Just the other day we were discussing the difference between an anniversary and an ordinal, and how an Nth-anniversary patch is so much better than an Nth-season patch (at least in my book). And now the Saints have come along and raised the issue all over again.
As you can see at right, they’ll be going with a 50th-season patch this fall (further details here). And just like I said in that recent post, the date range is highly unsatisfying. Disappointing that they didn’t have the patience to wait until 2017 — that way they could have a 50th-anniversary patch, and the date range would read “1967-2017.” Much better.
At least the Saints are consistent: They wore a 30th-season patch in 1996, and a 25th-season patch in 1991.
Such issues aside, I don’t much care for the design. For starters, I hate the way the 5 is bigger than the 0. Yes, I realize some fonts are like that (look at the headline on this post, for example), but it doesn’t look good on a patch. I also hate the way the two black outlines converge on the 5’s vertical stem. (It doesn’t bother me when the black borders converge along a curved part of the numeral, but for some reason it really bugs me on a straight area.) More importantly, the Saints continue to issue patches that don’t include Sir Saint, which seems like a huge missed opportunity.
Anyway: Don’t call it an anniversary patch, because that’s not what it is.
Click to enlarge
Friday Flashback: With March Madness in full swing, my weekly Friday Flashback piece on ESPN looks at the story behind Marquette’s infamous untucked jerseys from the mid-1970s, and also examines some other schools that adopted the untucked look. Check it out here.
The Ticker
By Mike Chamernik
Baseball News: The Reds wore a mix of green caps, green jerseys, and red jerseys yesterday. … The Pirates, Astros, Red Sox, Phillies, D-Backs, Tigers, Royals and Braves wore green, and the Orioles and Dodgers wore white with green numbers and letters, with green caps. … St. Paddy’s Day caps even had sublimated shamrocks on the side. … Here’s the logo for this year’s World Series. … An artist produces some cool painted bats (from Seth Erdmanczyk). … Dusty Baker wears his own Say No To Drugs wristband (from James Ryder). … A’s season ticket holders received their passes in a chest protector-shaped package. … Interesting that the Brewers’ season tix use the ball-in-glove throwback logo instead of the team’s primary logo. “They know what’s what we want, so why are we stuck with the ugly primary unis?” asks The Barrelman. … Very cool graphic: this minor league color wheel. … Brett Ducharme was at yesterday’s Tigers spring training game with his two sons. The boys were chosen to participate in pregame activities on the field, which culminated in a photo op with Miguel Cabrera featuring three different Tigers caps. … USC wore green caps yesterday. Also, some players had TV numbers on the left sleeve and some had it on the right (from John Furstenthal).
NFL News: The Ravens proposed an eligible receiver rule change: When a normally ineligible receiver, such as an offensive lineman, wants to declare himself eligible, he would have to wear a pinnie over his jersey. … The NFL used St. Patrick’s Day as a way to sell more jerseys from teams that already wear green ”” odd, because the Seahawks only wore lime green for one game in 2009, meaning Russell Wilson never wore it (from Wyatt Beltz and Jon Gaudelli). … The NFL Draft caps haven’t been officially unveiled yet, but this image has been circulating. It’s not clear whether it’s legit.
Hockey News: As is their annual custom, the Devils wore their green-trimmed throwbacks for St. Patrick’s Day. And since they were playing the Wild, the game featured an NHL rarity: two teams wearing green pants. … Teams wearing green jerseys for preame warm-ups included the Penguins, Blue Jackets, and Predators. … The Penguins wore a Pittsburgh bicentennial patch last night. Pittsburgh mayor Bill Peduto wore a Pens jersey for the occasion, with an “M” where the captain’s “C” would usually go (from Andrew S). … The Penguins and Devils had tasty St. Patrick’s Day-themed avatars (from Phil). … The Kalamazoo Wings held their 35th annual Green Ice game. A few more shots of the ice can be seen here. The Wings also wore these St. Paddy’s Day jerseys; here’s a front view (from John Chapman). … Caps G Braden Holtby is in favor of shrinking goaltenders’ pads (from Tommy Turner). … The Wichita Thunder will wear these yellow jerseys for Fight Cancer Night on Saturday. Here’s another look.
NBA News: The Suns and Jazz went orange-vs.-green last night. After the Thunder and Celtics did the same Wednesday night, a bunch of people commented or emailed, basically saying this: orange vs. green can be viewed as a tad insensitive because with the Irish flag, green represents Irish Catholics and orange represents Northern Irish Protestants, and the two sides have clashed throughout history. … The Bulls wore St. Patrick’s Day unis last night, complete with special socks. The Nets wore white on the road. … The Jazz’s Trevor Booker wore green shoes. … Spurs fans got green shirts. … The Hornets and Heat went teal-vs.-red in Miami, with Miami wearing the “El Heat” jerseys. … New uniforms for Team USA. Here’s a closer look at the women’s unis (from Brinke). … New renderings for the Bucks’ arena have been released. … New uniforms for the Philippines’ national team.
College Hoops News: The NCAA has a corporate partnership with Coca-Cola and Powerade, so Florida’s women’s team has to drink its Gatorade from Powerade bottles (from Alex Hider). … Even better than that, some NCAA tourney games are being played at a Denver arena named the Pepsi Center. Evidently, the Pepsi logos on the seats’ cupholders had to be taped over (from Patrick Runge). … Arizona coach Sean Miller completely sweat through his shirt last night. Here’s another look, if you want. … Yale’s coaches wear matching suits, shirts, and ties. … Some USC players yesterday wore the PAC-12 patch and some didn’t. … Seton Hall normally has an American flag patch on the back, but yesterday it was covered up (from Michael Romeo).
Soccer News: Lots of new national team soccer kits were unveiled yesterday: USA home and away, France home and away, Brazil home and away (here’s a slideshow), Portugal home and away, Turkey home and away, Greece, Chile, England, Ireland, and Poland (thanks to Saurel Jean, Patrick Thomas and many people on Twitter). … Also, here’s a closer look at England’s new kit (from Yellow Away Kit). … Sports Illustrated compiled the best and worst USA jerseys from over the years (from Phil). … Bethlehem Steel FC unveiled its kits. The USL team begins play this year (from Mike Diodati).
Grab Bag: Nike revealed new Olympic athletics uniforms for Team USA, along with Kenya and Brazil (from Phil). … Under Armour is holding off from unveiling all of its new USA gymnastics uniforms in an effort to maintain surprise at the Olympics. Gymnasts are judged on performance, and design factors into that (from Phil). … A traffic light in Syracuse has the green light on top and red on the bottom (from Tony DiRubbo). … David Keel took a trip to the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame and he took a bunch of photos of the uniforms on display. … New logos for the University of Tampa (from Eric Cowen). … Wright State will scrap its new logo and go back to its old one. … Nike has released its self-lacing Back to the Future sneakers.
Makes the most sense for the NHL to meet with Bishop, Dubnyk, Schneider, and Holtby. They’re all 6’2″ and up, putting them in the above-average height range for goalies. Any resizing of equipment will affect them and other tall goalies the most.
(My memory and Google are weak this morning, so bear with me.)
Reminds me of a story from a few years ago explaining how some the taller goalies, maybe Garth Snow (6’3″) and Sean Burke (6’4″) had to order thigh pad extensions for their pants because TALL wasn’t an available size for goalie pants in the late 1990’s. Sounds crazy but this was around the time that most goalies were sub-6′ (Mike Vernon, Arturs Irbe, Fred Brathwaite, John Vanbiesbrouck) and looked like stocky Micro Machines when in position.
Let’s home Under Armour performance enhancements work out better for our gymnastics team than our speed skating team
As stated during the recent discussion, I much prefer the Nth season approach over the Nth anniversary, but I agree with your consternation about the mismatched dates.
Perhaps a simple solution for Nth season patches would be to eliminate the date range and only include an “established” date?
That’s tricky as well, because franchises are granted/announced prior to the first season. It could reasonably be argued, for example, that the Saints were “established” in 1966 (a year prior to their first season in ’67), because that’s when the new franchise was announced.
So “1967-Present” instead?
So then, it IS the 50th anniversary, but of their establishment rather than their first game (or season).
For my 2 cents, I prefer an anniversary if you are celebrating a moment in time (basically a day), but I like the Nth season if you are going to make it a year-long celebration. That kind of makes it a long celebration leading up to the anniversary. (Of course that argument breaks down if you don’t actually continue the celebration into the first day of the (N+1)th season, but I digress.)
2016 *is* the 50th anniversary of the franchise’s establishment. But the date on the patch is 1967, not 1966 — so the patch is for their 50th season, not the anniversary of the franchise’s establishment.
Agreed. I wasn’t suggesting that’s what they were going for with the patch, just that it could be a “compromise” option of sorts between the two approaches. (Not necessarily a good one, but an option nonetheless.)
I sometimes wonder if, we the addition of the Sunday alternate ball-in-glove logo cap, if the Brewers are doing a Twins-style transition back to a classic logo (when the Twins began bringing back the TC cap at the beginning of the 2000s, to eventually go full-time with that logo and eliminate the “M” logo). Perhaps in a couple years, they finally pull the trigger and make the ball-in-glove the permanent logo?
Jerry Wolper was having trouble posting this, so I’m posting it for him:
As you can make out on Mayor Peduto’s sleeves, he was wearing #200. Some of you will remember the link and link wearing “Pittsburgh 250” patches in 2008 to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the city’s founding. Fewer will remember the link wearing bicentennial patches in 1959. The current celebration is the bicentennial of the city’s incorporation.
Why don’t the NJ Devils complete the look and wear the green breezers?? Seems odd to have “half” the look.
Not sure what you’re referring to. They DID wear the green pants.
I am so frieking tired of forced sponsorship’s in college sports. Not only do the companies get tons of exposure, the NCAA/schools get tons of money, and the players get nothing, it’s just stupid.
Indeed.
Mike compiled today’s Ticker, not me, so a certain word didn’t come up. But I’ll say it now: Douchebags.
you need to expand the vocabularies around the old office, there. that word should be coming up *constantly*.
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Hey it could be worse, if the Olympics was in town then everything would censured. From the name to logos on the scoreboard to logos on the bathroom and the seats.
So why exactly does all the money Coca-Cola paid to the NCAA trump all the money Pepsi paid to have their name on the arena? Is there some sort of doucebaggery duel to declare King Douche for the day?
I’m going to guess that the venue would rather host the event than not. That is probably motivation enough to figure out how Coca-Cola can trump Pepsi when sponsorships mix like this.
Yes, but Pepsi doesn’t actually own the building. That means the host/no-host decision was in the hands of someone who doesn’t have a stake in Pepsi (or their brand). I’m sure this sort of thing is covered somewhere in Pepsi’s contract with the arena, but from the outside it seems like a conflict.
Of course Pepsi doesn’t own the building. Not sure how you took what I said to imply that they did.
In November 2012, I attended the Final Four of an NCAA Division III, non-revenue generating, women’s sport held at a 2,300 student college in upstate New York. The epitome of an event that couldn’t be monetized, in other words. Official attendance for all three games: 536. The event was webcast using a single camera situated across the field from the stands, and of course there were crowd shots.
Even in THAT setting, the only beverages you were allowed to have inside the stadium were Coca-Cola products.
Err, no crowd shots.
Aren’t these corporate sponsor censorship stories a great example of the link? All these cover-ups draw much more attention than they would otherwise. Whether this is protecting sales or brand image or whatever, the lengths these corporations go to just make them look slimy and petty.
I mean people sponsor events for a reason, same reason college teams who are sponsored by coke have to use gatorade come bowl season.
Do i think it’s silly, yes. Outrageous, not really.
I mean people sponsor events for a reason…
Yes, duh, we all know *why* this bullshit happens — but it’s still bullshit.
The mere fact that a business engages in a particular business practice does not automatically make that practice self-justifyingly acceptable. Business practices, just like personal behavior, can and should be evaluated and, if need be, called out and subjected to ridicule and shame. In this particular case, calling it out is entirely appropriate, and we should continue doing so.
Douchebags.
USC TV numbers….
Just a guess here – is it so the numbers are always facing out while they are batting? Judging by the helmet flaps in the photos it seems that way. I kind of like it, but what do you do for a switch hitter?
Got a ‘page not found’ message for the Back to the Future sneaker link.
Fixed. Here’s the proper link, so you don’t have to scroll back up:
link
Cannot wait until 2019 which will feature MLB’s 150th anniversary, the Padres and Royals 50th anniversary, college football’s 150th anniversary, the NFL’s 100th season and the 60th season for the eight original AFL teams and the Cowboys.
And Green Bay Packers 100th season to be celebrated in 2018.
Paul, you are right. The breezers the Devils wore were green. Looked black at my first glance. Sorry.
You have the same color-blindness I have. We’d better stay out of Syracuse.
The Marquette jerseys had too much of a maternity look.
So… Mike’s new soccer template with the boob/pec shadow and different colored raglan sleeves is what’s being forced to be a thing? Ick. BFBS USA? Ick x2. Damn you, Nike…
“The Ravens proposed an eligible receiver rule change: When a normally ineligible receiver, such as an offensive lineman, wants to declare himself eligible, he would have to wear a pinnie over his jersey.”
I know it sounds crazy, but isn’t that the NCAA rule?
Eh?
Do you mean two guys with the same number (happens a lot in college) can’t be on the field at the same time, so they pop on a different jersey?
The Ravens want to have a player “wear a jersey vest matching the team uniform, with an appropriate number for his eligible or ineligible status that has not already been assigned to another teammate.” That’s not quite the image I get when I think “pinnie” but OK.
Not sure the NCAA does with with eligible receivers (they still have to report to the ref, I believe).
No, I mean that in NCAA if a player with an ineligible number wants to “report” eligible, they actually have to change numbers. They can’t just tell the ref and have the ref announce over the PA that they’re eligible.
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In the example above, he has a different jersey with an eligible number (and his own name). I seem to recall seeing players with pinneys in the past but can’t come up with any visual examples.
FYI, link is the reason the Ravens want the rule changed.
I’m not sure they actually expect the rule to be changed, or if they just want to bring it up again so that the officials might make it a point of emphasis to pay attention to players that may be reporting eligible.
They used to have ineligible linemen put on “pennies” with eligible numbers in the CFL but they’ve since changed it to the NFL rule where you report to the referee.
Dan Clark wore two numbers for a few seasons with the Roughriders. He’d wear 67 for games when he was going to be an offensive linemen and 77 (70s are eligible up there) during the games when he was going to be a back-up tight end. He’s their starting center now, so he wears 67 all the time.
The sad aspect of the Marquette uniform story is how the school changed the identity with the nickname change. The basketball program hasn’t been as successful with the bland replacement name.
Yes, I’m sure the name change is responsible for the program’s on-court success (or lack thereof). Makes perfect sense.
For those unfamiliar with the story behind Marquette’s name change, that was covered on Uni Watch here:
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Pretty sure Marquette’s success declined once Al McGuire stepped down, not because of uniforms or nicknames.
“The basketball program hasn’t been as successful with the bland replacement name.”
~~~
Yes, and I can’t imagine why they’d ever change the name/mascot. Poor Willie Wampum…he never stood a chance.
Such a poor decision to emasculate the entire school and replace Warrior(s) with Golden Eagle(s).
Goalies should have shorter, narrower leg pads and MUCH smaller trappers. You can sleep a family of four in those bushel baskets they wear now. Oh, and eliminate the cheater that extends from the wrist. It does nothing to protect the goalie and everything to protect the net.
I wonder how many horrific car accidents are caused in Syracuse by people who are red-green colorblind.
If the public well-being was unduly infringed upon, I’ll bet rules of safety would supersede expressions of Irish-American pride. If this intersection isn’t in a sleepy neighborhood, it probably has an historical marker or some kind of obvious sign remarking, “Remember, this is the famous upside-down traffic light: Green still means go!”
I sincerely hope all that is true. In the picture at the top of the article, I was surprised that I didn’t see some sort of sign right next to the light. (The picture is pretty closely cropped, so perhaps one exists.)
My dad is actually red-green colorblind, and he’s said he relies on the light position (not color) to differentiate between red and green. It take an extra beat for him to process a traffic light that’s been positioned horizontally.
Even if it is in a sleepy neighborhood with little traffic, it seems like an unnecessary risk to me. I don’t possibly see how public safety isn’t being infringed upon here. The question really is, “how much?”.
After the painted NFL helmets I was prepared for the worst when I clicked the painted bat link but oh my… those are ABSOLUTELY beautiful. I’m amazed, and you can pick up some 80s Topps cards from them as well!
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I’m gonna hurl… Saturday monring cartoons? Or cereal box covers? Which is more appropriate than minor league logos?
The Dieter Brock Rams jersey in the Alabama HOF isn’t authentic. He wore the plastic-number variant with the angled fives when he was with the Rams.
Oh god. The Arizona coach was drenched halfway through the first half!
can anyone find any game shots of the O’s wearing the green lettered jerseys? They wore orange yesterday against the Red Sox
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looks like they wore them against the Twins though…
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still can’t find many good game shots
Do those segments with Cary Chow make it to air? Or are they web-only videos?
I believe web-only, although I’m honestly unsure.
I normally do my video segments via Skype from my apartment, but I was up in Bristol yesterday, so we shot a few vids in-studio. It was great meeting Cary in person — he’s really good to work with. Very smooth on-camera presence.
Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto was wearing uniform number “200”, as well as the “M” patch.
those are probably the best link the Bulls have ever worn.
And yes, link was probably the tallest Ewok.
While technically interesting in construction and detail, the Nike Olympics kits are a bit of a yawn.
Saints just tweeted
outa photo of the new patch on a jersey. Interestingly, it doesn’t include the team name on the top or the date range on the bottom:link
Funny how the Nike swoosh logo patch is placed between the (tiny) tv number and (above) the shoulder seam.
Bottom line on Saints: this year marks the team’s 50th anniversary. Patch should be an anniversary patch reading “1966-2016.” And I’m with Paul on Sir Saint.
All you really need to know about the 2017 NHL transition to Adidas can be ascertained from this catalog:
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Note the NHL team templates and the “form fitting” jersey design template (complete with “gusset neck” for the NHL shield patch?)
Topps has released their “Opening Day” baseball card set, and it includes an insert set called “Alternate Reality” which focuses on players wearing alternate jerseys. An example (both the front photo and the back text which talks about the jersey) is included in this blog post: link
Since I’ve seen so much Chuck the past few days, my default on the USA kits is turrible. Zero sense of national identity or unique design by using all same templates, Poland looks great and Portugal’s home is nice but Nike needs to remove their heads from their asses.
Second on the Olympic sets, “it’s not a uniform, it’s a system of speed.” Are you *bleepin’* kidding me?