Ted Cunningham

Yeah, the spacing in that scorebug is weird. Other than that, I like the simplicity.

3 hours ago, leopard88 said:

 

Thanks for finding this.

 

For the record, in my opinion, the old color looks more what I think of as burgundy than the post -1969 colors.

Agreed. I realize there are more precise definitions for these words, but as a shorthand, I usually use the two words interchangeably (with a preference for "burgundy"). However, (again) that's shorthand when distinguishing between red and a darker shade of red. If I were asked to define the two, I would likely define burgundy as having a little purple to it, where maroon is just a straight up dark red. As for however Washington would describe their colors, I would certainly think "maroon" would more closely fit it. And neither really fits Michigan, though I think the Panthers would be closer to burgundy. ("Plum", a reddish shade of dark purple makes more sense than either burgundy or maroon, as others have stated or indicated previously.)

6 hours ago, Kiltman said:

Hoping the alleged tweak they’ll be getting by the 2025 season has some of those changes. Anything beyond just updating the word mark on the jersey to the new one would be a plus.

 

Adding silver back in would be nice, especially since it’s back for at least two games now for the Kelly greens. Marry the two looks more.  That plus a new font is a doable change.

 

Wish they would either drop the black uniforms for a white alt of the Kellys

 

or if they must keep it, make a new one based on the throwback style instead of the home uniforms.

I've often thought that simply adding silver (or a lighter grey, as Nike has been essentially unable to produce silver on fabrics to this point) would certainly improve their current look. I don't mind Philadelphia's current uniforms. Even though the "midnight green" is a byproduct of the late 90s to mid 00s NFL dark era, it's a unique color in the NFL and I don't hate it. As a general rule, I like away uniforms that go primary/white/secondary/socks when the primary color is dark and the secondary color is some shade of gold or silver. I think that works for balance. (Digression: I also think that's why gold pants work so well for Washington.)

With that context, the one broad thing about the regular home and away looks I have never really liked was the balance of the away uniform: green/white/white/socks. Silver pants would add a lot of balance to that look, and would still look good, too, with the home uniforms (maintaining that dark-over-light look and avoiding two-tone dark-over-dark looks like Tampa's current iteration of the pewter uniforms).

12 hours ago, upperV03 said:

The Ducks just dropped their absolutely gorgeous throwback unis:

Perfection. No notes.

Yeah, these are nice.

I'm curious about the overlap of the E where the jersey buttons. While Ebbets doesn't have a home jersey (that I could find) from 1954, they do have the road version that shows some creative spacing to avoid cutting a letter over the placket.

Photos from that season show the word is evenly split, 3 letters by 3 letters.

9 hours ago, Silver_Star said:

 

Should be more italicized. This one looks half done!

Yeah. The kerning feels weird somehow, too.

1 hour ago, Cujo said:

Did the Mets switch to blue and red this offseason?

 

That looks so bad. The comparison of the Mariners jerseys further up the thread looked bad, but it just looked like an authentic compared to a cheap replica (even though that's not the actual case in the tweet). But when the on-field product looks like the lowest-tier for-fans replica jerseys, that looks like something done by an amateur operation. It's just ugly. I am no longer surprised by anything MLB does, as an organization. But you'd think something with that much history would collectively care a little more about how they present their brand(s).

Everything is too low on the jersey: the MLB logo seems too big somehow (thus pushing the name and number further down the back), and the lettering looks comically small. On a few personal projects, I've sewn letters and numbers onto the backs of sweatshirts and jerseys. My own personal preference is to keep everything higher up on the back, so perhaps I am a little biased, but I always thought that the name and numbers were noticeably higher on baseball jerseys than what's in that preview picture. And aren't the letters generally something like 3" tall? There's no way those are that big.

On 1/30/2024 at 1:35 PM, Pleepleus75 said:

Super Bowl XXXVI Outdoors

 

Haha. Just as drab as it was indoors. These two teams right here are pretty good examples of taking designs with bright colors and desaturating/darkening them in an attempt to, I don't know, chase trends? Make themselves look "tougher"? The late 90s into the 00s were a dark time for NFL uniforms in more ways than one.

1 hour ago, The_Admiral said:

 

If Philadelphia were to have a symbol, what do you think it should be?

I think it would be the Liberty Bell.

48 minutes ago, Lights Out said:

 

Oh, come on. Fred Durst wasn't that bad.

That's absolutely who I thought of first. Haha.

14 minutes ago, ruttep said:

Maybe an unpopular opinion, but I've never really liked Washington's gold pants all that much. And the striped socks that go with them are nice, but don't really match the jersey. 

 

Just put an updated helmet logo on the classic burgundy/white/burgundy/white and burgundy/burgundy/white/burgundy and call it a day. That's all you need to do.

I understand what you're getting at with the particular iteration of gold pants that they wore a few years ago. Those were originally throwback pants (as you're likely aware), so that's why they and the socks didn't really match their Gibbs-era jerseys. Washington is a burgundy and gold team. Not burgundy and white. What made the burgundy/white dynamic work was the presence of a fair bit of gold detailing. Generally speaking, I think Washington should have gold pants; just make the style match the rest of the look. That's made more difficult by how poorly designed their current look is (at least from a color balance perspective with no gold on the white jerseys). But stripeless white pants look terrible with any/all of their current jerseys, and that's what they've currently got. Gold would be an improvement.

2 minutes ago, BBTV said:

 

I can't stand Romo.  He's way over the top with his excitement level.  It's like Olsen on Red Bull and a hoarse voice,

Haha, somehow, I thought this would be the answer!

15 hours ago, BBTV said:

Greg Olsen is so good at this.  I think Brady will also be really good, but Olsen definitely doesn't deserve to be demoted.  If Brady actually follows through with his plan to broadcast next year, then FOX will have an outstanding B-team.  I think Kevin Burkhardt proved himself to be a A-team-caliber PBP guy too.  

 

I always liked Buck and Aikman, but now after listening to Olsen so much, I can't listen to an Aikman game without noticing how little he actually contributes.

I don't know how you feel about Romo, but I was recently talking to friends about how I think Olsen and Romo are similar in that they both seem so enthusiastic about watching the games in front them. From a layman's perspective, they both seem to know their stuff and provide some real insight, but they both also seem to be genuinely excited about what's happening on the field. Like you, I don't mind Buck and Aikman. But they also have a little more detached/aloof style; I don't know if that's because they've been doing it for so long and everything is just routine to them, or Aikman really isn't able to contribute as much as Olsen, et al.

All that to say I, too, have enjoyed the games that Olsen has been a part of calling.

Has anyone alerted @tBBP yet? One of the first concept series I saw on this board was his airlines football league. (To be clear, I am not saying you ripped this idea off or anything, @edjb93. It just reminded me of the previous series, and I figured tBBP might be interested in seeing it.)

2 hours ago, Ferdinand Cesarano said:

1. Having northern and southern divisions is no stranger than having eastern and western divisions.

 

2. The good thing about the XFL's (and the USFL's) playoff system was not that anyone can win, but, rather, that each place is rewarded differently.  The ideal playoff system would allow only division winners (which is to say, the winners of the first round of the overall championship competition, the regular season).  This best possible playoff system was in place in Major League Baseball from 1969 through 1993.  If non-winners are allowed, then their path should be harder than that of divisional champs.  That was the system in place in the NFL when there were two wild cards per conference, as the divisional champs all had a bye week while the wild cards played each other. The NFL has lost that advantage with three wild cards, as one divisional champion is effectively demoted to the level of wild card. In the XFL, the disadvantage was that the second-place team had to play on the road. (If you want to argue that that's too small a disadvantage, I'll agree; the fix for that is to have a postseason consisting of only one game: the matchup between the two division winners.)

 

3. If you're going to have a single table, then there's no doubt as to which team is best; that team should be the champion.  Here the European football leagues get it right.  Whereas, if you have the top four teams out of eight make the playoffs, then there is no meaningful difference between finishing first and finishing second, a terrible format which robs the regular season of meaning.  (Evidence for this is the NBA.)

 

Playoffs came into being  because of the impracticality of a single table, hence divisions/conferences.  When you have divisions or conferences, each one of those units is going to produce a champion. The final should always  be between those two champions; indeed, for this reason alone (the producing of two champions to meet in the final) divisions/conferences are desireable. But in the UFL's case, where the two conferences start with established identities, having the conferences determine the playoffs is just so obvious.

Fair points in some of these responses. A few replies (also, I'm not sure how to multiquote, so I numbered them instead; I hope that's alright):

1. My understanding was always that east/west was preferred because of time zones and how that impacted TV/radio and scheduling. Granted, scheduling impacts of a north/south split are mitigated by the fact that the XFL had only eight teams, so the broadcast implications weren't as pronounced because the games didn't overlap much. But that was always my general understanding of why divisions generally run east/west vs. north/south.
2. This is a fair assessment. Though I think divisions will always introduce an element of unfairness if the point of having a playoff is to crown the best team as champion (which I feel like is the point; who is the best team in a given season). While it's not the 69-93 MLB system, I think MLB offers a decent example of how using division champions can impact nonchamps who are also better: the 2015 Pirates would have won every other division in baseball, but they ended up in the wildcard that year because they were second in their own division. I fully grant that could be a chicken/egg argument because the playoff format was terrible during that era, so it's also to blame. But if the seeds in the playoff were just determined by winning percentage, then the bottom two teams to make the cut would have played in the wildcard (NYM and LAD), not the teams with the second- and third-best records in all of baseball (not just the NL): PIT and CHC. It shouldn't really matter that the Mets and Dodgers won their divisions because (as you somewhat allude to in point 1), divisions can be arbitrary.
3. Another good point: a single table shouldn't need a playoff in a perfect system. But a) most leagues don't play balanced schedules wherein all teams play all other teams either home and home, or at neutral sites, and b) circumstances change over the course of a season. Winning games is what should get you to the playoffs because that's still the best way to determine if a team is deserving of calling itself the best, not just winning division games. To use your example from above, the teams that win the most games are the ones who "win the first round of the championship competition, the regular season", but because it's likely they didn't all play each other, there's still room for interpretation for who is the best, hence the playoffs.
   1. Now granted: I am looking at this from a decidedly football perspective where flukes are more common and games are far fewer. I absolutely agree that the NBA model is flawed because they just simply let too many teams into the playoffs (and because they play a lot of games). And in baseball, if one were to trim the playoffs down to just league pennant winners, that would make sense too, since 1) the sheer number of games they play removes much of the statistical anomalies and flukes and 2) they do play everyone in the league at least one home and one away series (unless that permanently changed after the 2020 short season and I wasn't aware).
4. My quasi-innate understanding of why we have divisions is because in most leagues, there can't be a perfect schedule wherein everyone plays everyone home and away; there are just too many teams/games to schedule in a limited amount of time. That's how we end up with your explanation of winning divisions as winning that quasi-"first round". The logic is sound, but when divisions are too small (which I would argue is generally the case in the NFL as well as some other leagues), it leaves a lot of room for comparatively bad teams to make it into the playoffs and either being higher-seeded or outright disqualifying likely better teams. In larger applications, I don't think big divisions (i.e. conferences) are necessarily bad. For example, if the format of the NFL changed to where we just had the AFC and NFC and the top four teams (or six, if we want a "wildcard" weekend) from each conference went to the playoffs, that feels like like a fairer format than seeding an 9-8 team higher than an 11-6 because the 9-8 team beat other somewhat mediocre teams in their sort of arbitrarily determined division. (We all saw how that played out though; ha.)

After typing all of this and reading what you and others have said, Ferdinand, I think I've come to the realization that the solution (especially for football) lies in the middle: one table isn't practical for a full league (e.g. the NFL), but too many divisions or divisions that are too small can prevent the best teams from participating in the playoffs. (I wonder if there has been any research done to determine ideal division sizes.)

As for the discussion about the playoffs and their structure: in the ratings I mentioned above, the Renegades came out 5th out of eight teams, which is fairly obvious if one were to rank the teams simply based on winning percentage, let alone the other metrics. Not to mention the very strange way the conferences were drawn in the 2023 XFL (north vs. south ostensibly in order to not split up the Texas teams because having them play each other multiple times saved money due to proximity). So it was quite obvious that Arlington benefited from being in a bad conference rather than earning their way in through on-field performance. (Certainly they won the championship, so there's merit to the claim that they actually were one of the best teams in the moment, at the end of the season, etc. But if the argument is that anyone can win if they're given the chance, then why play the regular season? Just have it be a tournament with everyone involved.)

Frankly, I don't think any of the reasons mentioned in this thread are strong enough reasons to use division/conference champion as a reason for postseason bids. The playoffs should always be amongst the best teams. The only reason for conferences/divisions that I could see is for scheduling purposes where every team can't play every other team. (And even for leagues like the NFL where the talent pool is generally pretty even across all 32 teams, rigid division/conference schedules may not be necessary even if every team can't play ever team.) In the XFL, scheduling isn't even really an issue: it's small enough that every team will play every other team. So what's the point of having conferences when records can be objectively used to say "these are the best teams based on their on-field performance throughout the seaon"? "Establishing traditions" or similar suggestions just sound like precursors to "We've always done it this way". Traditions should build themselves organically. Have a league table that runs 1 to 8, and have the best four teams make the playoffs. If you want in, win your games from the start of the season to the end. Don't sneak in on a geographic technicality.

2 hours ago, Red Comet said:

 

I don't think anyone who  follows leagues like this long-term actually expect this to last decades or really beyond a few years. But, a lot of us are burned out by the NFL and maybe we want to see something else succeed.

It's interesting why people get into alternative leagues like the XFL/USFL/UFL. I am not burned out on the NFL in the slightest. And yet I also want the UFL to succeed. I find these spring leagues to be a lot of fun if they've got whatever combination factors make them appealing to me. For the XFL, specifically, that was the the interesting rule changes; the decent coverage from ESPN; the crowds in DC, Seattle, San Antonio, and especially St. Louis; and the fact that the league is so small I feel like I can get my hands around it completely from a statistics standpoint. Plus, I simply can watch every game if I want to. For my own entertainment and for keeping better track of the state of the league, last year, I kept up a ranking of the XFL teams based on winning percentage, margin of victory, strength of schedule, power rankings, etc. It's a lot easier to do something like that for a league with eight teams in it where I put eyes on at least a few minutes of every game throughout the season.

I just hope it makes it to next year.

51 minutes ago, BBTV said:

Here's a game-worn Sanders jersey.  To be fair, there's other game-worn ones for auction that are different shades.  I assume the lighting is pretty good for these since they're listed for auction and need to be representative of the actual product.

 

I think it may be an optical illusion caused by the amount of white on this jersey as well as the light reflected by the dazzle fabric.  I think the royal-ish blue is for Bubbles as well as the numbers on their white jersey, which certainly appear darker than the Honolulu-blue one.  

 

I wonder if the fill-tool was used to make the white in the numbers into a darker gray, (same with the stripes), if that would show that they're closer to current than I thought.

 

  

(Emphasis added for my point.) I think the fabric has a lot to do with it. Official colors have always appeared to be different to me than their actual applications on various physical media and objects. The degrees of reflectiveness of the material combined with the ways the light (in domes vs. outside vs. day vs. night) interacts (for lack of a better word) with it changes perception a lot.

If I were to describe the iterations of blue the Lions have used, I would say that:

• The current version is the most saturated and closest to royal,
• With the 1990s version (illustrated above) being the "truest" to what I would think of Lions blue being.
• The blue used in first black redesign in the early 2000s was far more washed out (and I think a large part of this was due to the shine of the jerseys at the time combined with the added black and just general drabness of dome lighting).
• And then the 2009 redesign blue was much closer to Carolina's blue.

But again, as you illustrated, I'm probably actually way off in my assessments when it comes to the official color values. The above is just how it looks/looked to my eyes. And getting back to the earlier point: I'm certain that the modern blue appears more saturated because it's on essentially matte fabric and therefore has no reflections/highlights to make it appear lighter or less saturated.

As an aside, but related to this conversation: I was looking at the Gridiron Uniform Database to get the general dates right, and it appears that the colors of those jerseys roughly mirror my perceptions described above (with the exception of the current uniforms being more saturated than the 90s uniforms; they appear to be roughly equivalent on that site). Acknowledging that the GUD isn't 100% accurate anyway, I presume they also don't use official color values and instead go on "perceived" colors as well?

4 hours ago, timjameskohler said:

Hot take (maybe): All-white from the pants down, paired with colored helmets and jerseys, looks EVEN WORSE than mono-white with white socks...Eagles, Texans, Vikings, Cowboys are the worst offenders.

 

A football uniform on top, white tights on bottom. Not. Good.

Yep. It gives off this weird practice-but-also-formal look/feel. The same thing works the other way too for away uniforms like the Ravens and Saints when they wear black pants (with no stripes, especially) and black socks.

15 hours ago, HopewellJones said:

Yeah, Jersey-Pants-Socks/Sleeves.

 

I know the average fan doesn't really notice socks and accessories, but most people here do. And they make a big difference in aesthetic. The blue jersey/pants combo definitely has a different feel when they wear maize socks and sleeves with it.  Wearing the maize pants with maize socks just looks bad. But anyway yeah it seems as though they very deliberately tried not to repeat any uniform combos until the very end.

 

Blue-Blue-Blue 

 

Blue-Blue-White

 

Blue-Blue-Maize

 

Blue-Maize-Maize

 

Blue-Maize-White

 

Blue-Maize-Blue

I see. I understand the socks in a pro context; it's just that generally speaking there is no required (or practiced) consistency in how socks are worn in college. So I didn't realize that, apparently, Michigan wears the same color socks/tights from player to player each game. Thanks for clarifying.

1 hour ago, HopewellJones said:

Looking back, I didn't realize how many different combinations Michigan wore. 

 

11 different combinations to start the season. Wasn't until Ohio State that they repeated a combination (all blue).

Week 1: Blue-Maize-Blue

Week 2: Blue-Maize-White

Week 3: Blue-Blue-Blue

Week 4:  Blue-Maize-Maize

Week 5:  White-Maize-White

Week 6:  White-White-White

Week 7: Blue-Blue-Maize

Week 8: White-Blue-Blue

Week 9:  Blue-Blue-White

Week 10: White-Maize-Maize

Week 11: White-White-Blue

 

I'm sorry, I'm not following what these colors mean or what order they're in. I am guessing the helmet is not included (as that would be blue all the time). Is it like sock color or shoes or something? If it's socks, I didn't know they were consistent enough to track or definitively say they were one color per game.

13 hours ago, Sykotyk said:

Yes, they're all my photos and yes it's a lot of travel. 

 

Where in West Virginia? Was in Hundred this past year for the first time ever. 

 

2020 Favorites

2021 Favorites

2022 Favorites

2023 Favorites

All-time Favorites

 

sykotyk.com details a bit more but I haven't updated since late in the season. Will get on it in the off season. 

I live further north in the panhandle. It's just as fast, for instance, for me to get to Western Beaver or Beaver Local (OH) as it is to get down to Moundsville (let alone up in the hills to Hundred, Cameron, Littleton, etc.) What takes you between Western PA/WV, Texas, and all these other locales?

The pictures are a lot of fun. Thanks for posting them. (As an aside, I feel like the rise in mobile-device use to post here, generally, has led to a downturn in the amount of photos and other visual aids posted. So I appreciate the effort to post pictures!)

On 12/31/2023 at 2:23 AM, Sykotyk said:

First game of the season:

 

Last game of the season:

 

 

My best/favorite photos of 2023:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Last game of the year, I was just going around the stadium and found my favorite photo spot. DeSoto-Summer Creek was a blowout (74-14), and I wasn't doing sideline for it as I had finished up with the afternoon game. So, was looking for something unique. And found it:

 

Run-Throughs:

 

Coin Toss:

 

Kickoff:

 

 

So wait, did you take all these? Because that's a lot of travel over a season! And several of those are less than 30 minutes from where I live (compared to those down in Texas, for example; lots of topography changes throughout those pictures!)

Visual aid:

ReliaQuest:

Fiesta:

Citrus Bowl:

Not a bad looking game in the bunch. Good use of school colors, good contrast.

Also, Ohio State's QB is wearing 33. I have only been watching, not listening, so I'm not sure why that is.

The Cotton Bowl is a color v. color game. I think it's a pretty good contrast (despite there being very few pictures of it online that I could find).