Two days ago I Ticker-linked to this photo of a Wisconsin high school football player and asked, “Is this where football sock design is headed?”
I got a much more thorough answer than I’d anticipated from reader Jeff Bahry, who informed me that the socks are actually leg sleeves with elastic stirrup loops. “The fabric is comparable to higher-end polyester — not cotton,” he wrote. “They also feature a silicon band to
prevent slipping.”
The company behind this is a Wisconsin operation called Dye Sport, which specializes in sublimated graphics. If you click on “Team Sports” and then start poking around from there, you can get an idea of what they’re about — basically, if you have really bad taste some innovative design ideas, they’ll indulge you as far as you want to go.
The socks aren’t mentioned on the Dye Sport site, however, so I gave them a call and found myself talking to company founder Scott Yeomans. Here’s how our chat went down:
Uni Watch: So what’s the story with these socks? I’ve never seen anything like them.
Scott Yeomans: We developed that about four years ago. We test-marketed it on one Wisconsin high school — Lancaster — to see how it performed, how the kids liked it, blah-blah-blah. And they ended up winning the state championship in it. And from there, things really started exploding. And actually, the Lancaster coach told us they didn’t have any kids cramping up with calf cramps that season. Is it the socks, is it that the kids were in better condition or better hydrated? I can’t say it’s definitely the socks…
UW: What was the design that you did for them?
SY: I’m trying to remember. I remember how we were watching the state tournament on TV and the commentators and the camera kept focusing on the socks. “Look at those socks!” I think we had a gradient — white down at the shoe and fading up to royal blue — with an arrow design.
UW: And how many teams are wearing the socks now?
SY: Last year we had 30 teams here in Wisconsin. This year it’s close to 50, plus we have a team in Michigan wearing them. And we have a dealer now in Arizona — I just shipped him 70 pairs for a youth soccer team. And we have our own boys’ and girls’ soccer teams wearing them here in town — they’re just lovin’ ’em. So we’re gonna expand more into soccer, girls’ softball. And getting back to football, last year we had six Wisconsin teams wearing our socks in the state tournament, and two of them won their divisions, so we’re getting a lot of good exposure.
UW: Since these socks are open at the bottom, does the player wear an ankle sock under it or what?
SY: Some of ’em wear a full-length sock underneath; some of ’em wear a little ankle or no-show sock. It’s personal preference. But you have that stirrup strap to pull it down into the shoe, so it looks like a full sock.
UW: Why’d you choose to make it that way, instead of making a traditional sock with a toe?
SY: It’s less bulky, and it lasts longer. If a sock develops a tear or wears out, it’s usually in the toe.
UW: And again, just to make sure I understand, you developed this product yourself, and you offer it exclusively?
SY: Yes.
UW: Has there been any negative feedback from people who think these designs are too radical or whatever?
SY: No. You have your old-school coaches, but you have more and more younger coaches, and they seem to like the socks a little more cutting-edge.
UW: And, of course, you can offer this product in a conservative design too — it doesn’t make any difference to you.
So there you have it, the beginning of the end for football hosiery as we know it, all thanks to my favorite state, which I will henceforth refer to as Hades, the end.
And speaking of sock-related follow-up items: Back on Monday I asked about the sock logo that Maurice Stovall has been wearing. Turns out it’s the logo for a brand of compression gear I’d never heard of before: Sweat It Out. The bad news is that I just played into their hands by giving them free publicity; the good news, I hope, is that some of the NFL’s uni police guys read this site and will now start cracking down on this pernicious logo creep.
Gazoo Boo-Boos Up the Wazoo: I really messed up the part of yesterday’s ESPN column that pertained to the new S100 batting helmet. As originally published around noontime, the column stated that only three players had worn the helmet in a game: David Wright, Ryan Dempster, and Shane Victorino. But then, shortly after the column went live, Guy Serumgard informed me that Carlos Guillen wore the S100 on Sept. 3rd (apparently this was even noted at some point in the comments section on this site, but I either didn’t notice or didn’t remember), so we added a little “Update” graf to that section of the column. That was shortly before 2pm.
Then I went out and didn’t get back to a computer until about 9pm, at which point I found several e-mails from people telling me that Edgar Gonzalez had also worn the S100. Too late to add another update to the column — I’ll just run a correction in my next ESPN piece.
Not sure how I missed the boat so badly on this — I thought I’d been keeping track of the S100 situation. Interestingly, when I interviewed Rawlings exec Mike Thompson for yesterday’s column, the very first question I asked him was, “Just to make sure I have my facts straight, to my knowledge only Dempster, Wright, and Victorino have worn the new helmet — is that right?” He replied, “Yes.” Of course, it’s not his job to keep track of that — it’s mine — so that doesn’t absolve me. If anything, it’s another reminder that I need to do my own homework and not depend on others to confirm things for me.
Anyway: Let the record show that five MLBers have worn the S100 — unless you know of any others who’ve done so.
Research Query: Got a note yesterday from Matt DeLeon, who poses a very good question: “I was wondering if you knew the history of the ‘Property of’ T-shirts. Were there shirts that were actually the ‘property of’ certain teams? I would assume so, although a T-shirt would seem to be something worth giving away after a few uses. How far back do these shirts go, and what’s the history behind them?”
Excellent question! Anyone out there know anything about this? If so, give me a shout.
“Turntable? What’s a turntable?”: I’ve put a few more old indie-rock 45s up for auction on eBay, and I’ll continue to add more over the next couple of weeks. You can keep track of everything I’m selling here.
Uni Watch News Ticker: LSU will be wearing purple jerseys this Saturday against Mississippi State. “This is unusual because they generally only wear purple at home for non-conference opponents — this is a conference game on the road,” notes Ben Melancon. … New mask for Yann Danis. … The Swedish military has some uni issues (with thanks to Chad Todd). … Is it OK to wear ONOB is the jersey is given to you by the team? (Nice find by John Brooks.) … There’s a resurgence in sales of Expos gear, and it’s coming from an unlikely source (with thanks to Graham Bakay). … Jon Canella notes that Pedro Feliz always has a line of dirt on the back of his road jersey. “I’ve been noticing it since the end of May,” he says. “Superstitious? Not a good enough stain remover by the clubhouse attendant?” And before you propose any theories of your own, remember it only happens on Feliz’s road jersey. Weird. … A few months ago I got some e-mails from a Milwaukee marketing exec who wanted to redesign the Packers’ logo. I didn’t post his designs, because (a) I didn’t think they were very good, and (b) the Packers obviously aren’t going to change their mark. But I guess it was a slow news day at the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinal.
I’m rejoined today by Larry Wiederecht (”Lwiedy”), my double play partner, as today we look the pages of another All Star Game program, this time from the Midsummer Classic in Milwaukee, 1975. Although this would be the first time the Milwaukee Brewers would play host to the game, it was not the first All Star Game to be held at County Stadium, Wisconsin. That honor belonged to the 1955 Milwaukee Braves. The ‘75 game was the 46th playing of the classic, and the game was played on July 15th, 1975. Additional information on the actual game can be found here. I love this really neat patch from the game, featuring the words “All Star Game 1975″ in blue and gold on one circle, and the swinging “barrelman” on the other. (Although, Larry notes that the patch not worn on the uniforms, but rather was based on the press pin from that year [third row, fifth from the left].)
So, without any additional ado, let’s get into Larry’s ASG pics:
‣ Rather boring team photos (by All-Star standards). The American League and the National League. The only real uni anomaly that I know of (Vida’s all gold get-up) didn’t even show up. These came from the ’75 Series program.
‣ Less than dramatic cover artwork by a fellow named Robert Deuel
‣ Obligatory welcome letter from the Commissioner, Owner, used car salesman.
‣ If you are going to use little action shots of Garvey & Cey, at least put them by their own head shots. Sutton, Seaver & Gossage were “misplaced” as well
‣ Also a staple of AS & Series programs are the ring ads
‣ With a lot of help from ChampionshipRings.net and a little deductive reasoning, I came up with the following list (top to bottom then left to right)
1971 Dallas Cowboys
1971 Utah Stars
1971 or 1972 Boston University Hockey
1966 SMU
1967 Philadelphia 76ers
1958 Baltimore Colts
1959 Oklahoma Sooners Orange Bowl
1970 USC Rose Bowl
1967 Southern Illinois NIT
1964 St. Louis Cardinals
1969 Minnesota Vikings NFL Champions
1965 Los Angeles Dodgers
1968 New York Jets
1953 New York Yankees
1972 Boston Bruins (World, not Stanley Cup Champs?)
1970 or 1971 Nebraska Cornhuskers Football
1967 St. Louis Cardinals
19?? UCLA Basketball (Pick a year)
1966 Baltimore Orioles
Thanks again, Larry. Those are awesome. See ya again soon when we look at our next All Star Game Program!
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Guess The Game From The Scoreboard: This one is difficult, but not impossible. The location should be easy, and there are other clues right there on the scoreboard. You shouldn’t need any hints with this one. Date, location and final score are required. Based on the comments yesterday, if you do get the answer, shoot me an email but post something like “I GOT IT” in the comments. This way, people can take guesses throughout the day. I’ll post the winner’s name and some of the good “deductive” guesses at the end of the day. Ok? Ok! Good luck. Guess The Game From The Scoreboard
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Another Uniform Tracker has answered the call. Matthew Bohman “Namhob” is a Cincinnati Reds tracker. Here’s his update:
Phil,
The Cincinnati Reds have had their fair share of uni shenanigans in the past, but nowadays they have kept it pretty standard with a traditional home, away, and softballalternate home uniform. Thankfully, baseball’s oldest franchise has avoided the dreaded away alternate and in doing so has kept many a Laundromat in business on the road. At home, there seems to be 2 rules the Reds follow: 1) the traditional “Sunday Red” is alive and well in Cincinnati and 2) for every home series, the red alternates have to make at least one appearance. The only deviation from this rule so far has been a Monday-Tuesday-Wednesday series against the Astros where the Reds wore home white every game (which didn’t stop the Astros from wearing their red alternates for EVERY GAME of that series). Actually, looking through the Astros games for the first 2 months I have counted 24 away games and they have only worn their away grays twice! And one doesn’t even count as an away gray since they were wearing the Stars & Stripes hat on Memorial Day! Hint to the Astros, you are undefeated in your away grays; try them on sometime!
Sorry, back to the Reds…Being an excel spreadsheet junkie, I am tracking the Reds 3 different ways*: overall record by uniform, game-by-game, and per pitcher. For being an average ballclub, the Reds are .500 in both the home whites and the red alts. They’ve had some success on the road this year and it shows with a 14-11 record. As it stands, they are still undefeated in wearing anything apart from the home whites, road grays and red alts (1-0 is undefeated, am I right?). That will probably change as they are expected to get fancy for July 4th and September 11th as well as the Civil Rights game against the ChiSox on June 20th (they’ll be wearing throwbacks of the 1964 Cincinnati Reds). In the end, I predict they will finish 2-2 in the “special attire” category to remain at .500.
* As of June 1, 2009
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In case you missed yesterday’s post…a NOB research project, by UW Historian/Research Architect, Timmy Brulia:
Hello All,
This is Timmy B, the guy who created the “NFL White At Home” database that chronicles what teams have worn their white jerseys at home in the NFL since 1957, and the “Pro Football Uniforms 1933-1958″ database, which describes the uniform designs for each team in the NFL and AAFC from that era.
My next attempt at a database is for all the teams that have worn the player’s name on the backs (NOB’s) of their jerseys in the “Big 4″ sports of football, baseball, basketball and hockey. Specifically, when they started doing it.
Up until 1960, there was only one documented example of a team with the NOB, the defunct New York Americans of the NHL in the 1926-27 season. Then in 1960, the Chicago White Sox began wearing NOB’s on the backs of their away blouses. Later that year, the upstart American Football League featured several teams that wore them at the start of the season. From all indications, by season’s end ALL teams wore NOB’s in the AFL. The Raiders went so far as to feature the players’ FIRST name as well as their last.
When the AFL merged with the NOB-less NFL in 1970, the NFL absorbed the idea and adopted the look for all 26 teams.
The NBA, already with several teams sporting NOB’s, took a shining to the idea and also made NOB’s mandatory starting with the 1971-72 season.
Not wanting to be left behind, the NHL adopted a league wide NOB policy in 1977-78 (with ONE notable exception which we’ll get to later).
Finally the National League, in 1979, mandated that all 12 teams at least have NOB’s on the teams’ road jerseys. To my knowledge, the American League never has adopted an NOB mandate. However, the NL’s rule seems to have been “waived” or not enforced as the Ddogers went NOB-less for several years earlier in the decade.
The purpose of the database is to be an easy to follow guide as to WHEN teams started to wear NOB’s, either before a league-wide edict, or especially in MLB, when there were gaps from exactly when they first started wearing NOB’s, then dropped them, and then added them. So if you’re wondering when – say the Braves – started wearing NOB’s (1963), when did they stop, and when did they resume the NOB’s. So, as an example, the Braves entry might look like this (years may NOT be correct):
Braves: 1963-1964, 1976-current.
or for hockey:
Rangers: 1970-71 thru 1976-77 (home only), 1977-78 to date.
What I am asking of you, the Uniwatch faithful, is for your help. I think I can cover the NFL and the NHL pretty well. However, for the NBA and especially MLB, if you can send me any photo samples with some verification as to when certain teams started and/or stopped wearing NOB’s it would be hugely appreciated and I will make sure to give you props in the database with your particular contribution(s).
To close, as promised, the NHL exception for 1977-78. In 1977, John Zeigler took over as NHL President, succeeding the long tenure (30 years) of Clarence Campbell. One of Zeigler’s first actions was to mandate that all NHL teams get with the program and affix NOB’s on the team sweaters, both home and away. 17 of the 18 teams complied, with no problem. One did not. The Maple Leafs owner, the crusty Harold Ballard, refused to follow the edict. They went half a season before Zeigler finally said to Ballard, put ‘em on or be fined. Finally, Ballard complied, by having blue NOB’s on the away blue sweaters! Zeigler, said, “Not funny” and then was ready to clamp Harold with some fines. At last, some time in late February, Ballard and the Leafs followed orders, but only for the blue jersey, with white letters. However, Ballard said to Zeigler, I will not do it for the home whites as he had an iron-clad clause with the Maple Leaf Gardens program printers NOT to adorn NOB’s on the home jerseys. Zeigler relented but ordered Ballard to comply fully starting with the 1978-79 season, which he did.
Thanks and again any and all help will be appreciated!!
You can reach Timmy by emailing him with any info.
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Last FINAL Call For the RPM Stirrup Club: Got a note from Robert Marshall, the bobble boy. “phil, could you give a last call on the oriole stirrup, and make mention this weekend that i sent out this email to people that contacted me, and that if they didn’t get this email, that they should get in touch with me again? i think everyone is on here, but maybe i missed someone. i will be placing the order tuesday, so get in before then, i will not order extras. and they take tck 2 weeks to manufacture, so you should have them in less then 3 weeks from tuesday.” So, here’s that last call:
1) Cost $11 per stirrup. We will go through paypal, and use his rpmarshall art email address. Mr. Marshall does not intend to profit from this, but he doesn’t want to lose either. One of you sent Robert a payment for $10 (that is fine, don’t send him an extra 1$, you can work it out on the next pair), and those paypal bastards took $.60. but the breakdown is this: $7 for stirrup/$1 shipping from tck/$.50ish per envelope/ $.50ish paypal/$1.75 shipping to you (he just shipped a pair 1st class)=$10.75, which leaves $.25 for Robert’s gas/time/cover overruns, and he thinks that is more then fair. So, if you want 3 pairs, Robert will know by the $33 total. Make sure you give him a shipping address through paypal if you can. Please make this as easy on him as possible.
2) No, you are not obligated to buy every stirrup. They are calling it a “club”, and it would be nice if people were “generally” in, but nobody is in a must buy position. Robert will continue to add to this email list, and you will get emails every time they go for another ‘rup. If you want off the list, tell him, and he will take you off. Sure, you may occasionally get duplicate info, but it is easier for him to just have a general email to all involved, and not respond individually, he does not want to turn this into a job, he just want to get us all the stirrups we want :)
3) Clearly the next three ‘rups are the red sox, cardinals, and a’s, a popular, yet distant third choice. Robert provided this graphic with some other possible upcoming rups, most were suggested, others he just added to round out the image. He says we knock out the mlb’s first, then go from there, but we might mix in a crazy one here or there. Also the opening size will vary, this first pair is a 5″, and Robert has a feeling people will be happy with this size, it shows sani without getting crazy (staying classy), but we will more or less match the opening to the era. Or if 24 people get in, he can order twelve (min) 5″ and twelve 7″, he will make as many people happy as he can.
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From The Jeremy Brahm files: Bunch of stuff from UW’s Pacific Rim Correspondent today: Here is a picture of the new Speedo LZR Hybrid swimsuit. This one is being made in Japan … Who says golf is dull? Japanese LPGA Golfer Sakura Yokomine is bright in the rain. While Megumi Kido, well it says on her shirt. I Love Golf. Or Chie Arimura hearts golf … Here is a pdf of the FINA swim cap guidelines for the 2009 World Championships. And the Rules in press release … Yowsa! Check out this photo of the KBO (Korean Baseball Organization) Lotte Giants … And finally — Remember the Expos helmets with the odd panels? How about this from the defunct KBO Sammi Superstars in 1984. Awesome Jeremy.
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A brief candle; both ends burning…An endless mile; a bus wheel turning…A friend to share the lonesome times…A handshake and a sip of wine
So say it loud and let it ring…We are all a part of everything…The future, present and the past…Fly on proud bird — You’re free at last.
The above is for a friend. Everyone have a good Sunday. Peace.
In case you missed it in yesterday’s comments, the big hockey news is that Nike is getting out of the sport. This isn’t quite as good as, say, curing world hunger or solving the global warming problem, but it’s a good start.
Unfortunately, we’re still stuck with Reebok, which is apparently determined to blaze a new trail in hockey uniform design, so this seems like a good time to look back at the hockey attire of long ago. The photos that follow come courtesy of reader CJ Fleck, who found them in The Great Book of Hockey (out of print but easy to acquire if you’re so inclined). Lots of good stuff here:
• Two other old Habs sweaters — both light-years from their current design — here.
• Art Ross — you know him as the name of a trophy, but back in the day he coached the Bruins while looking pretty damn suave. And I probably don’t need to say this, but I really want that sweater.
• Time was when front uniform numbers were pretty common. My favorites are here and here, because I love the way the Bruins put the “B” on their sleeves, turning the current number/crest relationship on its head.
• Back when I was a kid, it wasn’t so uncommon for players to wear their uni numbers on their skates. But check out the guy on the left — is he wearing someone else’s skates, or was he traded and issued a new uni number?
Membership Update: The good news: About 30 new membership kits went out yesterday, covering everyone who signed up through last Wednesday.
The bad news: A week or so ago I mentioned that a server glitch had resulted in about about 90 names being wiped off of the membership roster page but that we were retrieving the data and would be restoring the missing entries soon. Unfortunately, the data retrieval has turned out to be trickier than we thought. I still have all the original membership orders, so I could cross-reference the roster table against those, but that would be reeeeeaaaallllly tedious, so instead I’m asking for your help: If you’re an active member but don’t see your name on the roster, please e-mail me with your name, membership uni number, membership level, and why you chose your number. If your name linked to a photo, please re-send me the photo or the URL. And although this last part isn’t necessary, you can speed up the process a bit more by picking out your card design from the design gallery and sending me the URL for that too. I’ll restore things as the info comes in.
Sorry for the hassle, and many thanks in advance for your help.
Uni Watch News Ticker: I just can’t watch when the Yankees trot out Ronan Tynan to sing “God Bless America” (plus he takes so long that I actually had time to run to corner store for more beer during the middle of the 7th inning on Sunday night), but several people tell me that TBS’s camera shot of the American flag during Monday night’s rendition showed an Adidas flag in the background — nice. Unfortunately, MLB.TV’s video archive doesn’t include this segment, so I can’t get a screen grab. If anyone TiVo’d the game, kindly shoot a photo my way. … The Chargers will wear their new powder blue alternate jersey this Sunday. … Speaking of the Chargers, on Monday I mentioned that LaDainian Tomlinson’s American flag decal was still missing in last Sunday’s game, but I didn’t have visual proof. Now, thanks to Doug Mooney, I do. … And speaking of helmet decals, yesterday I wrote that the Bills’ throwback helmets appeared to have the little warning decal. But as Rob Montoya and Joe Skiba quickly informed me, that’s actually the NOCSAE logo, which is a molded into the helmet, not a decal. … Reprinted from yesterday’s comments: Good article here about the Seals wearing gold skates back in the early ’70s. … Essential reading: This article about the NFL Players Association feuding with the league over uniform fines (you’ll have to register for the site, but it’s easy and free). Among other things, it turns out the league is now threatening to fine equipment managers and trainers as well as players, which could be bad news for faithful Uni Watch reader Joe Skiba. No more low whites, Joe! … Something very odd is going on in this photo. Aside from the defender’s underwear being partially exposed, is that his jersey tag coming loose and falling against his left thigh? … Slowly but surely, we’re building a nice little gallery of nose bumper messages. As noted yesterday, Illinois wears “Team” and Eastern Michigan wears “Pride.” Today’s addition: Toledo wears “Attack” (with thanks to Noel Blaha). … Has anyone else seen this Monday Night Football ad? Lots of things here just don’t add up: Black shoes (Nike Speed TDs, at that, which didn’t exist back in Rice’s SanFran days), no whites, no sock stripes. Clearly a Photoshop job, but why? (Good spot by Ryan Armbrust.) … A friend just sent me a copy of a South African real estate magazine (don’t even ask), which featured this splendid hosiery display in the back-cover ad. … Someone on the Chris Creamer board found this Red Sox typographic guide. … Speaking of Red Sox typography, check out the title on the new John Fogerty CD (good catch by Brad Dugan). … Also from the Creamer site: Uniform designer Joe Bosack will be speaking in Boise this Friday. … Here are UCLA’s new basketball uniforms, with the gold “C” signifying the school’s 100 championships in various sports (with thanks to Erkki Corpuz). … As Scott Turner notes, “This photo is great for so many reasons.” … Strictly speaking, the following video isn’t truly uni-related. But it’s worth watching nonetheless:
Last Tuesday morning I drove out to Seaford, Long Island, home of the sports memorabilia auction house Lelands (I’m writing a business story about them for the Financial Times). I’ve devoted several blog entries to Lelands’ auction offerings — you can see examples here and here — so I was all pumped up to see some of their stuff in person.
As it turned out, most of the best items for their next auction weren’t available, because they were out being photographed for the next catalog. But there was still plenty of good material on hand — much of it hockey-related — and Lelands prexy Mike Heffner was nice enough to let me photograph a bunch of it. Here are some highlights:
• There was very little NFL stuff on hand. The primary exceptions: these Bills helmets.
• When I first saw this, my initial thought was, “Cool, a 1980 U.S. Olympic hockey jersey.” Then I turned it over and learned that it was actually an early Nordiques design, from the franchise’s WHA days. (I was apparently so flabbergasted by this discovery that I neglected to snap a photo of the front side.)
• My love of green and gold found Shangri-la in this Chicago Cougars jersey. And here’s the home version. Note the front jersey numbers, similar to what the Sabres did last year and what the Islanders have just unveiled.
• There was also a really cool set of WHA pennants (additional pics here, here, here, here, and here). I especially liked this one — like, is that logo an all-time classic or what? Let me go on record right here: I’d gladly pay an extra $10 per ticket to see hockey players smoking pipes while they played.
• Not quite WHA, but close: a pair of California Golden Seals jerseys, home and road.
• Here’s a minor league team I hadn’t been aware of: the Cincinnati Swords.
• My biggest nightmare was embodied in this Nordiques jersey. “I didn’t realize they had purple trim,” I said to Mike. “They didn’t,” he said. “But some of the blue turned purple in the laundry. Look, it happened on the back, too.” At this point I ran screaming from the room.
Big, big thanks to Mike for his hospitality. And when my Lelands article is published (probably early next month), I’ll link to it here.
Research Project: Last week’s ESPN column about uniform prototypes led many readers to suggest a related topic: uniforms that made it onto the field (or court, or ice) but were worn only once. Classic examples would include the Phillies’ solid-maroon design shown at left (worn on May 19th, 1979, and then quietly abandoned after intensely negative fan reaction) and the Mavericks’ silver ensemble (October 28th, 2003). I agree that this is a good topic, and I’m going to write an ESPN column about it for later this week, as a follow-up to the prototypes column.
Before you flood me with additional examples, let me spell out what I’m not looking for. I don’t want throwbacks, commemoratives, MLB’s futuristic jerseys, special designs created for particular bowl games, or anything else that was only supposed to have been worn once in the first place. I’m also not interested in uni elements that are technically active today but rarely worn (I already devoted a column to that topic two winters ago).
What I want here are designs that were supposed to be full-fledged components of a team’s wardrobe but barely got out of the starting gate before being mothballed. Limiting the project to things that were worn only once would probably make for a very small list, so let’s expand the parameters to include things that were worn, say, up to three or four times. This would allow us to include the Orioles in solid orange (worn twice in 1971, according to this page from Bill Henderson’s CD, although I’d prefer to know the exact dates), the Twins’ Dairy Queen jerseys (worn on April 6th and 21st, 1997, according to reader Tim McCabe), the Mets’ white caps, which were worn just a handful of times in early 1997 (anyone know exactly how many, or when?), and the Phillies’ “bad luck” 1994 blue caps. But it would not include designs that were worn for an entire season before being abandoned, like the Lions’ blue pants (with gray socks!), which were worn for all of team’s 1998 road games.
One thing that should definitely be included: N.C. State’s unitards. As many of you know, I’m weak on college hoops — when exactly was this design worn, and how often? Also: What year was it that Jim Boeheim had Syracuse dress up in blue for one game, and does anyone have a photo of that?
Got more contributions? Let’s have ’em. And don’t delay — I’ll be delivering this column to my ESPN editors on Wednesday afternoon.
Membership News: About 40 membership kits went out in yesterday’s mail, and another dozen or so should be ready by the end of the week. Almost caught up! My continued thanks to everyone for your patience.
Incidentally, there’s an absolute doozy of a raffle coming up next month — one for which you’ll definitely want those three extra raffle entries that come with membership. Can’t tell you the details just yet, but a hint is lurking somewhere on this page.
And speaking of raffles, remember that entries are currently being accepted for the football helmet from Helmet Hut. The drawing is Thursday, 10 p.m., so e-mail your name to uniraffle at earthlink dot net by then. One entry per person, but membership enrollees automatically get three extra entries.
Uni Watch News Ticker: Yesterday’s entry prompted a couple of great follow-ups. First, as you’ll recall, yesterday’s post made prominent mention of Helen Robinson, the Red Sox’s switchboard operator who did double-duty as the team’s emergency seamstress. Jere Smith provided a photo of her. And second, the upside-down 8 on Fenway’s exterior facade can be seen in this photo, which was linked in yesterday’s comments by Rick Schoffelen (if you squint hard enough, you can see that the upper opening in the 8 is larger than the lower). … Several sources inform me that Reebok is poised to acquire Mitchell & Ness, with the deal slated to become public in about two weeks. … Latest example of NFL’s miraculous disappearing sleeves: the Ravens (here’s another shot). “What’s next, wife-beater tees?” asks Tim Walsh. … “Julio Franco reported to the Rome Braves, the Class A minor league affiliate for Atlanta, to finish out the month of August before being recalled to the big leagues in September when the rosters expand,” writes Jonathon Binet. “All of the Braves’ minor league teams where home whites identical to what the big league club wears. But it’s clear that Franco is wearing his Atlanta Braves jersey, and not a jersey issued by Rome. This photo gallery shows that Franco’s jersey has the MLB logo on the back collar, not the MiLB logo. Also, his jersey lacks the American flag patch that the other players are wearing. Finally, Franco’s jersey still has the Lew Burdette/Johnny Sain memorial patch that Atlanta is wearing this year, while none of the Rome players have such a patch.” … I love Tom Bachtell’s illustrations in The New Yorker’s “Talk of the Town” section, but why the hell did he depict Barry Bonds wearing a double-earflapped helmet? … Great photo gallery here of the UCF staff applying decal’s to the football team’s helmet (with thanks to Kyle Mas). … Rugby news from Eric Bangeman, who writes: “England has unveiled their alternate World Cup uniforms. It looks like another bad Nike idea from the world of college football (think Florida and Va. Tech) has been transplanted across the Atlantic. Here’s a photo gallery. In this shot, you can see the different shades of red in the shorts; there’s at least 3 different shades of red in the uniform.” … No photos yet, but 20-year-old Tigers call-up Cameron Maybin wears braces. I can’t think of any other brace-faced MLBers — or NFLers, NHLers, or NBAers, for that matter. Anyone..? … Amusing gallery here of Evel Knievel uniforms (with thanks to Knievel-phile Steve Mandich, who also notes that the CBA team from Evel’s hometown of Butte, Montana, is called the Daredevils). … Todd Burus notes that Kevin Cash is back in the majors — and so is his front-facing helmet brim. … There’s been lots of chatter in the comments about the inconsistencies in how Mark DeRosa’s name has been styled on his jerseys, but I think Chris Andringa is the first to offer visual proof. Here’s DeRosa as DE ROSA at home, and here he is as DEROSA on the road. Andringa says he’s seen both typographic styles on both jerseys at various points, meaning DeRosa has worn four different jersey/name combos. … Ohio University has unveiled a line of “heritage logos” (details here), and their new uniforms are out too (with thanks to Tim Burke).
Now that the first slate of NFL preseason games has been played, a few new developments have come to light (aside from those green dots on QBs’ helmets, which we’ve already discussed at length). Let’s take a look:
• At first glance, it appears that the Chiefs are wearing an AFL logo patch. But upon closer inspection, it turns out that the patch includes little “LH” initials at the bottom, in memory of Lamar Hunt. Personally, I’ve always loved the AFL logo and am happy to see it in just about any context, and I realize Hunt was a prime mover behind the AFL’s inception, but this still seems like an odd memorial choice, especially since it’s so hard to see the “L.H.” initials. Maybe if all the original AFL teams were wearing the patch..? Visually pleasing conceptually puzzling.
• Great to see the Browns wearing their old striped socks again, instead of what they were wearing last season. Additional views here and here, just cuz it looks so damn good.
• Nice catch by Chad Wilcox, who notes that many of the Redskins with non-Riddell helmets are wearing the team’s stylized “R” secondary logo (the one usually seen on Joe Gibbs’s cap) on their nose bumpers Here’s another view. I like. Meanwhile, we’d all seen the team’s 75th-anniversary patch before, but it’s worth noting that it looks plenty sharp on the field.
• Speaking of anniversary patches, the one being worn by the Steelers doesn’t look as good. And although this is still appearing on the Bengals’ home page, it’s not on their jerseys, at least for now.
• There’s something weird about opening your season — even your exhibition season — in your alternate jersey.
• I wish the Chargers’ pants bolts had a few more jags in them. Otherwise, I think their new design looks sharp.
That’s enough for now. Look for further developments in the Ticker as more games are played (like tonight’s Eagles/Ravens and Niners/Broncos tilts).
Charge It: The story behind this commercial and its inconsistent lightning bolt designs (compare this view of LaDanian Tomlinson, in which the upper-front point of his shoulder bolt is pointing forward, to this one, in which it’s pointing backward) continues to evolve. Last week I posted a note from Steve Due of AIS Uniforms — the company that made the unis — which didn’t fully explain the inconsistencies. Now I’ve received a dispatch from Due’s AIS colleague Bob Halfacre (who, as elephant-memoried readers may recall, had some very strong opinions a while back on the subject of nameplate initials), which I think finally closes the book on this story:
We made the bulk of the uniforms in a week with no help with patterns from the NFL. All we had was a replica-style jersey from Reebok. So the jersey itself isn’t perfect. … When the commercial was filmed, the Chargers sent Antonio Gates, Philip Rivers, and LaDanian Tomlinson with their actual tailored game jerseys. The shots of those three players are a mix of footage of those players in their actual uniforms along with footage of actors in the jerseys made by AIS, edited into what looks like continuous football action. I noticed the problem when I saw the commercial the first time also.
This shot is actually LT in his real jersey. Now that I have studied it a little more, I can see the problem. We put the bolts on backwards. If you look, the actual pictures of Gates and Tomlinson have the bolt with the first jag inside low and outside high. The AIS jerseys have the bolts the other way.
This explanation matches up with yesterday’s Chargers/Seahawks preseason game, where all of the Chargers’ shoulder bolts had the upper-front point facing forward (additional views here, here, and here). So there you have it: an all-too-rare case of someone taking responsibility and admitting his mistake. Thanks, Bob.
Membership News: We’re almost caught up on membership designs. Lots of good new stuff in the design gallery, including, as you can see at right, our first Bad News Bears treatment. Also newly added: a San Diego Chicken design. (I confess that I had never noticed the Chicken’s jersey logo until member Michael Rawson asked for it on his card.)
The next batch of designs, which Scott should have ready in a day or two, includes a really brilliant request that’s gonna look sooooooo cool — stay tuned. Meanwhile, new members are still welcome, so keep those orders coming.
Uni Watch News Ticker: No photo yet, but David Conley reports that Tiger Woods’s baby girl, Sam, “was actually wearing a red jumper with a large Nike swoosh on it when they showed her on TV yesterday after Tiger won the PGA.” And if you’ll excuse me for a second, I need to go throw up. … Okay, I’m back: The Celtics have announced that Scot Pollard and Eddie House will be wearing Nos. 66 and 50, respectively. Why? According to Friday’s Boston Herald: “‘Because all the other (expletive) numbers were taken here,’ Pollard said, looking around a conference room that had the numbers of Bill Russell (6), Tom Heinsohn (15), John Havlicek (17), Robert Parish (00), Larry Bird (33) and Kevin McHale (32) hanging on the wall.” (With thanks to Matt Englander.) … If you’re into modifying the uniforms on your video games (as discussed in detail here), you’ll want to check out the customization videos on this page (with thanks to Trev Ulmer). … Shorpy continues to be a great source of old uni photos, including this shot, captioned as follows: “Opening Day at Hilltop Park, April 4, 1908. New York Highlanders and Philadelphia Athletics” (as forwarded by Bob Andrews). … Brilliant catch by Peter Fahey who notes that Red Sox uniforms often have an upside-down 8 (the bigger opening should be on the bottom). … Elena Elms reports that the Durham Bulls will be wearing Livestrong jerseys, to benefit the Lance Armstrong Foundation, on August 19th. … While doing a bit of membership-related research, Scott Turner came across this photo, taken in 1984. “How come Dorsett’s got a big star on his chest?” he asks. Good question. Anyone..? … If you haven’t read Game of Shadows, some of its most damning evidence about Bonds concerns his uniform: “[Giants equipment mananager Mike] Murphy could document Bonds’s physical changes via the changes in his uniform size. Since joining the Giants, Bonds has gone from a size 42 to a size 52 jersey; from size 10 1/2 to size 13 cleats; and from a size 7 1/8 to size 7 1/4 cap, even though he had taken to shaving his head” (with thanks to Matt Schudel for forwarding that quote). … Bryan Redemske notes that Chris Duncan, like all the other Cardinals, wore red shoes on Friday but switched to black on Saturday. … Matt Algeo reports that the Russian national baseball team wore throwbacks the other day. “Who knew there was a Russian national baseball team, or that they were around long enough to wear throwbacks?” he writes. Details and additional pics here. … Not often that you see “Sr.” on a nameplate. The player in question is Nebraska wide receiver Chris Brooks, whose young son is Chris Brooks Jr. (nice find by Brian Hansen). … Small item about Rick Ankiel’s uni number history about halfway down this page (with thanks to Tom Chalifour). … Dave Gardner sent along a few hockey-related links I hadn’t seen before, including a discussion forum for vintage goalie masks and a gallery of Russian jerseys. … “Found a cool gallery of lacrosse photos from the Victoria Shamrocks of the Western Lacrosse Association, a semi-pro summer box lacrosse league in Canada,” writes Thomas Langan. “Looks like some of the jerseys get recycled, as evidenced by the tape over the name. Some nice retro-looking jerseys too.” … “This blog entry has two uni-related tidbits,” writes Kim Kolb. “One is about a United midfielder trading jerseys with Beckham, the other is about some guys trying to steal the Galaxy’s laundry, leading to a chase through the bowels of RFK Stadium.” … The Twins’ recent I-35W memorial decal provides a uni-related connection for this excellent story about how a new signage typeface is being used on American highways. … Soccer note from Jeremy Brahm, who reports that Montreal Impact goalie Matt Jordan was injured with a broken jaw a month ago but is now playing with a mask. … My worst nightmare recently came true down in Virginia, where the Richmond Braves had a purple jersey promotion (with “thanks” to David Rosenthal). … Latest MLB team to pull the totally bush move of wearing their BP jerseys for a regular-season game: the Mariners, who did it yesterday, apparently because it was so hot and muggy and they don’t have a Cool Base road jersey option. … Speaking of the M’s, many of them are wearing a custom-designed undershirt. Details here (with thanks to Jerry Gardner). … Amusing column here about the PGA’s no-shorts rule (good spot by Alan Kreit). … Eyebrow-raising note buried in Phil Mushnick’s Sunday New York Post column (as spotted by Seth Horowitz): “The University of Utah’s new basketball coach, Jim Boylen, could be the guy we’ve been looking for. At Boylen’s urging, black has been eliminated from the team’s uniforms. ‘Our [school] colors are red and white,’ he explained. ‘Black is not one of our colors.’” … The Texans are the latest team to publish their jersey schedule for the upcoming season (good find by Seth Harris). … No photo, but Morris Levin reports that Bruce Froemming is still wearing his All-Star Game cap. … “Adam Gaylord plays his college baseball at Stanford, but this summer he’s been playing for the Waterloo Bucks of the Northwoods League,” writes Matt Nelson. Sunday he sported these nice stirrups.”
I arrived in St. Louis at about 9:40 a.m. and headed straight for Liebe Athletic Lettering. This was just a “getting acquainted” visit, so I could get the lay of the land in advance of my video shoot the next day. It turned out to be an amazing facility, with patches, insignia, nameplates, and rolls of twill fabric all over the place.
Liebe is a subcontactor: They don’t manufacture jerseys, but the big manufacturers send their garments here to have numbers, letters, patches, and piping sewn onto them. For a long time they did most of MLB’s on-field jerseys; now, sadly, Majestic has taken all of that work in-house, but Liebe still does a lot of MLB’s retail authentics (including most of Mitchell and Ness’s throwback product), along with game-day and retail work for pretty much every big pro and college sports entity other than MLB. With the lovely Marcia Meyer as my tour guide, I was given complete access to the entire place, which means I was pretty much like the proverbial kid in the candy store. A very small sampling of highlights and observations:
Although a lot of Liebe’s embroidery is now done by computerized machinery, an astonishing amount of the company’s sewing is still done by hand, primarily by women who look like they’ve been doing it forever. For example, although the main insignia on the Cardinals’ jerseys is done by machine (that’s just a sample piece of cloth, not an actual jersey), the finishing details, like the dark outlining, are all done manually.
Back in the pre-digital days, the main embroidery work used to be done by hand too. Each logo had a pattern like this — basically a sheet of paper or plastic with lots of pinholes. The patterns would be positioned over a jersey and then a worker would smear some pigment over it, which would pass through the pinholes and replicate the pattern on the fabric. That would be the guide for the sewers to follow.
Nowadays, sleeve patch designs are digitized and fed into a computer. But as recently as 25 years ago, the designs were blown up to six times their normal size to form a pattern. Every line on these diagrams represents a stitch. I can’t say I fully understood the explanation of the process, but the patterns were used to create rolls of paper with punches in them, like player-piano rolls. The punch rolls were then fed into the machine that would stitch the patch. The patterns, which are gorgeous pieces of artwork in their own right, aren’t used anymore, but they’re still floating around in old files, many of them dating back to the ’50s and ’60s.
Here’s a nice little detail that nobody would normally know about: The Cardinals’ equipment manager arranged to have special patches sewn onto the shirttails of the Cardinals players and coaches attending the All-Star Game. This is a sample run of the patches.
I spoke with a heat-press operator who griped about how little material there is to work with when pressing numbers onto football jersey sleeves. Check out his high-tech method of getting the sleeves to stay put on the press mount.
Nowadays, all the letters, numbers, and logo appliqués are cut either by a laser cutter or a water jet. But they used to be die-cut, and Liebe still has drawers and drawers full of stamping dies (additional examples here and here). For some reason I found myself particularly charmed by this one, so the next day one of the plant managers used the die-stamper, three pieces of cloth, and a small heat-press to assemble a little Expos logo for me (look at an enlarged version and you can clearly see the cloth edges).
The company has loads of old job order files. Here’s an old Rawlings order form for the 1989 Mets. Among other details, note that Lenny Dykstra wanted his sleeves shortened by half an inch, Keith Hernandez’s captain’s “C” was being removed, and lots of players wanted their pant legs to be a bit tighter.
I could go on, but you get the idea — it was basically a smorgasbord, a feast, an orgy of uni-related arcana. I didn’t want to leave, but I had to head downtown to the Cardinals Hall of Fame and Museum, where assistant curator Brian Finch was waiting for me (along with Jeff Scott, who runs the excellent Birdbats site). After gawking at Brian’s World Series ring — which dwarfed the rest of my hand — I had him lead me to the museum. Here’s a sampling of highlights:
Pretty much every version of the birds on the bat insignia that you can imagine is represented in the museum, including this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one (that’s actually replica that was made for an old-timers’ game, not an original 1927 model), this one (note the royal outline on the birds), and this one.
This is the Cards’ 1956 road jersey — the only year since 1922 that the team hasn’t worn some version of the birds on the bat. But they made up for it by including the super-cool Slugger Bird sleeve patch.
Best attire of the night: Marty Hick and his old-school St. Louis Cardinals necktie. Marty also brought along some incredible show-and-tell materials, but I’m gonna save that for another day.
To my surprise, two of the Liebe brothers showed up — a super-nice gesture that really impressed me. Here I am with Bill Liebe, whose grandfather founded the company about 80 years ago in his basement.
By 10:30 or so, I was pretty wrung out, so I scooted hotel-ward for some shut-eye. The video shoot the next day went extremely well, although I’m told that it will be boiled down to only three or four minutes after editing — a shame, since we taped so much great material. (I didn’t expect a half-hour feature, but I was hoping we’d clock in somewhere around the eight- to ten-minute range.) Not sure when it will be posted on ESPN.com — maybe as soon as next week, or more likely two weeks after that. I’ll keep you posted.
Membership Update: Scott’s been turning out some killer work, as you can see in the card gallery. We’re now over 250 members, and counting. Can’t even begin to tell you how happy I am over the way this project is evolving and growing — my thanks to all.
Signal Flare: Yo, Jeremiah McElwain — if you’re reading this, please get in touch. Thanks.
Uni Watch News Ticker: How great is my intern? This great: I got home from St. Louis yesterday afternoon and found a big package waiting for me, with a Cleveland return address. Inside was this old NFL serving tray, circa 1971. Wow. Thanks, Vince. … Some serious logo creep upcoming for the WNBA (with thanks to Matt Edwards). … “Looks like the Argentina women’s soccer team, which is competing in the Pan Am games, is wearing the uniforms of their male counterparts,” writes Jonathon Binet. “Why else would they still have the two stars above the AFA crest? The two stars represent the nation’s two [men's] World Cup wins in 1978 and 1986.” … JR Boucicaut of ModSquadHockey swears that this rendering of the new Sharks logo is legit. Personally, I think it’s an upgrade, if only because the tape goes all around the stick blade (which, as we’ve discussed before, wasn’t the case with the old logo). … Eli Ganias saw this MasterCard ad on the subway. He doesn’t understand it, and neither do I. What exactly is the point being made here — that you become “more than a fan” when you buy a cap with your credit card? … Several readers noted that Bruce Froemming (known, of course, for his tactful repartee) still had the All-Star Game logo patch on the side of his cap during last night’s Tigers/Mariners game.
You probably know that the Devil Rays played a few “home” games in Orlando last week at the Disney Wide World of Sports Complex, which, despite having only 9000 seats, was no doubt an upgrade over Tropicana Field (and where, as you can see at right, Richard Petty threw out the first ball for one of the games). Reader Andrew Ranck attended one of the games and documented some interesting factoids regarding the 246th stadium to host an MLB game:
The field in front of the dugouts had logos commemorating the 10th anniversary of the complex (who knew). The on deck circles had MLB logos on them, and they seemed pretty worn. I’m guessing they may have been spring training holdovers, but they didn’t seem to get much use anyway.
Left field had a collection of pennants representing some of the Rays’ regular sponsors. Also the area beyond the left field fence was grassy, with families spread out on blankets and kids running around.
Center field was pretty bare, and the scoreboard gave little batter information. Besides the line score and the current count, we only saw the batter’s uniform number and batting average. Right field had a temporary Jumbotron, which only displayed the basic graphics from the player intros and whatnot. In the foreground of that last photo, you can see the soft drink race, which took place after the 4th inning.
The only beers for sale that I could find were 24-ounce cans (for $8.50!). The Anheiser-Busch products had Rays logos on them. This surprised me, because Disney is known for not selling that much in the way of A-B products, because Busch Gardens and Sea World are main competitors.
Thanks to Andrew for the first-hand report. Meanwhile, if anyone wants to give a similar account of the proceedings at the Trop, that might be amusing.
Uni Watch News Ticker: Big kudos and thanks to Trevor Williams of the Brainerd Dispatch, who attended the Uni Watch party in Minneapolis two Saturdays ago and then wrote this very nice article about it. … Lotsa stuff you might have missed over the weekend, beginning with Boise State’s new football jerseys, which were unveiled late on Friday. They’ll look like this, this, this, and this. Further details here. … Also from Friday: Roger Clemens warmed up for his minor league season debut wearing high cuffs and white-striped Adidas cleats but later switched shoes and pant styles. … Reprinted from Saturday’s comments: Friday’s blog entry about Chris Sampson being told to remove his hospital bracelet (in case you missed it, look here) should have included a reference to Rob Mackowiak, who hit two home runs while still wearing his hospital bracelet on the day his baby was born back in 2004 (full details here). … It was Armed Forces Night in Milwaukee on Saturday, with the Brewers and Twins wearing military-themed caps. … Interesting thread on the Chris Creamer boards regarding the Cincinnati Jungle Kats, an AF2 team with a pretty innovative helmet design. … More arena football news from Michael Alper, who notes that Kenny Higgins of the Nashville Kats (again with the stoopid spelling) is wearing red shoes, even though there’s virtually no red in the team’s uniform. … The Orioles are denying reports that they’ll put “Baltimore” on their road jerseys next year (as forwarded by Jason Reddish). … Antiques Roadshow recently had a nice little segment on this medal. Details here (with thanks to Jeremiah Conway). … Anyone know why a manufacturer would refer to this pant style as a “Clemson Cut”? Also, who knew there was a hidden interior stirrup in there? (Good find by Rick Subrizio.) … Grant Emerson notes that Angel Pagan’s helmet logo appliqué has been crooked lately. … Club Deportivo Chivas USA has a new jersey sponsor. Full details here (with thanks to Jeffrey Israel). … If you’re interested in Tennessee high school uniforms, tons of photos are available here (courtesy of Marc Walls). … Texans cornerback Jason Simmons came up with a novel way to sell his uniform number to new teammate Ahman Green. … Ronnie Poore noticed something interesting in this photo of the 1965 NFL draft: The little figurines on each desk are wearing stirrups, instead of football-style socks. Most NFL players did wear stirrups in those days, but they also wore shin-length white socks over them — odd that the figurines didn’t get that final finishing hosiery touch. … Good story here about this Texas company, which makes varsity/letterman jackets. Further background info here. (With thanks to Matt Mitchell.) … Follow-up report from Jen Muller, who recently provided the photo of Dane Richards with his name misspelled: “At a Red Bulls ‘meet the team’ event on Saturday, I had a chance to ask Richards if he knew his name was spelled incorrectly on his jersey. He said he had no idea until he saw it later on the internet. Maybe he’s a Uni Watch fan.” … Check out the socks on Dong Tam Long An of the Vietnamese soccer league, who’s been playing in the AFC Champions League this year (as spotted by Jeremy Brahm). … Can’t say I thought much of Cory Spinks’s trunks or glove colors during his fight against Jermain Taylor on Saturday night. Weirdest bit: When Spinks’s trunks started slipping down, his corner tried to secure them with tape around the waistband — never seen that maneuver before. Meanwhile, check out the fringe on Taylor’s trunks. … Former Knick John Starks is promoting a new line of basketball warm-up pants, which are supposedly easier to pull off in one motion. Details in the “Starks to NBA” section about two-thirds of the way down this page (with thanks to Eric Stangel). … Lots of great stripes on display in this rugby photo, taken by Rick Collins. … Odd logo/number format being worn by the Texas City Stings (good catch by Seth Harris). … A little birdie tells me that the U. of Texas hoops team will go to Nike’s tight-fit jerseys next season. … Matthew Lepke notes that as of yesterday, Ron Gardenhire was still wearing his Mother’s Day ribbon on his windbreaker. … Matt Meltzer and I both want to know what’s printed on Dice-K’s left undersleeve. … Seth Horowitz forwards the following, from yesterday’s NY Post: “Tom Nieto, the Mets’ catching instructor, now has a tilde over the ‘N’ in ‘ÑIETO’ on the back of his jersey. He didn’t have one in his previous two years with the Mets but had it switched this season so that it would be properly pronounced.” … Nike’s latest brainstorm: a new and “improved” design, featuring a black jersey, for the Miami baseball team. … Awesome stirrup display by Brian Garman of the UC Bearcats (with thanks to Buckeye Mike, who says he’s known Garman since they were both about five years old). … Uni Watch design director Scott M.X. Turner and I attended last night’s Yanks/Mets debacle. The shameful truth: I was cold, tired, and depressed by the game’s proceedings, so I left in the middle of the 8th inning. Let the record show that Scott stayed to the bitter end.
The e-mails started coming in on Tuesday evening — not a ton of them, but a steady trickle, all from readers who said something like this: “I’m watching the Georgia vs. Georgia Tech baseball game, and Tech is wearing some seriously weird-ass batting helmets.”
I couldn’t find the game on TV (apparently it was on Fox College Sports, or some other channel I don’t get), so I started poking around Ga. Tech’s web site, figuring I’d find some photos from other games. But all the pics seemed to show pretty basic batting helmets.
Fortunately, reader Brent Hardman was at the game (that’s him and his wife, Christy, posing with the UGA mascot, Hairy Dawg), and he had his camera. To see what he saw, look here, here, and here. Yowza! “Looks like a cross between the Arena League and Top Gun-style fighter helmets,” writes Hardman — a pretty astute analysis, I’d say.
As you can see, the helmets say “Worth” on the back. I’d heard of the Worth brand before but didn’t know much about it, so I went to their site and discovered that they’ve been around since the early 1900s and were among the pioneers of aluminum bats (which, according to their corporate timeline, were at one point used by prison guards to quell an inmate riot — gee, there’s a proud moment). Their current line of fielder’s gloves all have comic book-esque names like the Silencer, the Mayhem, and the Avenger, which should give you an idea of what sort of market they’re aiming for these days. They also make a chest protector that sort of looks like it has pockets.
Anyway: The helmet model being worn by Georgia Tech is the Worth Prodigy. Obviously, all the stripes and color inlays are designed to create a branded look, same as with the Cool-Flo (no surprise, since Worth and Rawlings, which makes the Cool-Flo, are both owned by K2).
One thing I noticed right away is that the Prodigy shown in basic stock photos has a dial in the back (this is presumably what the Worth web site describes as the helmet’s “dial-adjustable ring fit system”), but this dial is missing from the Tech helmets, which seems to leave the lower part of the head exposed. And I’m not the only one who noticed that: When I called Tech’s sports info department to learn more about the helmets, spokesperson Cheryl Watts told me, unprompted, “I don’t know if you noticed, but it comes up very high in the back. Some of us in the press box were like, ‘Does that cover his head?’ ”
Watts also explained that Tuesday wasn’t the first time Tech had worn the new lids — they’d also worn them last weekend against N.C. State. “Worth, who’s our bat and glove sponsor, approached us earlier in the season, and Coach [Danny] Hall said we could try them out,” she said. “That’s how we got started with them. When we saw them, we were all like, ‘Oh, gosh,’ just because they look so different.”
I asked Watts a few additional questions, and she later e-mailed back with the following info:
• Worth had a prototype at the last Coaches’ Convention and asked if Tech players would wear the helmet, and Coach Hall said that they probably would.
• The team just received the helmets in recently, which is why they hadn’t worn them earlier in the season.
• They intend to wear them at home games only, and it won’t be every home game either. We have a huge helmet case that we travel with, which can only hold one of the two sets of helmets that we have — and since we have worn the blue with everything in the past, it’s just more logical to take those.
Watts had also hoped to provide me with some reactions from the players, but that hasn’t happened yet. Meanwhile, the most interesting thing about the Prodigy is that is that it continues the move toward batting helmets that look nothing like caps. I’ll let you decide whether you think that’s a good thing (I’m sure you can guess where I stand).
Research Project: Reader David Smalling suggests that all the fuss regarding Schilling’s sock presents a good opportunity to create a gallery of bloody uniforms — a good idea, if we can get enough of them. Know of any good pics? Send your tips here.
Meanwhile, XXXXXL-sized thanks to everyone who contributed numerological suggestions for yesterday’s ESPN column. I literally couldn’t have done this one without you, people — can’t even begin to tell you have much I appreciate it, and I’m truly sorry I couldn’t thank all of you by name.
Hell Jade on Wheels: I’m in the market for a used car, and I’m sure you won’t be surprised to hear that I’d like it to be green. Thought I had a deal last week to buy a green Civic, but it fell through (don’t even ask), and I’m having a tough time tracking down another emerald chariot. So: If anyone in the NYC area knows of a small-ish used green car for sale, $10,000 or less, please get in touch.
Uni Watch News Ticker: Interesting article here about how several of the Red Sox are wearing little pedometers on their shoes. … Man, I warned them about this way back in November. … Great article here about the patches worn by New York City firefighters. … Rugby news from New Zealand, where the All Blacks have a new jersey (with thanks to Caleb Borchers). … Nice catch regarding Carmelo Anthony’s out-of-date sweatpants here. … Latest reason to move to St. Louis: According to an item toward the bottom of this page, most of the Cardinals have stopped wearing the new BP caps (good catch by Adam Morris and Elena Elms). … Interesting note from Greg Necastro, who ordered himself a Montgomery Biscuits cap (yes, best team name ever, best mascot ever, and so on) and was surprised to discover that “the majority of the graphic is an appliqué sewn onto the cap, but the feet are separate and [embroidered] directly onto the hat panels. … I emailed the retail manager for the Biscuits. He said he really didn’t know why the cap was done like that but that it’s been that way since New Era made the first hat back in 2003.” … Shouldn’t there be some rule about yellow vs. orange? Additional pics here, here, and here, but trust me, none of these shots really captures how bright this game was. I don’t think they even bothered to turn on the lights in the arena. … Wondering where Michael Irvin gets those bizarro suits? Okay, probably not, but look here anyway (with thanks to Randy Miller). … Brian Urlacher’s contraband cap is doing brisk business on eBay. … According to a small item buried at the bottom of this page, the Steelers will unveil a 75th-season throwback uni today. If they follow the Eagles’ example and try to match their 1933 design, they’ll end up with something like this (much like what they wore for the NFL’s 1994 throwback program). … Update: No such luck regarding the Steelers’ throwbacks — full gallery of pics available here.
Guess The Game From The Scoreboard: This one is difficult, but not impossible. The location should be easy, and there are other clues right there on the scoreboard. You shouldn’t need any hints with this one. Date, location and final score are required. Based on the comments yesterday, if you do get the answer, 
Another Uniform Tracker has answered the call. Matthew Bohman “Namhob” is a Cincinnati Reds tracker. Here’s his update:
In case you missed yesterday’s post…a NOB research project, by UW Historian/Research Architect, Timmy Brulia:
From The Jeremy Brahm files: Bunch of stuff from UW’s Pacific Rim Correspondent today: Here is a picture of 
A brief candle; both ends burning…An endless mile; a bus wheel turning…A friend to share the lonesome times…A handshake and a sip of wine
