andrewharrington

The pattern that matches what’s on the ship and not what the Army wears?

What makes it “Army camo” as opposed to “the camo from the actual ship?”

I think that USF uni is the first look at adi’s woven option. At last, a high-caliber alternative to Primeknit.

Honestly, I don’t know if the NCAA requires pre-screening uniforms for compliance. I know we do so as a courtesy to the schools (definitely cuts down on headaches and is one less thing for a busy staff to worry about), but I think some tend to treat it as a “it’s better to ask for forgiveness, not permission” situation.

Someone at Temple must be a great negotiator. Despite being a small school with little mainstream success or nationwide brand clout, they’ve been able to get their outfitters to give them a high level of customization for several years now. I’m not sure I love these uniforms, but good on them for standing up for what they think they deserve.

Man, that was the pinnacle of aesthetics for UT. Classic with just a hint of distinction (the wide stripes, checks, and subtle “moonshiner block” numbers). Loved it.

It was a direct request from the student athletes, so I don’t really see it as an empty, performative gesture from the school.

I think it’s cool that several UC campuses share the bear as a mascot given its association with California iconography, and I think this one is quite creative. It would have been significantly less exciting if it was just tartan, and significantly less creative if it was a literal highlander. I think the approach they took merging California and Scottish traditions is a benchmark for creating a unique identity. As far as the monogram goes, I don’t mind that the R is the isolated character since that’s the distinguishing feature of this particular campus compared to the other UCs, but there’s something nice about the symmetry of bringing the C to the front. Is there an explanation anywhere for why the monogram is oriented with the C dropped below? My first thought upon seeeing it was to make the leg of the R vertical and adjust the spacing between the ends of the C so that there’s a defined H hidden in the negative space of the C and R.

Absolutely. A simple lack of cohesion and balance/hierarchy has long been a weakness in so much football design. You’ve got enormous flag graphics on the two most prominent parts of the uniform. You don’t need more of that pattern shrunk down and printed on the numbers. It’s redundant clutter. The aforementioned graphics are full color, and huge. You don’t need little slivers of those colors on the digits. Solid color numbers would complement those big graphic blocks spectacularly. Gimme a solid black number with red team and player name, or vice versa.

Man, I thought I was being overly facetious with the compass and ruler joke... You’ve got to ask yourself if people can understand the ideas you’re trying to communicate. Do people know about these blueprints? Do they have access to them? Are you presenting the work in a way that connects the two for your audience? If the answer is no, or even maybe, then the value of the idea is questionable, in my opinion. That’s not an inherently bad thing, but here, they’re relying on that idea to essentially excuse the type for looking overly geometric and lacking polish, and that’s trouble; if people can’t understand the why, all the context is gone and you’re left with a bad piece of type. I didn’t even make the connection that the new numbers look much more like Tech’s at first glance, either. Puzzling move, all around.

That type is... rough. It looks like the brief said, “We want a new wordmark that’s clean, sharp, and looks toward the future, but it’s very important that you only use a compass and ruler to create it.” This needs major optical corrections before it looks polished. Also a great example of what happens when your verticals and horizontals are the same thickness; the verticals look thinner than the horizontals in some cases.

I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if they get a letter from Johnnie Walker, either.

They’re obviously referring to night sky, not day sky.

I do have it, but I can’t share it. In general, if you’re looking for really nice sport-inspired typefaces, I highly recommend CJ’s Varsity Type Foundry. If what you’re looking for isn’t available, odds are he’s got something in the works, so keep an eye on the Varsity Type Instagram as well.

No. That’s just an issue that could easily be fixed by not having open fronts on baseball jerseys. Sew that placket shut and it’s fine.

That’s one of adidas’ brand fonts (though it shouldn’t be horizontally squashed like that). I bet there’s something with a similar look out there, but I’m not sure what.

For what it’s worth, every single time a team briefs a project (in any sport), some variation of “inspired by the past/built for the future” is in the brief somewhere. It’s a natural byproduct of internet comments becoming a primary means of critiquing design, and it’s resulted in a “follow the formula or risk stoking the ire of Twitter” mindset throughout the industry. No one wants to take a risk when there’s so many dollars and reputation points on the line.

It’s notoriously difficult to protect the design of plain letterforms and typefaces. They’d have to show the court that their F is so unique or so associated with the school that the end result would inevitably cause confusion, and both color and proximity factor into that. UF would have a good proximity argument, but I think they’d lose on color, because FT would argue that there’s no way in heck anyone would ever mistake a garnet-colored logo as belonging to UF.

I missed it... because it’s not mentioned in the post I quoted... which was a post pertaining to its purpose in MiLB, not MLB.

But how many people care about an MiLB team’s dilution of their own brand when the act of dilution is often what makes the kids laugh and gets the parents to take the family out to the park for the “one night only” swag in the first place? The brand audience for an MiLB team compared to an MLB team is like a lemon compared to a bowling ball.

Thanks for the rundown. Very informative. I think I heard about the crown and “king for the day” custom from a college friend. Maybe it was his family tradition or something. Most of the documentation I can find on the subject of finding the baby, however, does paint it in a positive light, the only negative aspect, as you said, is having to bring the next one. Additionally, I totally understand not being on board with the concept of national marketing for a regional team, but given that’s obviously the goal for teams that are branding themselves in this manner, I still contend that Baby Cakes works better in the pursuit of that goal. It piques the curiosity of outsiders who aren’t familiar with the king cake tradition, which is a good move when trying to increase the reach of your brand. For better or worse, it engages (some) people to think, “What a silly name. I gotta check this out.” Then, before you know it, it’s, “OMG their logo is an angry king baby breaking out of a pastry! How outrageous! Take my money.”

There are some good discussion topics here: Being able to travel to do research is a luxury, and you often pay for that out of your own pocket. If you’re taking research trips, it means you’re taking your job seriously, literally spending your own money in order to do a better job. And yes, you can learn a lot in two days. If you’re committed to naming your team after a religious pastry, why does the team need to be exactly the name of the actual thing? Why not use some creative license to make the name a little catchier? I’d argue that Baby Cakes is a better sounding name than King Cakes (which is a bit clunky), and debate the nationwide marketing approach if you’d like, but given that approach, I’d say Baby Cakes is the better name. It’s simply more recognizable and familiar to people as a fringe-level term of endearment, meaning it’s inclusively marketing those who don’t know what a king cake is (which is probably a lot of people outside the Gulf Coast region). If you do know what a king cake is, I think it’s pretty easy to draw the line from Baby Cakes to, “Oh! They’re talking about a king cake.” I mean they’re called crawfish, but you could probably figure out what I was talking about if I said mud bug or swamp lobster. Lastly, I’ve always gotten the impression that it’s good luck to find the baby. You get the crown and you’re “king for the day” or whatever. Sure, you’re chosen to supply the next cake, but I’ve never met someone from the south who *didn’t* want to cook for you or host a party. Ive even seen people with collections of various cake figurines, so I’d say “sought after” accurately describes the cake babies in some circles.

That particular style of slab serif typeface is commonly referred to as Clarendon, of which there are many different examples out there (of varying quality). A condensed option will likely get you close.

Precisely. The Bills are named for Buffalo Bill Cody, and Cody was famous for being the best bison hunter in the country; that’s how he got the nickname “Buffalo” Bill.

Buffalo Bill Cody lived in western New York immediately following the Civil War (three of his children are buried in Rochester, I believe). Not long after that, he was contracted by the Kansas Pacific Railroad to supply bison meat for its workers. Essentially, he was a professional bison hunter during that time.