Pat Patriot made his triumphant return to the gridiron yesterday, as the Patriots rolled out the red throwbacks for the first time since 2012. Such a good uniform — look at all those stripes (lots of additional photos here, here, and here):
The Patriots will wear these throwbacks again on Dec. 1, when they host the Bills for a Sunday-night game.
In other news from around the league yesterday:
- The Cardinals’ black helmet made its regular season debut, and the Eagles countered by wearing their alternate black pants:
- The Browns wore their brutal mono-turd Color Rush design, which looked even worse compared to the finely attired Chargers:
- The Ravens wore their mono-black alternates:
- The Commies finally debuted their burgundy jerseys, which hadn’t been worn in either the preseason or the regular season. Thankfully, they went with white pants instead of the mono-burgundy look featured in all the unveiling photos. Not a great uniform, but at least a serviceable one:
- For what I believe is the first time ever, the Vikings went purple over white with the whole team wearing white socks (or leggings, or whatever). They’ve previously had some players wearing white hose, while others wore purple, but I don’t think they’ve ever had the whole team go white-legged before. Not a good look (yes, I’m actually wishing there was more purple on the field).
- Bears running back Dave Montgomery’s surname was misspelled on his NOB during pregame drills (but it was spelled correctly during the game):
- Packers cornerback Jaire Alexander wore yellow sleeves to match his pants and helmet. He’s previously done this during pregame activities, but I think this was the first time he’s done it during a game.
- In that last photo, see the green cleats Alexander was wearing? Those were painted with a tribute to Queen Elizabeth II, because the Packers/Giants game took place in London.
- In a related item, Giants running back Saquon Barkley warmed up in a Tottenham Hotspur shirt, because the game was taking place in Tottenham’s stadium:
- A (presumably Canadian?) tailgater at the Steelers/Bills game in Buffalo had a Bills/Canada mashup flag:
Tonight: KC hosts the Raiders, so it should be a good-looking game, as long as KC doesn’t go mono-red.
(My thanks to all contributors, including L.J. Sparvero, @AndrewNewts, @NotHotTakes, and our own Jamie Rathjen.)
The truncated stripes on the Patriots jerseys made them fauxbacks.
The truncated shoulder stripes drive me nuts and detract from an otherwise excellent looking uniform. Surely Nike could fix this if they wanted to.
Was it just me, or did you notice that the Browns “Color Flush” uniforms didn’t have any stripes on them like they did in previous seasons?
Actually, that change (to plain pants) happened in 2020 with the redesign. They *do* still have brown pants with stripes, but they don’t wear them with the color rash now.
They had stripes up thru 2019. But in 2020, they dropped the stripes:
link
“Color Flush”. Classic. I told my Browns-fan buddy they we wearing the mono-turds with a candy corn chunk on top.
Comment of the day. Helmet sticker and a virtual beer for you
While I don’t like the design of the Falcons uniforms at all, their black jersey’s looked substantially better being worn outdoors on a grass field. Lighting can effect things so much. Speaking of lighting, it sure seemed like the Bengals orange was much deeper during last nights broadcast.
I complained about all of the dark uniforms yesterday but I was pleasantly surprised with how the Cardinals helmet looked. The red flake really popped in their stadium. I think that helmet with a red facemask and even more red flake could be a good look for them when they rebrand.
Regarding the Vikings white socks, it just seems that more and more teams are ditching their color topped socks to go all white. The Eagles do it almost always. Hard to find a player with black topped socks when they wear white pants. Funny thing is, I love high white socks on college teams. They don’t belong in the NFL though. Once you hit the NFL, team socks mean you made it.
Grisham looks like he may also have a wedding band on.
Yes, but it appears to be one of those silicon bands that lots of athletes now wear on the field (as opposed to his actual metal band). Clearer view here:
link
I love the Patriots’ throwback uniforms. I hope they do well enough wearing them this year that they’ll go back to them full time. I know it’s a long shot, but a guy can dream.
What’s with the strap that Wil Myers has in that pic? It connects his wrist to his pinky and ring fingers.
The Queen Elizabeth cleat suddenly brought the Sex Pistols to mind. No future…
Is it just me, or is there an orangey filter on some of these photos? Especially the header photo of the Patriots, the Browns, and the Padres.
Not seeing an orange filter at my end.
The images on the Pats website and Getty look fine, but the images on the Lions’ website showing the Pats unis (which seems to be where the header image comes from) look like the contrast has been blown out a bit, causing them to look a bit closer to orange than their proper red.
Agreed on the Pats and Browns photos. I noticed a warm filter of some sort and a more blown-out exposure. Especially on the Browns photo above, the orange looks almost Tennessee Vols orange and much yellower than their actual color and I don’t think it’s just “the lighting”.
Is it just me or do most of the photos appear dark or are very low resolution lately across the website?
On a side note, the orange on the Browns helmets and numbers seem to vary, depending on the lighting/photography.
Pics seems fine at my end.
The colors on the site have been jacked up for a couple days. All the red is orange.
Justin, could you please email me a screen shot (plukas64@gmail.com), so I can see what you’re seeing?
I think it’s just the way the photos are catching the shadows on the players.
Hey Paul,
More of a website design comment but on iPhones the website seems very zoomed in when first getting into articles with the first couple of letters of the left side always cut off. You can get it fixed by rotating to landscape then rotating back but might be something to have your website designer take a look at to figure out a fix.
This is a Twitter-embed problem. Not sure why it keeps happening, because we’ve tried to address it. Will try again.
For the record Paul, it’s doing the same for me on Chrome desktop
I’m on Safari and it’s getting cropped as well. FYI, Paul. -C.
Should be fixed now.
Looks great now! Nice work as always.
Same here. Home page looks fine. The posts themselves are truncated on the sides.
Since the Giants changed their road pants to these white ones, it has become apparent to me that they needs to switch the road uniforms to those based on the late 1960w/early 1970s version.
I could handle the lack of blue when they were wearing the grey pants with the white jersey. It was a traditional, throwback uniform for them and there was at least a bit of blue striping in the pants.
Now with these new white pants it has no blue at all except the helmet. It looks off to me and they could do better aesthetically. Basically, it looks like it would be a good Calgary Stampeders road uniform but then has the blue helmet which does match the uni well.
Bring the blue back with the white unis. Late 1960s/early 1970s white uniform a good base which would match up well with current blue uniforms.
It’s time for the Jints to embrace the blue on their road uniforms. A little red would be fine (say, the player names), but the numbers need to be blue.
Random thoughts:
The Commanders look like 17 other Division II teams. Yet it’s still their best current look.
The Cardinals’ black helmet better be a one (season) and done.
Many pundits are already expecting a Bills/Eagles Super Bowl. Can that happen next year, with the Eagles in Kelly, White, and Silver and the Bills in the red helmets, blue tops, and white pants, please? The contrast and (hopefully) striping would be, in a word, Super.
My favorite team wearing those throwbacks again on my birthday…couldn’t ask for a better present.
Happy (belated) Birthday, AE!
Mono-turd really is just the best description for the Browns’ rash uniforms. Ugh.
What would it take (better record? better design?) to get people to start calling them mono-chocolate instead of mono-turd?
Stop wearing brown pants with brown shirts.
Casual reader here, so I apologize if I am not aware of a back story. Washington is not my team and I certainly have my share of negative thoughts on Dan Snyder. I just don’t understand the constant reference to Washington Commanders as the “commies”.
Here is a team, which obviously had the most racist nickname in sports and finally changed (albeit, forced) the name and there is the constant back-hand slander of that name on this site. I get that changing a team nickname carries sentimental and emotional weight, and it will always be met with criticism.
However, the Commander’s name is at least a tribute to the men and women who have volunteered to serve in our military. And to minimize that here using a reference that has a politically incorrect undertone just feels on par with those who were beholden to the Redskins name in the first place.
I’m old, I’m crotchety, and I appreciate having this forum to read and the ability to vent my thoughts through the comment section. I am not expecting any mea culpa, just one guy’s opinion.
Because naming a team after the military is kinda xenophobic and gross
1. Because Daniel Snyder is a buffoon.
2. There were so many better options than Commanders that were presented.
3. It’s so much fun to shout out “You Suck you Commie B*stards” :-P
The abbreviation for Commanders should follow the military: Cmdr. And while I would have preferred that they skip a nickname entirely and call the team Washington, DC, with alternating monuments on one side of the helmet and numbers or their new W on the other, continuing to complain about the choice just makes you sound like the guy in your fantasy league still moaning about last season’s results.
Hoping that the Pats make the move to Pat Patriots full time.
My thinking is that they didn’t want to move away from flying Elvis with Brady at the helm and an indicator of their successful years and they didn’t have enough time to do a full rebrand so just repurposed their Color Rush uniforms for their new set.
Am I wrong or did the Bengals look pretty darn good in their black pants last night? I feel like this may be their best look.
You’re wrong ; )
Yes to the black pants…No to the white jersey.
Orange/Black/Black/Orange or Orange/Orange/Black/Orange look much much better.
I agree.
Not of they insist they wear black socks + black pants. It simply doesn’t work, IMO. (Not just for them but all the teams that do it)
Orange socks would have been +1 however.
Lee
The same honor should be bestowed upon the Panthers yesterday. I always hated that the white over white look was completely void of silver, the color of their dang helmets. The black pants eliminate that issue in one fell swoop. And you know I love fell swoops. Especially when their is one of them.
Washington’s Uniforms are the worst in the league imo.
Yesterday’s combo was the best we could hope for from the Commies.
“Not a great uniform, but at least a serviceable one”…Nailed it.
Anyone else notice how the NFL on Fox seems to use a red background for the Bills logo during Fox NFL Sunday and most other times even though the Bills haven’t worn red helmets in quite some time?
Even after a few tweaks by Fox to the visual tv presentation over the years the use of red for the Bills still remains constant.
On a tangential, non-uni topic, has anyone else noticed when watching sporting events recently that the sound of the announcers, in the regular course of the game/race/match, is so low it’s nearly inaudible over the other sounds? It’s really bad on NBC channels, but it’s really noticeable on all events.
Or, maybe I should go get a hearing test, again…
I’ve not noticed it myself, but I’ve seen a lot of comments on message boards and FB groups to that effect. There’s probably something to it.
Would someone tell the Dallas Cowboys to start wearing silver pants with both their white tops and the blue tops? Silver pants would look much better than white or light blue, and the pants would then match the helmets.
On Sportscenter Scott Van Pelt commented on the pats’ throwback, totally paraphrasing, but he said something along the lines of: instead of hiring firms to do research, keep it simple, you have a uniform that everyone loves, wear it.
Well since the priority Nike & the NFL share regarding jerseys is marketing, and NOT making the teams look as best as they can look, the Patriots throwback will remain just that: a throwback and not the regular uniform.
Lee
Quick cut on Red Zone and I thought the Philadelphia Eagles were playing the Houston Gamblers of the USFL.
Gamblers, 1985: link
link
I thought they were playing the Falcons.
That black helmet is the definition of unnecessary.
What was wild to see recently was a bare-handed batter with a hand guard. I forget who it was but it looked so odd.
It was Danny Jansen of the Jays
Is the stripe on the Lions helmet slowly getting wider lmao
I dig the yellow sleeves Jaire wore for GB.
As for eagles cardinals and jets with the black, yuck stick with your colors.
Happy Thanksgiving Day hosers!
Should the Patriots wear a blue jersey in the design of the reds when they wear the pat helmets? The Americans wore blue Versus the redcoats, and Pat Patriot is wearing blue on the helm
Red really makes no sense
There’s a story about this (feel free to google) but basically the Boston Patriots had last choice for uniform color, and the AFL (of 8 teams) already had four teams wearing blue: Bills, Oilers, Chargers and Titans. So the team basically had to go with something besides blue, and since they basically *had* to wear red/white/blue (being the Patriots and all), they went with a red jersey. link
Obviously, we all point out that the original colonists/patriots’ opponents, the British not only sported red, they were nicknamed the Redcoats…so having the Patriots in red has seemed to fly in the face of history; again, had the Patriots gotten to choose their team colors *sooner,* they undoubtedly would have gone with blue instead of red.
Phil thanks for the history lesson. It never made sense to me that the Pats wore red, but now I know why.
I may be the only one who sees it like this, but especially in the picture provided, the Iggles/Cards game gave the intra-squad scrimmage look, which is especially bad considering their primary colors complement each other…
Doing a little quick-and-dirty research, there are currently 14 teams, including the Patriots, with blue as a primary uniform color – Bills, Panthers, Bears, Cowboys, Broncos, Lions, Texans, Colts, Chargers, Rams, Patriots, Giants, Seahawks and Titans. Yet, only 6teams have red Red as a primary uniform color – Cardinals, Falcons, Chiefs, 49ers, Buccaneers and Commanders.
I would hope that the Patriots would want to get out of that blue logjam and go back to Pat Patriot and those beautiful red jerseys. Bob Kraft inherited the Flying Elvis. He started out as a fan, he must love throwbacks. I hope they make the switch as soon as they can under NFL rules.
The Jaire Alexander long-sleeves-matching-pants-and-helmet thing is such a nice look. More players ought to do that. Not that matching the jersey looks bad, but this just pops. The Packers’ color scheme helps – I don’t know that it would work for the 49ers, for example.
The Eagles’ uniforms are puke-worthy. Whomever came up with the idea to change the kelly green and silver to midnight green and black in 1996 should be tarred and feathered. I do not hate that look. I despise it. And the Cardinals’ black is also abhorrent.