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Posts filed under 'College Baseball'
By Phil Hecken
Little bit of a different entry today. While I don’t normally have readers contact me with requests for my graphical talents, mainly because I don’t have any, (usually the fantastic graphics in my pieces are done by others), what follows was one of those rare times. Shortly before Uni Watch went on Summer Vacation, I received an e-mail from Jerome Nemanich, who is the head baseball coach in Sartell, MN. Jerome approached me with a most intriguing idea — help him design a cap for his baseball team. Flattered though I was, I immediately thought this was a job for you guys. Here’s what took place in that original e-mail and how this contest came to be:
Phil,
My name is Jerome Nemanich, I’m the head baseball coach in Sartell, MN. I was wondering if you could help us with a possible new hat logo for the 2010 season. I follow your work on Uni watch.
I enclosed our alternate hat mock-up from the game from last year (look here and here.). Our main hat had the same S, just all Royal with white “S” and white eyelets. I’ve also enclosed a couple of ideas I’ve had. The old Spokane Indian “S” and possible going with the UVA look. Our nick name is the Sabres.
We have three uni tops-
White — looks like old royals sleeveless, 3 color shadowd lettering script.
Blue — Like Texas Rangers blue with Pittsburgh font.
Grey — Same as blue, a different font. Piping is Blue/White/Blue.
I can’t offer cash but will offer a lid if you come up with a cool idea.
Thanks,
Jerome Nemanich
Tempted as I was to try my hand at designing a cap logo, I wrote Coach Nemanich back and asked if he thought the “design a cap” might be something the graphic designers (and readers) who frequent UW would like to try their hand at. Jerome wrote back that he’d have to check with his AD, but thought it wouldn’t be a problem. Turns out, he thought a “Design A Cap Contest” might just be a great idea. I also asked him about his teams uniforms, sensing perhaps a “design a uni” contest might follow, but alas, ’twas not to be. Jerome wrote:
I like all the work that I’ve seen you do on Uni watch, we won’t get new Uni’s for 3 more years but I may be ok with a contest down the road with Uni’s too. I just got the new Russell catalog for 2010 today, boy are there some ugly uni’s coming out. They also have a pullover mock button down jersey so they can sew the artwork across the jersey better. There are actual buttons on the front but they don’t open.
Ah well, the unis will have to wait, but he gave the go-ahead for the Design A Cap contest.
So, lets see what you guys can come up with! You’ve seen what they have worn, and you see the ideas that Jerome has in mind. That leaves a pretty open canvas to give it a shot. You could probably use the templates Coach provided or you could always use one of these.
I won’t set a time limit on this contest, but I would hope everyone could get me your submissions within the next couple of weeks. And if Mr. Nemanich likes your design, he’ll send you a cap for your efforts! Pretty schweet, huh?
So get your crayons out, fire up your computers, or use your protractors — as long as you can come up with a design, and you can e-mail it to me, it will be considered. You can also send me multiple submissions. In a couple of weeks (or whenever the contest appears to be over), I’ll post your submissions.
Send them to me and please put in the “SUBJECT” line “Cap Contest”. If you have questions about the contest, post them in the comments (that way others who may have the same questions can see them) or you can always e-mail me. Obviously, Coach Nemanich will be the one with the final say in the design.
Good Luck!
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OK, last weekend Ricko and I gave you our five NFL uniforms most in need of a tweak (or one less bumper sticker), and tomorrow you are going to be treated to an OUTSTANDING new uniform idea from Ricko. But today, I’m going to bring you a few more NFL teams whose uniforms don’t really suffer from the OMBS (”One More Bumper Sticker”) syndrome, but are oh so close to being just right — at least as far as their uniforms go. Some of these teams are just missing one small detail, others suffer from perhaps one too many details (OMBS), and others simply just don’t quite “get it.” With that, then, here are a few more teams who could use a teensy tiny fix or two:
New Orleans Saints: The Saints have some classic unis, and i really like them. They’re not BFBS, but there is just one little problem. Maybe two. First, when they wear black pants, the pants are devoid of any kind of stripe, and they like to wear black leggings, giving them the leotard look. They also have the propensity towards the monochrome leotard look (although, to my knowledge, this season they haven’t broken out the black pants yet). But we know they will, it’s only a matter of time. So, to fix the Saints, I propose they place a simple stripe on them, and ditch the black leggings in favor of white striped socks. It’s not even a new concept, they used to sport a similar look. And there was nothing wrong with that look. One other slight tweak I would offer for the Saints (other than never wearing monochrome black), would be to add a white stripe to the thick black stripe on their pants (they currently look like this). Finally, the fact that the old gold on the helmet or the pants does NOT match the old gold numbers really bothers me. So, as long as we add the stripe to the gold pants, lets get that gold on the jersey to match the gold on the helmet. See? Minor tweaks can really make that uni sharp!
Carolina Panthers: Most, if not all, of you will disagree with me on this one, I’m sure, but I really dislike the pointy, truncated pants stripe. I know, I know, they’ve always had this look. I also greatly dislike how some players have truncated sleeve loops, while others sport full loops. The full loops look much better. So what’s my tweak? It’s real simple: Eliminate the pointy pants stripes, and just make sure everyone has full shoulder loops (even if you have to taper them). And as far as uniforms go, I think that all white uniform is one of the BEST in the NFL. All it needs is real pants stripes.
St. Louis Rams: I never really liked the Rams switch in color and uni scheme after they won Super Bowl XXXIV. However, in the past couple of years, they gone away from wearing their standard gold pants and have begun wearing blue and white pants. The blue pants are worn with short white socks and blue leggings, producing the dreaded leotard look, and both the blue and white pants have stripes while the gold ones do not. Some of you may like this quirkiness, but I do not. I’m fine with them having three sets of pants to choose from, so long as they don’t pair the blue pants with the blue top. But lets get some consistency. The fix? Lets put a stripe on the gold pants. Much better. For the blue pants let’s narrow that stripe a tad and give them some white socks with a complimentary stripe. Finally, for the white pants, lets put a classic Rams stripe on there. There you go — three pairs of pants, not quite identical, but with much more consistency. I’d still like the yellow-gold and royalish blue to return, but keeping the current colors, this works better.
Cleveland Browns: I’m not going to touch their sleeve striping — Ricko will take care of that tomorrow. But, I do need to get to work on those “new” brown pants. Remember last preseason when the Browns broke out the brown pants? Well, Coach Mangenius apparently likes them, and he plans on having the team wear them on a semi-regular basis this year. But, unlike the leotard look, at least he’s had the good sense to put them in white socks. But, they’re still wearing those godawful brown pants. The solution? Well, a stripe on the pants is a start. But, should the order be orange-white-orange, or white-orange-white? Neither one of those looks all that great. What about simply two orange stripes which would replicate the brown-orange-brown-orange pattern on the sleeve and the socks? It’s a tough call. Maybe they just shouldn’t wear brown pants. That’s what the football gods are saying anyway. But if they ARE going to wear them, they need some kind of striping. And for the love of god, whatever they do this year, don’t go brown over brown. We’ve already heard the Mr. Hankey jokes. Let’s not let them come to fruition. (And on a completely unrelated note with the Browns, they were one of the few teams to sport the beautiful and classic white over white look — can’t they just stay with that as often as possible? That has to be one my my top-10 all time great NFL looks)
New England Patriots: Ok, here is what they should wear full time. But that’s not gonna happen. The Pats are one of those teams who feel that a side panel (even worse on the road uniform) is necessary. It’s not. I’m also not a fan of those weird, wide pants stripes. Solutions? First, lets remove that garish side panel. If you noticed the pants striping pattern in the throwbacks, it consisted of three thin stripes. Well, they could sorta go for that look or even “thinify” the wide stripe on the pants? Even if we keep the total stripe width the same, adding more red and white to them is a better look, IMHO. The home jersey just needs the red ‘pinstripes’ removed, but the pants stripe is still a little too arena league for me. So, we can simply add one strip of silver down the middle, or thinify the stripes with two blue stripes or keep a nice patriotic blue-red-blue pattern. Frankly, I think the red-blue-silver-blue-red looks pretty sharp.
Baltimore Ravens: Moving towards the penultimate tweak, the Ravens tweak is simple. They have a black-purple-black stripe on the white pants, but like the Saints, their black pants are stripeless and they like the leotard look. They also like the all-black leotard look. Solution? Simple, some kind of stripe on the pants, and white socks. It’s not like they didn’t sport that type of look at one time. Hell…they could call it their fauxback uni.
Tennessee Titans: OK — the final tweak. I don’t really so much mind the navy over white and I LOVE the white over powder blue. I really think that’s one of the all time good looks in the game, even though it’s relatively new. However, I hate their other looks, no matter if it’s navy over navy, powder over powder or mix and match. So I’m not touching those. But for the two combos I do like, how about we simply remove the “yoke”? Now that’s a classic look, right? How about on the white over powder? Man, that looks like an NFL uniform right there. I won’t say I love their helmet (a few teams sport the “fading stripe” look), but just imagine what would happen if they went with a solid center stripe? Too Penn State-ish? Not for me.
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Mercifully for you, thus endeth my uni tweaks. But I think you’d have to agree with at least a couple of them. Each team still retains it’s unique color scheme, but I simply remove or tweak what I feel is the one or two things wrong with an otherwise excellent or pretty damn good uniform. I’m sure you’ll disagree, at least on a couple. That’s fine. If teams would just knock off the monochrome look, or the leotard look, I’d be happy. And if those few teams who feel stripes are anthema, well, I took it upon myself to correct that. Feel free to tell me where to go. I’m ready. Fire away.
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 Guess The Game From The Scoreboard: Once again, I gotta apologize in advance if I gave you today’s Guess The Game game already. I don’t think so. Even so, it would have been a while ago. Pretty sure also that this one came from Squiddie. Anyway, you know what to do. Date, location and final score. Please link to Retrosheet or Baseball Almanac if applicable. Ready? Guess The Game. Got a couple new ones from SlimandSlam (he’ll be doing the honors tomorrow), but I’m still always looking out for new scoreboard games. If you have one, send ‘em my way. Thanks.
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 Ricko’s back with Benchies, but I’m pretty sure this one come from his “way back machine.” But that’s OK, because they’re all new to us. And even Ricko’s oldies are still goodies. So, now, we take you back in time when the greatest two-sport athlete ruled the ad world too. I think you know who I’m talking about. Enjoy your Saturday Benchies.
“A child of five would understand this. Send someone to fetch a child of five.” Groucho Marx
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Whew. Another short post. But if you made it this far, you made it to the end. Don’t forget to try your hand at the “Design A Cap” contest — maybe you’ll win a prize. Don’t worry about the quality of your work or the skill of your craftsmanship. But do give it a shot! This should be a really fun contest and I bet we get a number of great submissions.
Have a great Saturday. Don’t forget to check back tomorrow — got a really kick-ass post with Ricko you will NOT want to miss.
September 19th, 2009
[Editor's Note: With the College World Series upon us, Omaha resident Bryan Redemske checks in with his annual CWS survey. I'll see you down in the Ticker. -- PL]
By Bryan Redemske
We often make a big deal about tradition here at Uni Watch. Changes to our favorite teams’ uniforms, colors, or ballpark tend to ignite passionate pleas for the status quo.
In terms of college baseball tradition, Omaha has the market cornered. Since 1950, Rosenblatt Stadium has been the home of the men’s College World Series. Next year will be the final CWS at the stadium on the hill. In 2011 it’s moving to a downtown stadium called TD Ameritrade Park.
Rosenblatt Stadium will be demolished, and the land will be handed over to Henry Doorly Zoo, which will probably use it for monkeys. Or maybe, just maybe, those pandas will finally come to Omaha. Pretty sweet, huh?
As long as we’re talking about tearing things down and destroying tradition, it’s a good time to welcome Arkansas to the College World Series. Nobody kills baseball fashion tradition like the Razorbacks. Here’s a look at their crimes against the sport, along with the rest of the bracket. If you need me, I’ll be out back parking cars on my lawn ($20/game).
Arkansas
Oh, Arkansas. What the hell? Adidas was to blame for the whole football uniform thing last fall, so we may as well keep it up. Here’s the jersey seen most of the time, in white and red. As you can see, it’s equally offensive on the front and back. If there’s a matching gray set out there, I couldn’t find pictures. And I’m not going to go looking for it, either.
Last year’s pinstriped whites are also in play, as is a throwback-style cream-colored set.
LSU
The Tigers are back in Omaha for the second straight year, which makes bar owners happy. LSU fans take over bars for a week at a time, especially now that RV parking has been limited at Rosenblatt.
The good thing about LSU being in Omaha is the familiarity. The yellow and purple jerseys have been largely unchanged for years. Seems like having two sets of white uniforms (pinstriped and plain) is a bit much, no? There’s also a white-crowned hat that sometimes appears with the purple jersey.
Cal State Fullerton
For the past few years, I’ve crowned Fullerton the winner of the uni bracket at the CWS, mostly because all of their looks are consistent. Many teams use several different seasons’ worth of uniforms all at once, which saves on laundry but annoys people (me).
The Titans win again this year, even though there are a few new bits hanging in the closet. The traditional white and gray pinstripes are standard, as is the blue alternate jersey. There’s a second blue alternate that’s completely unnecessary but still looks OK. Same for the white-crowned lid.
North Carolina
Nike teams are a bit of a pain in my ass, at least for this annual roundup. Elite teams like UNC are often oversupplied, with about nine different jerseys on hand. Refreshingly, the Tar Heels seemed to have exercised a bit of moderation this season.
The standard sleeveless whites are around, but a new Carolina blue jersey has been added, along with a similar navy jersey. Too bad they still have the Nike pit-stains on the white and gray sets.
Virginia
Perhaps it’s because I like Charlottesville, or maybe it’s because it’s similar to Fullerton, but damn if Virginia doesn’t look good.
Two sets of whites — old and new — along with navy and orange. Pretty awesome, until you see this. What the … you were so close, Virginia. So close.
Southern Mississippi
The Eagles make me neither excited nor angry. I guess that’s like a win compared to the stylings of some of our less civilized CWS attendees.
White, gold, gray. That is all.
Arizona State
I’ve determined that Arizona State officials don’t want us to see their uniforms. Because seriously, ASU media people, I’m not downloading anything to get to the multimedia viewer. No way.
Here’s what I did find: Home whites and a maroon alternate. The Sun Devils have traditionally been well-dressed, so this media (me) blackout is puzzling.
Texas
Finally, we get to Texas. Another Nike school. Here’s the good thing about Texas, though: They haven’t changed much over the past few years. Consistency is king here, once you get past the overkill thing.
White vests, white sleeves, white pinstriped vests, burnt orange, gray. That’s actually not horrible, considering Florida State had nine jerseys last year, followed closely by North Carolina’s eight. [Also worth noting: All of the Texas jerseys are pullovers with one-button collars, much like MLB's batting practice jerseys. -- PL]
And yes, that’s the landscape of college baseball today: five jerseys doesn’t seem so bad. Help us, Johnny Rosenblatt’s ghost — you’re our only hope.
Ah, crap. There’s a lady trying to double-park her Dodge Caravan out back. If she gets in there sideways, no way that black Corsica is going to fit. Back to work!
Some other news of note: Paul here, with a few tidbits that may interest you:
• As you may know, the very wonderful rock band Wilco will be releasing a new album later this month and is already on tour to support the new record. You may also know that four of the band’s shows next month will be held at minor league ballparks. But what you can’t possibly know, because I haven’t told anyone until now, is that I’ll be raffling off two pairs of tickets for each of those shows.
I’ll have more details on this during the week of June 22nd. Just wanted to get you excited about it now.
• True story: When Kirsten and I arrived at the WNYC studios yesterday for our radio interview, they sat us down in front of two microphones — one green, one purple. You can guess which one I took. As for the interview itself, our time slot got cut in half because the guy who was on before us (who happens to be the Governor of New York State) ran long, so we didn’t really get to discuss anything in any kind of depth. But if you want to hear very cursory chatter about Candela, Uni Watch, and “I’m Calling It Shea,” you can listen to the segment here.
• One problem with the Candela exhibit has been that the City Reliquary is only open on weekends. But they’ll be open next Thursday, June 18th, from 6pm-10pm, and their very nice back yard will be available for lounging, drinking, etc. You know what to do.
Uni Watch News Ticker: My favorite item of the day comes from Nolan Brett, who writes: “Toronto brought in reliever Jason Frasor in the 7th vs Texas last night, and catcher Raul Chavez realized his signals weren’t getting through. So he just reached over and stuck the back of his hand in the chalk, turning his hand and fingers white.” … Major news at NHLuniforms.com, where the site has gotten a serious upgrade. … Here’s a good view of Derek Jeter not wearing the Yankees’ cap patch (with thanks to Steve King). … Ten more illustration scans have been added to our gallery from The Professionals (with continued thanks to Jim Mellett). … In a related item, here’s an interesting note from Noel Basnight: “A few of the images from The Professionals seemed familiar, so I checked my library. My search uncovered a ‘playbill’ from an NFL-sponsored show called The 100 Yard Canvas. Several of the images were identical to the ones from The Professionals. I’m including scans of some of the full-page color images (trying to avoid overlap in the process), as well as the cover sheet and foreword.” Never heard of this show before — anyone know more about it? … Jason Smith commissioned Rob Ullman to do this illo of his girlfriend, Jennifer. “The resemblance is incredible — Rob is a great guy to work with,” he reports. … Sad news from helmet collector Jeff Fedenko, who reports that Helmet Hut historian Jim Parker passed away this week. Jim had weighed in here several times on helmet-related issues, most recently regarding the Lions silver/gold debate. My sympathies to all who knew him and to the Helmet Hut community. … I haven’t seen the new Eastbay catalog, but Chris Edwards has, and reports the following: “In the football equipment section they had a picture of a line of football players in full uni. They were Nike schools — Penn State, Florida, Ohio State, etc. — and they all had either the team name or school initials in embossed or raised lettering on the thigh pads.” Not positive, but this appears to be part of the undergirdle, or maybe part of the pad itself. Not sure if this will be showing up on the field or if it’s just for the ad. … Here’s a new baseball glove brand I hadn’t heard of before. Bizarre designs here and here (with thanks to Jeremy Brahm). … DIY project of all time: Two Arkansas convicts escaped (and were later recaptured) by making their own Arkansas prison guard uniforms. Details and photos here (big thanks to Steve Lega). … When you lie down with dogs, expect to get fleas. … Back in 2007, Mario Fontana wrote an entry about the charity Wiffle Ball tournament he participates in. For this year’s edition, he created an awesome logo that he’s making available on shirts and patches. For details, look here. … Reprinted from yesterday’s comments: Audio Outmania! Josh Outman discusses his stirrups, among other things, about a quarter of the way through this radio interview. … Plenty of Broncos uni discussion in this article (with thanks to Brad Shannon). … The minor league Florence Freedom will wear special police and firefighter tribute jerseys on Sunday (with thanks to Jim Ransdell). … Mark Fightmaster reports that the city of Cincinnati has a new logo. … Oh man, look at this: In happier times, GM had its own hockey team (great find by Mike Hersh). … With ads on uniforms looking more and more inevitable, locker rooms are gonna have a lot more signs like this one (with thanks to Chad Todd). … Washington State will unveil new football uniforms tonight (with thanks to Spencer Bowen). … The All Blacks have a new alternate jersey — and it’s white, paradoxically. Details here (with thanks to Haydn Green, who also came up with a bunch of photos from the 1965 Springbrook/South African tour of New Zealand). … Very odd to see pillbox caps for American League teams. Kyle Pineda found that auction, and also found this. That can’t be right, can it? … The NBA will be playing preseason games in Mexico and China this fall. Here are the logos they’ve come up with for the occasion — not bad.
Looking back, looking ahead: Thanks yet again for all the supportive words and thoughts in recent days. It’s no exaggeration to say that the Uni Watch community played a major role in helping me get through this very stressful week. I’m a lucky fella.
I had a lengthy road trip planned for today through the middle of next week. After initially thinking I’d cancel it, I’ve decided to go ahead with it. This means you’ll be in Phil’s capable hands for the next five days, and I’ll look forward to meeting the Baltimore/DC crowd on Wednesday night, 7pm, at Hillendale Lanes. Remember, it’s BYOB, and don’t worry about actually bowling — I just like the idea of hanging out at a duckpin house, even if we don’t toss any games. Of course, if people want to bowl, that’s fine too.
Okay, that’s it. See you at the end of next week.
June 12th, 2009
After a nearly three-decade gap, Oregon will be returning to the college baseball fray next spring, and yesterday Nike unveiled the team’s new baseball togs. At first glance, a few things jump out — the oddly truncated pants piping (vaguely reminiscent of Korea’s WBC design), the annoying thigh logo, the guy wearing his IQ on his chest. But if we take a closer look, a few subtler details become apparent:
• The reason the pants piping is truncated is that the pants have an odd tailoring pattern. Look at the seam wrapping around the hip here and here.
• You know how some hoops uniforms have contrasting rear necklines? Nike appears to be bringing that concept to the Oregon baseball team, as seen here and here.
• Similarly, it looks like the vests have partial outlining on the armholes. Looks like a new undershirt concept, too.
• Here’s the best part: According to the press release, the pinstripes on the gray uniforms “are made with the words of the Oregon fight song,” which you can sorta-kinda see here. (I’d be all in favor of doing this for the Mets’ pinstripes, as long as they included the rarely heard second verse of “Meet the Mets,” which includes the line “All the fans are true to the orange and blue” — no mention of black.)
I don’t follow college baseball (and let’s face it, neither does anyone else except MLB scouts), so for all I know maybe some of these elements have already been incorporated into other schools’ uniforms, although I kinda doubt it. But if nobody watches college baseball anyway, then does any of this even matter? Yes, and here’s why: Nike badly wants to get its hands on the MLB uniform contract when Majestic’s deal is up at the end of next year, which means some of these design concepts could be headed to a big league ballpark near you.
Meanwhile, if you take another look at Oregon’s press release, there’s a very telling choice of words lurking within the third graf:
Like uniforms for other Oregon sports programs, the Ducks new baseball uniforms are designed for performance as well as style, with the ultimate goal to remove any distractions so an athlete can perform to its full potential.
Note the choice of words at the end there — not “his potential” (or hers, as the case might be), but its potential. There’s the Nike/Oregon approach in a nutshell: the athlete as promotional robot, just a means to a marketing end. Is there any doubt that they’d replace the live athletes with androids if they could?
Personally, I’d use green and gold: On Tuesday I had a short Page 2 piece about how counterintuitive it is for red — normally a leftist-associated color — to be the unofficial “team color” of the Republican party (in case you missed it, scroll to the middle of this page). That prompted a response from Josh Starr, who said he could explain the “real history” behind the way red and blue got assigned to the two major parties. Here’s his story:
I was a polling analyst for Mark Penn and Doug Schoen in 1995, when we were brought in by Dick Morris and Bill Clinton to do the polling for Clinton’s 1996 re-election campaign.
In 1995 and 1996, there were private weekly meetings (Wednesday nights) held in the White House residence on Wendesday nights to plan the campaign. It was a small group (Clinton, Morris, Penn, Schoen, Al Gore, Leon Panetta, Bob Squier, Bill Knapp, George Stephenopolous, maybe a few others). These meetings were later detailed, I believe after the election, by The New York Times.
For each week’s meeting, I would develop maps of the status of the electoral college, as well as maps of media buys and visits by the Clinton and Dole campaigns. At the time, mapping software was making it easier to create these kinds of maps. I was known as “the Map Guy.”
When you sit down to develop an electoral map, you have to actively decide which colors to use. I did some research at the library (this was before the extensive online resources we have today) and found that the networks were inconsistent in their assignment of colors to the different parties, so that wasn’t helpful. And the parties themselves tended to use red, white, and blue — again, no help.
So I decided to assign the Democrats blue and Republicans red. I wavered between green and yellow for “toss-ups.”
After a few weeks of meetings using these maps, Mark Penn came back to my office (something he rarely did) and said something like, “Josh, they love the maps, they’re a big hit. The President loves it.” He then said the President had asked him why we chose these colors for the parties.
As I explained to Mark, there were several reasons. For one, the term “Blue Dog Democrats” was thrown around in the early and mid-’90s, so the association stuck with me. In addition, we were centrist Democrats and I never liked the association of our party with red communism. So I wanted to symbolically throw the red back at the Republicans. I also saw the Republicans as more angry/red in the face/out of control, since this was the era of the Newt Gingrich and the Contact with America. In addition, I associated red with a “red light” and stopping, while blue connotes something more positive and forward-thinking. All of these were reasons that went into my decision.
So that was the genesis of the color selection.
From these meetings, the shorthand vernacular turned to using the terms “red states” and “blue states” and spread from the private meetings to conversations with political professionals and the media. By 2000, these terms had been part of the DC language for years.
The funny thing is, I am a public opinion researcher and we never tested the branding impact of the colors red and blue — yet this is one decision that (unintentionally) has had long-lasting brand implications.
Accurate? I have no idea. But it’s pretty fascinating.
Uni Watch News Ticker: Maybe the scoop-hems on those Reebok hockey jerseys have a use after all. That’s the cover of Teeny Bikini, a 20-page chapbook of Rob Ullman’s latest hockey-themed cheesecake sketches. You can get a copy for only $2 here. … Speaking of Rob, he’s done two more illustrations for Uni Watch readers. This one was commissioned Rick White, and this one by Trish Brickler and Ryan Johnston. … Looks like both Habs goaltenders are breaking in new “natural” pads to be worn with this season’s throwbacks (with thanks to Jonathan Deery). … Lookalike Bowl this Saturday, as Auburn hosts UT-Martin (as pointed out by Mike Pennington). … “I was Kansas’s first exhibition game to see how the NOBs would be handled for twin freshmen forwards Markieff Morris and Marcus Morris,” writes Brad Barker. “I was almost certain no first initials would be used, and I certainly did not foresee this solution.” … Reprinted from yesterday’s comments: An artist in Boston is making some truly magnificent silk-screened posters, many of which are only ten bucks. Click around the site to see more — great stuff. … Cam Ward has been trying out a new mask (with thanks to Chris Ashworth). … Yesterday I asked what this neck bumper inscription stood for. The answer comes from Chris Fleming: “Unless I am woefully out of touch, it is a reference to ‘Bad A$$ White Boy.’ Sort of a morph on the ‘Bad A$$ Yellow Boy’ tattoo over Kenyon Martin’s heart, and akin to Jason Williams’s ‘W-H-I-T-E-B-O-Y’ knuckle tattoos — an idea that Metal Mulisha’s ‘Twitch’ claims to have originated, although I would sooner douse myself in battery acid than referee that debate.” … Mike Pratt has come up with an amusing Missouri-themed T-shirt design. If you wanna score one for yourself before Mizzou and/or Jack Daniel’s serve him with a cease-and-desist, contact him here. … Beat writers rarely provide good uni-related coverage, but here’s an exception to that rule: a really good article about the Redskins’ solid-burgundy look (with thanks to Dan Steinberg). … In yesterday’s ESPN column, I mentioned that every MLB team wore the MLB 100th-anniversary patch either on their sleeves or on their vests (up high for the Indians, down low for the A’s)in 1969. But in yesterday’s comments, the pseudonymous PKK wrote, “I have never seen a picture of any Pirate with the patch. Did they wear it? And if not, why not?” This is something I’d completely missed over the years, but it turns out he was right — Okkonen shows no patch, and the same goes for all the 1969 Pirates photos I could find (additional examples here and here). I’ll see if I can get the full story behind this one. … Speaking yesterday’s ESPN column, Jerry Dior isn’t the only guy who’s never gotten credit for creating an iconic symbol (with thanks to Patrick Salvo). … Several good finds by Mako Mameli: a Texas A&M player with two sets of TV numbers (”I have never seen before and don’t know if they actually took the field with it,” he writes); Real Madrid’s Guti, whose unusual NOB is based on his first surname (Gutiérrez) and then the H is from Hernandez (his second surname), A from Aitor (his son’s name), and Z is from Zaira (his daughter’s name); and check out the lowercase letter in this NOB. … Lightning goalie Mike Smith’s has yet another new mask and says he might break out a new one every month. Details toward the end of this article (with thanks to John Muir). … A few more shots of purple-clad folks from Election Night, courtesy of Mike Hersh. … A few days ago I linked to a photo of a memorial decal on the front of a helmet, something I’d never seen before. But now Tris Wykes has come up with another example. “That’s Oscar Smith High in Chesapeake, Virginia,” he writes. “It’s in memory of RB Lonnie Andrews, who was shot and killed last summer. The same kid even has Andrews’s initials shaved into his head.” … Also from Tris: There’s nothing particularly remarkable about the Rockford Ice Hogs’ primary logo, but check out their alternate logo — I like. … The Penguins have unveiled their alternate jersey. … Look at this shot of Jim McMahon in his BYU days. Note that he’s got a blue facemask, while the running back and lineman have white (good spot by Jesse Agler). … Speaking of facemasks, Dan Wunderlich notes that several Florida players are wearing that new Revolution mask design, including Brandon Spikes, Dustin Doe, and Emmanuel Moody. … The Portland Pirates will be wearing a, uh, patriotic design for Veterans Day (with thanks to Ben Nickerson). … Tyler Hull reports that Real Madrid added a Spanish flag patch for yesterday’s Champions League match against Italy’s Juventus.
November 6th, 2008
By Bryan Redemske
Florida State was eliminated from the College World Series on Monday night, robbing a national television audience of the chance to see an all-yellow uniform. Of course, that loss also took away viewing opportunities for five other unseen Florida State jerseys. You know, because they have eight different jerseys.
Eight jerseys. Remember when the Marlins came into the National League in 1993 with multiple jerseys and hats? What seemed like overkill then is pretty much par for the course at the College World Series. The roots are likely in the laundry room, where uniforms would have to be washed after every game of a three-game road trip. And, let’s face it, doing laundry all night sucks. So why not bring another uniform set? Or maybe two extra sets! Perfect!
Or how about eight? Now you’re onto something. Here’s a team-by-team look at this year’s College World Series:
Stanford — It’s best to get the Cardinal out of the way early, because it’s the simplest. Here’s the entire wardrobe: home, away. That’s it. Note the pullover tops, remnants of a long-ago era and now part of the program’s tradition. Also note the black front number on the home uniform. It’s the only black on either set, and seems out of place. But that’s also a longstanding tradition [plus it's in keeping with, say, the red number on the front of the Dodgers' jersey, which has no chromatic reference anywhere else in the team's uniform system -- PL].
LSU — Speaking of longstanding tradition … Omaha felt strange without LSU fans milling about, drinking all of our beer. The Tigers are back, and they brought their purple and yellow along. The yellow jerseys are the same as they were in the late-1990s glory days, while the whites are similar. There’s a purple jersey in the wardrobe, but LSU has stuck to yellow and white over the last month or so.
Fresno State — Here’s the surprise team of the series. From an attire standpoint, it’s probably my favorite. The Bulldogs have four jerseys (white, gray, blue, and red), two pairs of pants, and two hats. But everything matches, so any combination can be worn together. It’s like Oregon football, but without the whioe burning-retina thing. Also, the Bulldogs appear to have merit stickers on their helmets. Or else a pox of some sort. [Late-breaking footnote from reader Dana Czerwinski, who points out that the Bulldogs also seem to have some button issues. And eagle-eyed Hunter Franks has spotted something interesting: a "TM" symbol on the team's cap. -- PL]
Rice — The Owls keep it simple, with “Rice” across the front of their jerseys in Old English. It’s the same on the home and away sets, and also the blue alternate. There’s a pinstriped set this year, too, but it doesn’t come out much. I like it as a complement to their other jerseys. Same for the blue alt — nice.
Georgia — Beware, we’re deep into Nike territory here. Sure, Fresno State is a Nike school, too, but not like this. The armpit-stains jersey is here, and it won’t get better until this entry is done. There’s lots of it ahead. Georgia wears white jerseys and caps most of the time but went with the red alternate for the CWS opener. That’s the second red jersey they’ve worn this season — here’s the other. It looks like they got a new one halfway through the schedule, as the script one hasn’t been seen in a while. There’s also a gray uniform and a black jersey kicking around somewhere, along with a red-crowned hat with a black bill. The Nike pits thing is troublesome, but because of that cut, teams with those jerseys are forced to compress or shrink their logos or wordmarks on the front, which effectively clutters the hell out of things.
Florida State — Eight jerseys, huh? Here they are: White, pinstriped, white again, gray, pinstriped gray, red, yellow. Okay, that’s only seven — there’s another red jersey, too, but pics are hard to find. I really like the “FS” logo jerseys, which are the most current set. The others, with “Seminoles” across the front and Nike pits on the side, can go away any time now. Oh, like Monday … ouch.
North Carolina — The Tar Heels have undergone the same unneccessary uniform explosion as Florida State. But, sadly, they fell short of the eight-jersey mark. UNC has three white jerseys (and two different vests), one Carolina blue top, one navy top, and one gray jersey. Not sure if last year’s godawful black model might be available, too. And let’s not forget the two different white caps, the navy blue cap, the gray cap, and the Carolina Blue cap. Maybe we should. This makes me long for the days of old. Or just makes me like Stanford more.
Miami — Finally, the Hurricanes are here to calm the waters with a mere six jerseys. That includes, of course, a sleeved and sleeveless version of the same jersey, à la the Twins. Then there’s green, orange, gray, and — regrettably — black. Always with the black.
And that’s the College World Series, minus paying $20 to park on some dude’s lawn and then walking a mile to the stadium, or $7 for a milkshake (after waiting in line for 30 minutes), and then, finally, coming home with severe sunburn on half of your body. I love June.
While we’re on the CWS, though, here’s a note from Elena Elms, who spotted a uni-related item on this Q&A page. Here’s the pertinent passage
Q. So I was wondering…what’s up with the Michael Jackson approach to Carolina baseball? I’ve noticed that the position players wear a single white glove underneath their fielding gloves. The gloves look similar to batting gloves. I was wondering, what’s Nike’s newest baseball innovation? I guess they must be effective, because I’ve seen a variety of the players wearing them; including this past weekend, where I’m surprised that the gloves didn’t permanently fuse to their hands as a result of the sweltering heat.
A. For the last two years, Nike has picked a color to emphasize with their college baseball apparel and equipment. In 2007, that color was black, which resulted in a major Tar Heels abomination. The company also produced black bats that were used — with a varying degree of enthusiasm — by several players last year. This season, the color of choice is white. That means white bats, white batting gloves (which is what Jennifer noticed), and even white spikes. As you might have noticed, Nike sent the Tar Heels some custom white spikes with Carolina blue accents that are a vast improvement over last year’s black jerseys. The white shoes made the trip to Omaha, and it’s a safe bet that you could see them at some point during the College World Series. What’s next for Nike? I don’t know, but let’s hope their color choice for 2009 isn’t red.”
Wait, Nike issues blanket colors and templates to every team it supplies? No way! Thanks for the tip, Elena.
Second Time Around: Paul here, with a buttload of follow-ups. First, regarding my newly acquired vintage jersey of uncertain origin (left), several people wrote in to say it looks a basketball warm-up shirt. “Yeah,” I told all such correspondents, “but how do you explain the uni number, since 7 isn’t kosher for scholastic hoops?”
That pretty much stumped everyone, except for Terry Proctor, who responded, “Up until 1962, high school basketball players could wear the digits 6,7,8, and 9 in any combination. But starting with the 1961-62 season, those digits became illegal for use (that rule is still in effect for high school and college basketball). So a player wearing #7 in the 1950s is entirely feasible. The rules were made by the National Federation of High School Sports Federations (NFHS) and the NCAA, which usually parallel each other’s rules changes.”
I hadn’t known when that rule went into effect. Also hadn’t suspected that the jersey was pre-1961 (I figured mid- to late ’60s). As for Terry, he added, “I know a little about athletic uniforms — I’ve been selling them since 1967. My friend and I do mostly high school and junior league teams in the Rochester area. I worked in Rochester for 23 years at the former Ruby’s Sporting Goods. We used to outfit the Rochester Americans hockey team.” I asked if he’d be willing to do a Uni Watch interview, and he quickly agreed, so expect to hear more from him later on.
Meanwhile, reader Paul Kosman has helped establish a new benchmark for the earliest appearance of the ® symbol on the Cubs’ jersey logo. My previous working date has been 1982, but Paul provided me with this 1981 card. The photo had to have been taken in either 1979 or, more likely, 1980 (prior to 1979, the Cubs’ chest logo had a narrower blue circle, and there was no red circle on the chest patch), so 1980 is my new benchmark. Paul’s theory is that the trademark symbol arrived along with the thicker blue circle in 1979 — a good hypothesis, if we can prove it. For now, though, I’m going with 1980.
It’s worth noting, by the way, that someone had suggested in last Friday’s comments that the Tribune Company might have imposed the ® symbol after they bought the team. But that ownership change took place in 1981, so this latest visual evidence would appear to blow a hole in that theory. Meanwhile, just for fun, Paul also scanned the covers of the Cubs’ 1977 and ’78 media guides, which, as you can see, underwent their own ®-symbolic evolution.
Finally, I suddenly got a flurry of returned calls yesterday from the Chicago Athletic Association. First I heard from their attorney, who wanted to make sure I wasn’t doing some sort of exposé. Then I heard from their COO, Rich Wharton, who pointed me toward their historian, Ron White, who agreed to answer my questions about the connection between the CAA logo and the Cubs logo.
Ron turned out to be a real character. I don’t know if he smokes a pipe, is absent-minded, or wears a corduroy jacket with suede elbow patches, but let’s just say none of that would surprise me. Amidst lots of unrelated ramblings about woodpeckers, track meets, and Germans masquerading as Poles, he managed to convey the following points:
• The CAA adopted a red “C” logo on a white field in March of 1892.
• About six months after that, they added a black circle around the C.
• In 1908, it was proposed that the black circle be changed to blue, because blue would look better when rendered in stained glass, but the club’s membership voted down this change.
• In 1916 and ’17, prior to America’s entry in the first World War, there was a huge outpouring of patriotism and support for the French and British air forces, which were fighting the Germans in Europe. Both those air fleets used red, white, and blue roundels on their fighter planes — red with a blue center for the French and blue with a red center for the Brits (for more on roundels, look here). The CAA decided to change their black circle to blue as part of this wave of support.
• William Wrigley, who’d been a CAA member since 1895, was part of a syndicate that purchased the Cubs in 1916 (he became the principal owner after buying out other shares in 1920). But it’s not clear exactly when or how he began using the CAA logo as part of the Cubs’ identity system — Ron said the logo just sort of “drifted” into the team’s graphics, “and no one ever questioned it, because [Wrigley] was part of the [CAA].” But when exactly did this drift take place? If you look at the team’s uniform progression beginning with 1916, you’ll see that the now-familiar red “C” didn’t appear on the team’s uni until 1937. Even more confusingly, the team used a similar C way back in 1908 and a “C-ubs” treatment in 1909, well before Wrigley was involved with the team. It’s unclear whether these marks had anything to do with the CAA. It’s also unclear whether Wrigley used the CAA-derived mark — i.e., the one with the red C — for non-uniform purposes (programs, signage, stationery, etc.) between 1916 and 1937. If anyone has has any pre-1937 documents showing the Cubs using CAA-inspired graphics, please let me know.
Ron promised to send me copies of some early paperwork relating to the CAA logo, so hopefully I’ll have some additional info soon. Based on my conversations with him, though, it’s clear to me that there was never any sort of legal arrangement between the CAA and the Cubs. So the ® on the Cubs’ uniform has nothing to do with the CAA.
Incidentally, those people who first advocated the blue circle back in 1908 were right about the stained glass.
Uni Watch News Ticker: Awesome DIY project by Jeff Barak, who writes: “When I was a kid I bought several of the 1973 Fleer Baseball Big Signs. As an adult, I was able to add a few of the missing ones at a baseball card show, and I eventually got the rest of them off of eBay. But a couple of teams changed logos shortly after the set of signs came out and, as time passed, more expansion teams joined MLB, so my set of signs again started to feel incomplete. So I decided to make an ‘update set’ for the Fleer Big Signs in the style of the originals.” Jeff eventually showed his creations to JC Helf, webmaster of the completely amazing Fleer Sticker Project site, who featured Jeff’s designs in a recent entry. You can also see JC’s entry on the original Big Signs series here — all highly recommended. … Interesting tidbit in the middle of this story about Yadier Molina’s latest injury. The relevant passage (spotted by Ryan Johnston) reads, “Molina had a mild concussion in September of last season, prompting bullpen catcher Jeff Murphy to improvise a hybrid catcher’s mask. For better protection, he merged the shell of the hockey-style mask with the padding from a traditional mask. … Since the Wings beat the Pens, Pennsylvania governor Ed Rendell had to settle a bet by wearing a Wings sweater. Details here (with thanks to Morris Levin). … Hadn’t seen this before: gumball-style helmets modeled after the Riddell Revolution design (big thanks to Greg Riffenburgh). … “Took this photo over the weekend during the introductions of a softball all-star game,” writes Steve Johnston. “Kind of speaks for itself. Love the expressions from the girls standing in line next to her.” … When the Bills play occasional home games in Toronto over the next five years, they’ll be wearing this patch. Details here. There’s also some discussion about possibly adding a uni-borne memorial for Tim Russert. … Reprinted from yesterday’s comments: Georgia Tech football uni poll here. … I was walking through an Italian neighborhood in the Bronx yesterday afternoon when a lot of yelling and cheering emerged from a bar. Maybe it was because Italy’s Antonio Cassano got a little carried away celebrating his squad’s victory over France yesterday (thanks, Bryan). … In case you missed it, Mets GM Omar Minaya, asked why he fired Willie Randolph at the team’s hotel instead of at the stadium, said, “I don’t believe in firing a manager after the game in uniform,” becaus that would be a “disrespect.” So after losing his first game as interium skipper last night, Jerry Manuel quipped, “I made it through. I’m going to have to sleep in this uniform, though.”
June 18th, 2008
By Bryan Redemske
FYI: Paul’s got a non-uni piece up Page 2 today.
Meanwhile: Back in the good ol’ days — say, 1603 or so — the beaver played a key role in the rapidly expanding fur trade of North America. Without this humble, wood-nibbling creature, there’s no way the white man would have taken over the continent. A beaver pelt was good for all sorts of stuff … like trading for whiskey and tobacco. Actually, one pelt was good for one pound of tobacco or four pounds of lead shot. A dozen pelts hooked you up with a rifle. And 15 beavers meant you were a 17th-century pimp.
At Oregon State, five pelts means you play baseball. The two-time defending national champion Beavers have five different jerseys, effectively ending late-night laundry duties on road trips. You likely remember the old-timey contrasting-color placket that debuted in February, but here’s a quick look at the rest of the rotation. Thanks are owed to Hank Hager, the Oregon State baseball SID, for putting up with me for the last two months. I wanted to dig a little deeper, but the coaches are busy trying to win another championship or something. Their priorities are clearly out of whack.
First and foremost is the elimination of this logo. That’s a very good thing.
Here’s what the Beavers wore as their standard home uniform for the past few years. Despite a university-wide logo rebranding (aiming more toward this), the cream is still around. And though Oregon State is a Nike school, the baseball team wears Wilson uniforms and uses DeMarini bats, which are made by Wilson.
The new white uniform is pretty cool. A similar black jersey — worn with sweet striped stirrups — is also in the mix. The numbers on both, however, are morbidly obese.
The gray pinstripes, which looked like this last year (crap is also a good way to describe it), now look like this. Much better.
And, finally, there’s an orange jersey. At least they don’t have an orange hat to go with it. Or a white one with sublimated flames or something. Schools don’t do that, do they?
Now over to Vince, for more beaver jokes … and the ticker.
Uni Watch News Ticker: Chris Souder thinks he has found the perfect shoes for Paul. … Elena Elms passes on these photos from the Virtual Museum of University History at UNC. … Not sure this has been linked to not or yet, but someone went through a pretty detailed comparison of the old and new Portland Beaver uniforms. Even if it’s old news, I had to get one beaver mention in, right? (Thanks to Nick Oelke). … New football uniforms coming for the University of Kentucky (Thanks Shannon Knight). … That’s it for the ticker today. 15,347 emails on the ESPN smoking column, but only a handful of helpful ticker notes.
May 2nd, 2008
The Yankees played an exhibition game up at Virginia Tech yesterday, and there were lots of uni-related oddities. Dig:
• Both teams wore their home pinstripes. This reminds me of when the Yankees and Devil Rays opened the 2004 season in Japan and the Yanks wore their home uni for both games even though Tampa was technically the home team, as if the foreign fans somehow “deserved” to see the famous pinstripes. Fuck that — if you’re the road team, even against a college team, show some respect and wear your road uni.
• The Yankees wore “VT”-emblazoned caps, similar to the ones they wore for one game last year after the shootings on the Tech campus.
• In a rather confusing development, Tech returned the favor by wearing “NY” caps rendered in Hokies colors (the Yankees themselves wore them in a pregame press conference; here’s a closer view). Am I the only one who finds this a bit odd? I mean, the home team wearing the opponent’s logo front and center, with their own logo bumped to the side? That’s nuts. It’s so nuts, in fact, that I started wondering if the Hokies normally wear pinstripes, or if that was just another way of honoring the Yankees. And after a quick check, sure enough, it appears that Tech’s normal home uni looks like this, although I suppose it’s possible that they might also have a pinstriped alternate. Anyone know if the pinstripes are one of their regular wardrobe options, or just a one-time thing? (Bizarre aside: While most of the Yankees were in Virginia, Mike Mussina was pitching a minor league game back in Tampa, and his kid — who really needs to ditch the mandals — was carrying one of the Hokie “NY” caps afterward.)
• Was Bobby Abreu was wearing Mariano Rivera’s cleats, or did his cleats just happen to be “42″-imprinted? As Matt Powers noted in last night’s comments, Abreu was wearing a different pair the day before.
• The batboys had special uniforms for the occasion.
And now a word from Intern Emeritus Vince Grzegorek: It’s time for the 2nd Annual Uni Watch March Madness Pool. It’s time for the 2nd Annual Uni Watch March Madness Pool. The pool will work the same way it did last year: Pick any six of the 64 teams in the NCAA tournament. You will receive points correlating to each team’s seed for each game that team wins. For example, a Number 1 seed will receive 1 point for each game it wins, a Number 5 seed will receive 5 points for each game it wins, a Number 12 seed will receive 12 points for each game it wins, and so on. Highest score wins. Please include a total score for the final game as a tiebreaker.
Paul says he’s got a backlog of stuff to give away [I'll announce what the stuff is tomorrow -- need to photograph some of it first. -- PL], so we’ll have five winners. First place will get first choice of the prizes, second place will get to choose from the four remaining prizes, and so on.
To enter, e-mail your six teams and your name here (NOT to the usual Uni Watch address) by noon eastern time on Thursday. Only one entry per person, and don’t bother trying to cheat because you know we’ll figure it out. Also, note that this is a contest of skill, not a raffle, so no extra entries for membership program enrollees.
Good luck to all, and to all a happy sick day tomorrow. Here’s Paul again with today’s Ticker.
Uni Watch News Ticker: Classic NOB typo last night in Detroit — check it out. He switched to a proper jersey midway through the first quarter. … This is about the funniest thing I’ve ever seen on eBay. I bid on it but didn’t win — dang (great find by Thomas Langan). … An eBay counterfeiter is amusingly brought to task via some ace typeface detective work here (with thanks to Bill Walsh). … “The Fukuoka Softbank Hawks will be wearing two throwback uniforms this year,” reports Jeremy Brahm. “This one is from the Fukuoka Daiei Hawks 2003 season (even though the uniform was used from 1993-2004), when the Hawks won the Japanese title, and this one is from 1964, when the Nankai Hawks were based in Osaka before moving to Fukuoka in 1988.” … Last week I ran some pics of soccer players with unusual tape jobs. As many of you informed me, this is kinesio taping, and now Frank Mercogliano has found an excellent article about the technique. … Gorgeous number typography here. The team is the Staten Island Stapletons, a pro team from the late 1920s and early ’30s (nice find by Marc Rabinowitz). … Remember our recent discussion of hearing-impaired athletes? Good article here on the NBA’s first deaf player, Lance Allred (thanks, Vince). … Reprinted from yesterday’s comments: One other team wore green jerseys on Monday — the Cardinals. … Ronnie Poore has a friend who was an extra in the upcoming Leatherheads flick and sent along two awesome pics — check ’em out here and here. … Awesome old girls baseball uni here — who knew uni numbers were appearing on pant legs way back when? … About two years ago, my pal Rob Walker wrote this column about a guy who’d created a Nike tribute brand, called Mike — read that column. And then read this follow-up from Rob’s blog. Todd Krevanchi, the follow-up item mentions your web site — care to weigh in on this? … Not uni-related, but there’s a great video clip here showing my Page 2 colleague Jim Caple discussing knuckleballs with Mariners pitcher R.A. Dickey. … Cool old Notre Dame patch here (with thanks to Michael Kimmins). … Good story here about Canadiens goalie Carey Price’s pads. Additional photos here, and there’s a great gallery of Habs netminders through the decades here (courtesy of Casey Barcomb). … Chris Mycoskie reports that LSU will wear these throwback uniforms for today’s game against Tulane. Video clip available here. … Ryan Raburn on Monday; Jacque Jones yesterday. I’d pay money to see Dontrelle Willis do it next. … I didn’t know this, but according to this page, last year the Devil Rays “made professional sports history, becoming the first team to wear less green on St. Patrick’s Day” (note the white cap). Now that’s a great factoid! … The Bucks retired Brian Winters’s number way back in 1983. But for reasons that only the team’s marketing department knows, they “rededicated” his number last night, whatever that means, complete with the whole framed jersey routine. “Problem is, that’s the current jersey and this guy never wore it,” notes Nicole Haase, who attended the game and took that photo. … Love the striped socks (and the height disparity), but c’mon, wear shorts that are at least slightly short (with thanks to Bryan Grupp).
March 18th, 2008
By Vince Grzegorek
As a fan, you might wear a ballcap when you go out to watch your favorite team. But for reasons of logic and convenience, you only bring one hat to the game — right?
Well, there is one man who fails to see that logic, and who appears to be undaunted by inconvenience. As pointed out in the comments section a couple of days ago, it looks like there’s a guy who sits in the first row at Jacobs Field and seems to change his hat during every inning of every Indians game. That would be Tom O’Toole, a 40-year season ticket holder who sits in perfect view of the camera every time there’s a close-up shot of a left-handed batter.
O’Toole began his headgear ritual in 1994, when the Indians moved from old Municipal Stadium to the new ballpark. He figured that he was on camera so much that he might as well have fun with it, neon-style. So he came up with the routine of changing his cap after each inning, meaning that he wears nine different lids during every game. Same rotation of colors, same innings, every single time. They even have a sticker on the underbrim denoting their designated times.
There’s a fantastic article on O’Toole and his bizarre and endearing hat routine in here, including the following highlights: He goes back to the first inning hat if the game goes extra innings; he only wears hats at the game, never anywhere else; he only makes it to about 20 games a year; and his wife has to wear the designated hat if he leaves his seat for any reason. The last one has led some random strangers around town to off-handedly mention, “Tom went to the bathroom in the sixth inning because Joanne was wearing the hat.”
For all the great info in that article, one important thing is left out — or, to be specific, nine things. They don’t go through the montage of hats, which is sad, because it is quite the colorful explosion of color that can only be truly appreciated all together in one place. Here’s the sequence:
Now that is fan dedication, in one of its strangest and most Uni Watch-ish forms. Although we might quibble with some of his color choices, Tom O’Toole’s obsessive dedication to uni-related ritual makes it clear that he definitely Gets It™. And if you’re ever watching an Indians game and you’re not sure what inning it is, refer to our handy guide and check for the man with the neon hat in the first row.
And now over to Paul with the rest of today’s news and info.
Research Project: I’m trying to piece together a timeline of bullpen cars and carts. When did they first appear? When and why did they fall out of favor? Which teams had particularly interesting or innovative vehicles or gimmicks? Which pitchers refused to use them? (Mike Marshall comes to mind.) Any other good stories?
If you’ve got any info on this front, please send it here.
ALL MEMBERS, PLEASE READ: I’m making good progress on restoring the missing names from the membership roster, but we’re not there yet. In case you’ve missed my pleas the past two days: A softwear glitch wiped about 90 names off the roster listing, and I need your help to get things back to normal. All members who haven’t already done so should please check the roster listing. If you don’t see your name there, please e-mail me your name, membership uni number, membership level, and why you chose your number. If your name linked to a photo, please re-send it. And if you’d like to help speed up the process a bit more, pick out your card from the design gallery and send me its URL. Big thanks for everyone’s help.
And if you’re wondering about the design of today’s showcase card, it’s based on the back of the Ohio State marching band uniform.
Uni Watch News Ticker: Good breakdown here of Arizona high school football helmets. … This isn’t me, I swear (good find by Todd Davis). … Speaking of the Rockies, good article here about their W-L record in all their various uni combinations. … Latest Euro-styled NBA teams: the Grizzlies and Raptors, who both played games in Madrid yesterday and wore the colors of the Spanish national flag. … Iowa has a new basketball coach who wants to add player names to the backs of the jerseys, but a new name-free uni set was ordered before he was hired and the numbers are positioned too high to allow for names. Details here (with thanks to Cork Gaines). … Is Colorado wearing reflective-outlined numbers or what? … Wake Forest wore a “Skip” patch last night, in memory of former hoops coach Skip Prosser. … Speaking of Wake, most of the team’s players go bare-legged. But as Zach Smith notes, several players appeared to be wearing striped leggings (additional shots here and here), similar to what Kobe Bryant was wearing a while back. … Latest college basketball team to go with the System of Dreck: UNC (with thanks to Jordan Woodson). … Carey Price’s white mask has now been painted (with thanks to Casey Barcomb and Dave Frolick). … “I was at the Pitt/Navy game the other night at Heinz Field here in Pittsburgh,” writes Doug Keklak. “They have a Steelers Hall of Fame exhibit on loan from Canton — I think it’s something they put together for the team’s 75th anniversary. I snapped some quick photos and put them into this album.” … You knew Chad Johnson was Ocho Cinco. But did you know Jonathan Papelbon had christened himself Cinco Ocho earlier this year? He’s even got it on his glove (as forwarded by Phil Johnson). … Jon Eisen just sent me a link to an archive that will take lots of time to explore. For now, though, here’s the cutest uni-related photo ever. … Yesterday I ran some old Detroit sports photos. As Doug Mooney points out, there’s plenty more where that came from. … Another small change for the Wizards: Player names, which had been white, are now bronze (good spot by Colin Wilcox). … Reprinted from yesterday’s comments: Good video here featuring the Sharks’ equipment manager showing the art of skate-sharpening.
October 12th, 2007
[Editor's Note: Long before this site existed, reader Mark Mihalik had already earned the title of Uni Watch Lifetime Achievement Scholar, primarily for his observations regarding footwear. He doesn't contribute as often as he did in those days, but he recently sent a manifesto that made it clear he hasn't lost anything off his fastball. Enjoy. -- PL]
[Intern's Note: With Paul gone, we'll take a few days to recognize some of the writing contributions of your fellow readers. This is the first of three that you can look forward to, along with a new entry by yours truly early next week. -- VG]
By Mark Mihalik
One thing I’ve been following over the past year or so is baseball players who wear basketball sneakers or cross-trainers with modified, cleated outsoles. Here’s an update on what I’ve noticed recently:
First of all, Frank Thomas is still wearing Nike Shox Ups this year with the Jays (just in all black instead of white and green like last year). I’ve recently noticed that Eric Chavez (pictured wearing sneakers here, here, and here) had switched to normal, unmodified baseball cleats for a while (he’s wearing Nike’s baseball Huarache 2k4 shoe here), but now he’s back to his old tricks. Chavez is pictured here wearing the original basketball Huarache 2k4, and he’s in the Huarache 64 basketball sneaker here (I added pictures of the original shoes and Nike’s MCS plates that were built into both sneakers).
None of that was too surprising — I figured all of these modifications could’ve just been done by MLB equipment managers, which is what I assumed was the case with Orlando Cabrera (here, here, and here), Jermaine Dye, and Jim Thome in the past.
But then I was watching the College World Series and I noticed that UNC’s Dustin Ackley is wearing a pair of Air Jordan 11’s with cleats added. Now, most of these modifications have been done on Nike shoes, so I suppose it is possible for Nike to make the customized shoes for their MLB players, but I find it hard to believe that they’d do the same for a college athlete.
But then I did a little snooping around, and found something interesting: Custom Cleats Inc.
If you look around the company’s site, you can see that anyone can provide them with a pair of sneakers and a pair of cleats or just a pair of sneakers, and they’ll put cleats on your sneaker for $89. Interesting stuff. I don’t know if they’re responsible for any of the footwear of the pro or college players that I mentioned, but I think they’d be worth contacting. [Agreed. I'll get on it soon. -- PL]
Friendly Reminder: Paul’s on vacation. If you have questions, observations, or contributions, send them to Vince.
Uni Watch News Ticker: In a move that begs the question, “Will Willie Nelson or Woody Harrelson be in attendance?”, Drew Samuelson notes that on July 20, the Lake Elsinore Storm will be wearing hemp jerseys as part of a “Goin’ Green” promotion that will include organic and healthy concessions, ecological tips, and green fireworks, whatever that means… On Saturday, August 25, the New Hampsire Fisher Cats, the AA affiliate of the Blue Jays, will play one game as the New Hampshire Primaries. That was their original name after their creation in 2003, but an uproar led to a quick name change (very electoral thanks to Bryan Widell)… Fantastic article passed on by Bill Ardizoia about Helmet Hut’s contributions to the uniform (and more specifically, helmet) reproductions for the upcoming movie about Ernie Davis entitled, “The Express”, great read… P.J. Mallardi thinks that BJ Surhoff’s old UNC baseball uni looks pretty cool, especially the helmet… A Uni Watch secret agent has told us that Rice’s football helmet this fall will now be navy and white with an Old English “R”, which would be a fantastic change in my opinion… This might be the coolest piece of fan clothing you can own if you really like Brazilian water polo… Reprinted from yesterday’s comments section, the Tennessee Valley Vipers will be wearing camouflage jerseys for a military appreciation night this Saturday… Enjoy your weekend folks.
July 20th, 2007
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