
From Tuesday:
• Holy Toledo, the Rockets look like West Virginia!
From Thursday:
• Mississippi State wore all-white against Mizzou.
From Friday:
• Though Pinktober is behind us now, a Temple coach was spotted wearing a BCA ribbon sticker/decal on his headset. Also, SMU wore all-red with red chrome helmets and S&S decals.
From Saturday:
• This might be the best season in infographics history (original Tweet with caption for context).
• There’s something so satisfying about the way Purdue does all-black.
• Ditto for Air Force in all-blue.
• For some stupid reason, I couldn’t find an image online, so you’ll have to settle for this video, but Texas Tech broke out the GFGS helmets and pants against Tole– er, West Virginia.
• ♫ Jingoism, jingoism, jingoism all the way… ♫
• Florida showed up to Halloween a week late and dressed up as the Miami Hurricanes against Vandy. What the ‘F’, guys?
• Speaking of the ‘Canes, they wore “Military Appreciation” uniforms that also doubled as BFBS. battin’ 1.000, aren’t we? Outside the BFBS costumes, at least they seem to be hitting all the right notes with the free tickets and the auction money (more info here).
• Northwestern wore black helmets and jerseys against Penn State. Speaking of the latter, check out the various sizes that Penn State’s neck bumper decals come in (pic provided by @TorryBruce on Twitter).
• During the Oklahoma State/TCU tilt, a TCU player was not only wearing a jersey with no player name (most likely a blood jersey or perhaps he switched to an eligible number), but if you look at his neck bumper, he has the stock Xenith logo, instead of the ‘HORNED FROGS’ like the rest of his team has. Photo provided by Alan J. Killham (@CoachKillham). One more thing of note is that TCU wore the same decal that Oklahoma State wears in honor of the Homecoming parade victims.
• Shoutout to Pitt for wearing white pants against Notre Dame.
• Stephen M. Brooks (@sbrooks70) notes that Junior Gronkonde of UNC had a decal of the Ivory Coast flag on his helmet.
• Johnny Manziel showed up to the aTm/Auburn game, but since he endorses Nike, he had to tape over the Adidas logo on his jacket. Credit to Josh Pate (@JoshuaPate) for the pic. Here’s another look.
• Cool move by Texas, who honored the 1969 team with socks, helmet decals, and no player names.
• Remember those military branch decals Minnesota wore on the back of their helmets a couple of weeks back? They did that again for their game against Ohio State, but it was instead a decal in honor of retired Gophers coach Jerry Kill.
And that’ll do it for Week 10. Maybe one day, we can all learn to CEAUXEXIST. See you next week.
Thanks TJ!
NCAA Uni Tracking
Back again today with our new feature: NCAA Uniform Tracking.
Once again, I’m pleased to welcome our 4 NCAA trackers, tallying the uniforms worn by the Power 5 conferences.
We’ve got Rex Henry (tracking the ACC & SEC), Dennis Bolt (tracking the PAC-12), Kyle Acker (tracking the Big XII) and Joey Artigue (tracking the B1G).
We’ll start with Joey & the B1G today (*Note – I didn’t receive a tracker from Joey as of 2:00 am, so this will be a placeholder until I receive it, at which time I’ll post it here):
B1G
Joey will be establishing a separate website for B1G tracking, but for now, you can follow him on Twitter.
Rex is up next today:
ACC
More Here.
SEC
And now, here’s Dennis with the PAC-12:
PAC-12
More here.
Here is your link to the 2015-16 Duck Tracker.
And finally, here is Kyle with the Big XII:
Big XII
And that’s all for today — thanks Joey, Rex, Dennis and Kyle!
Joe Ringham’s 5 & 1
We’re on to week 10 in the NCAA, and it’s time for camopander and flag desecration, so lots to choose from for our new 5 & 1 decider Joe Ringham. Did any of those make the good bad list? Or the good list? Let’s find out…
Here’s Joe:
Good Sunday, everyone! We’ve now hit the stretch run for the season, and what a weekend it was. Let’s get right to the list for this Shakeup Saturday.
5) Ohio at Bowling Green State — This one kind of sneaked up on me. Always have been a fan of Ohio’s green/white/green road set and, surprisingly, it doesn’t look too bad against the orange/brown/orange of the Falcons. Just all part of Wednesday Night MACtion.
4) Marshall at Middle Tennessee State — This game just popped to me, as I flipped the TV past it in the late afternoon. The Herd’s white/white/green really seemed to mesh well against the blue/blue/grey of MTSU. I’ll even look past the S&S helmet logo that MTSU used for this game.
3) Baylor at Kansas State — One could call this a case of gold vs. silver Thursday night. Loved the gold/white/gold road look the Bears went with against K-State’s always sharp silver/purple/silver home look. A fine looking, and tightly contested game.
2) Stanford at Colorado — Always have loved Stanford’s usual all-white road look, and it pairs up great with the Buffs classic gold/black/gold home uni’s (which, personally, I think Colorado should always use at home). Just a simplistic, traditional looking game that shown brightly in the early-November sunlight.
1) LSU at Alabama — This game was just too damn good looking. Too damn good looking, and a not a bad game on the field to boot.
And, finally…
+1) Northern Illinois at Toledo & BYU at San Jose State — Like West Virginia earlier this season, mono-yellow is a seriously hideous look. Take note, Rockets and Spartans.
Enjoy the week, everyone!
Thanks, Joe! Remember, the tip-line email (UW5and1@gmail.com) is back for any games you want Joe take a look at. Pictures of the game/games you want are very much suggested.
Uni Watch News Ticker
Apologies for the short ticker today — I was indisposed for most of yesterday and only was able to get to the submissions which were sent into uniwatching.com. Full ticker will return tomorrow — PH
Baseball News: “While trying to figure out the mystery caps from saturday’s Uni-Watch I came across this pretty neat olde english ‘C’ as the parent club does with the ‘D’,” from Douglas Ford. Here’s a look at the “C”.
College/High School Football News: “I would like to point out my high school alma mater, Algonac HS in Michigan, is wearing a unique Nike uniform set which uses a matte finish Michigan-style helmet in correct colors (maize and blue are AHS colors too) but jerseys with MSU’s alternate design, lettering, and numbering font,” writes Don Martinez. “A good series of pictures can be found at the Port Huron Times Herald article on their recent playoff game, at the following address.” … Kings High School (north of Cincinnati) wore GI Joke uniforms for their playoff game against Teays Valley Friday night (from Brian Henke).
Hockey News: Reader Gordon Fall noticed a tiny quirk with the Hockey Hall Of Fame plaque sketches: “Each HOF’er is honored with a headshot sketch and bio on an iced glass plaque. I never noticed this until tonight, but the headshots are done with the jersey collar included, and a trained eye can tell what jersey it’s coming from. My Red Wings got two guys in this year, Sergei Fedorov and Nicklas Lidstrom.” He adds, “Note the one-tone collar and simple shading. That’s the collar of a Red Wings jersey in each, but Sergei’s wearing a white jersey (the Wings’ home jersey for his entire time in Detroit) and Nick’s wearing a red jersey (the Wings’ home jersey when he was the captain).” Gordon also notes, “Red Wings legend Steve Yzerman was inducted in 2009. Long-time Red Wing. Never played anywhere else. The Joe Louis Arena is on Steve Yzerman Drive. But his plaque has him in a Team Canada jersey, specifically the red uniform from the 1996 World Cup.” … Reader Stan Capp checks in with this: Special orange jersey used for CT DOT OBEY THE ORANGE campaign, with one having a name issue, although that was fixed after warm ups. Also, there was this.
Grab Bag: The Milwaukee Bucks have released renderings for their new arena (from Mike Chamernik). … “While browsing my old college fraternity’s page,” writes Bryan Moore, “I came across news update. Apparently, there is a drive to standardize the logos that each fraternity chapter uses for its various philanthropies, charities, and recruiting efforts.”
Interesting long-form from Noah Wolf, that I’ll post in full here: “Flag desecration and awful camouflage uniform elements meant to honor United States military veterans are oft covered on your blog, and shamed. As they should be. These do more to raise profit than to honor our veterans, and more often than not look disgustingly tacky and generally distasteful. Plus, they pop up all the time. Baseball does it three times a year, with Memorial Day, Independence Day, and September 11, the NFL does it pretty much all throughout G.I. Joevember, and college football teams do it as they please (although most happen right around Veterans’ Day). The MLB and NFL seem to modify as much of their equipment as they can to fit the theme (the NFL more so) and sell them at slightly inflated prices with very little going to veterans organizations (although they advertize it as if it is a large sum of money). Of course, I don’t need to tell you any of this, as I learned most of it from your blog. I’ll admit, I’ve not been an avid follower of Uni Watch for too long, I only started this summer, so stop me if you’ve covered this already. But I have not yet, in my short time as a Uni Watcher, seen you cover what the Premier League does for Veterans’ Day, or as they call it, Remembrance Day. Every player and referee wears a red poppy patch on their shirt, and coaches pin it to their lapel. The placement of the patch varies, and it doesn’t look good on every kit, but it’s a simple reminder of those who gave their lives in the two World Wars. Some studio analysts wear it (including the Men in Blazers), and some fans go as far as to make a tifo out of it. And the best part? It’s not over-commercialized. They don’t sell the poppy-bearing shirts (save for some clubs who auction off the game-worn jerseys) and they don’t sell other items bearing the poppy. It’s a simple, meaningful nod to those who served, and it seems to have its intentions in the right place (the remembrance over the profit). Granted, this is the same league who has their players become walking billboards, so they’re getting plenty of profit from the uniform already. But I would prefer for teams in the U.S. to do something like this. Rather than desecrating a flag or making a mockery out of camouflage, they use a simple symbol to remember their veterans. Isn’t that what it’s all about?”
And that’s all for today — apologies for the smallish ticker. Thanks to TJ, Joe, Rex, Dennis, and Kyle. Everyone have a good week. Enjoy the NFL (and I’m sure a good number of teams will be breaking out the GI Jokevember gear), and I’ll catch you guys next weekend.
Follow me on Twitter @PhilHecken.
Peace.
“I’m more excited about LeBron bringing back the shorter shorts look than I was about him returning to Cleveland.”
— Jim Vilk
” … and a not a bad game on the field to boot”
As an LSU fan and grad, I respectfully disagree. The Tigers got their asses handed to them. The score does not indicate how much of an ass-whipping it was. Alabama is a much better team in every phase.
You guys need a new Big Ten tracker.
The VFW runs the “Buddy Poppy Program”, link, so I assume most US veterans are familiar with the poppy’s significance even if most of the American public is not.
Just last year the Cowboys had a poppy helmet decal for their game in London, link. I think this would be great for a Veteran’s Day tribute in the US.
On the poppy thing, doesn’t each country’s main veterans group (Royal British Legion, Canadian Legion, etc) sell the poppy pins each year for a few bucks ahead of Remembrance Day? So instead of a sports league selling expensive jerseys to a select few with essentially no money going to a good cause, it’s veterans groups selling inexpensive pins to everyone with all of the money staying with the veterans. And in the Commonwealth practice, athletes are joining with the rest of the citizenry with the simple poppy display instead of standing out with unique, look-at-me costumes. In terms of both the values expressed and the practical effects of the act, the Commonwealth practice seems superior in every way to the American practice.
A few problems big ten tracker is off a week and in the big12 Texas did not have a name on the front of the jersey and Kansas wore blue helmet with red chrome facemask
Jeers to Chris & Joe Rodgers for not reading the words above the Big10 tracker:
“We’ll start with Joey & the B1G today (*Note — I didn’t receive a tracker from Joey as of 2:00 am, so this will be a placeholder until I receive it, at which time I’ll post it here):”
Please go to the courtesy desk for your refund.
Mgmt
I’m sure Paul and Phil want a complete and accurate site. They don’t have that when one of their trackers flakes.
Cheers to Rich for being an honest and objective LSU fan. The “greatest RB since Herschel” got stonecold creamed by Bama’s D and it was Bama’s back who stole the show.
The only game I watched was Sam Houston State vs McNeese State.SHS in orang/white/orange and MSU in gold/blue/gold. If it weren’t for SHS’s awful striping on the pants and jerseys it would’ve been a fantastic looking game.
Noah, I’m American-born but live in Ireland and I’d like to echo your thoughts. I had a similar thought earlier this week and was thinking a yellow ribbon might be an option? One distinct difference the poppy offers over the oft-used faux-military camo uni-modifications is that it isn’t a “militarized” look, but rather a respectful “nod”. Classy and not crass.
Iowa went full imitation Steelers with the Hawkeye logo only on the right side of the helmet.
Jeers and cheers when joe Rodgers read the forum this note was not included so
When joe Rodgers and I read the tracker the note was not there
Shoutout to Pitt for wearing white pants against Notre Dame.
I’ll shoutout when they wear mustard or yellow pants. White should be used as little as possible…oh, wait…they’re not rivals with PSU anymore. Carry on.
Ditto for Air Force in all-blue.
Now you’re talkin’. They looked great against Navy…wait, that was Army? The Black Knights should wear the color of a midshipman’s uniform as little as possible. Navy, on the other hand, should be like Georgia Tech and wear it as much as possible.
Florida showed up to Halloween a week late and dressed up as the Miami Hurricanes
I have a question…
link
the orange/brown/orange of the Falcons
That’s brown/orange/brown, Joe. Either way would look good, though.
mono-yellow is a serious
ly hideouslook.Fixed.
San Jose State’s uniform has issues, but the amount of yellow isn’t one of them.
The ticker item about the Connecticut Tigers “C” logo reminded me that a few years back I designing an “Olde English” logo for them, just for fun. Here’s two versions I came up with: link
Boomer Esiason and his radio partner Craig Carton just went off for a bit on the Color Rash uniforms…Boomer said that the Jets would look like “a cross between a leprechaun and The Riddler” and added that the game would look like Christmas in November. Unfortunately, from there they got sidetracked into complaining that “you can’t say Christmas” because, you know, some businesses have altered their Christmas celebrations in ways that someone somewhere might interpret as implying that non-Christians are human beings, and we can’t have that. But the uniform comments were worthwhile, anyway.