aawagner011

They are replicas. Normal sizes instead of numbered sizes (size 40, 44, etc). Heat applied graphics. No laser cut numbers. Heat applied jock tag.

Mets new Nike fan replica has been released. Looks largely the same. While we have been ragging on a lot of the new Nike designs, I will admit getting the front numbers and sleeve patches back on the replicas is a major win. They were only available on the authentics under Majestic and then Nike continued to use rebadged Majestics product for the first few years of their partnership.

This stupid meme is the best photo I’ve found of the field so far. The black endzones have worked the last several years but will be horrible this year considering UW is purple and gold and Michigan is maize and blue. 2023 Georgia vs TCU 2022 Georgia vs Alabama 2021 Alabama vs Ohio State Those three matchups all worked fine because most schools feature black, or in Alabama’s case it’s a neutral color that didn’t clash with their simple color palette of only crimson and white. 2020 LSU vs Clemson would have been horrible, but as far as I recall, that has been the only CFP National Championship that featured plain grass colored endzones with only the wordmarks. I believe that’s just a Superdome thing, because the Sugar Bowl seems to always go plain endzones, too. A few of the Peach Bowls have used plain endzones, but when the title game was in Atlanta in 2018 (2017 season), it did feature black endzones. I’ll be curious to see if there are any changes for the 12 team playoff. I wish they’d go with regular team colored endzones.

The idea of going to pullovers sounds fine in theory, but there are too many teams with headspoons where it would mess with the aesthetic.

Where are you seeing that? To my knowledge, the only on-field authentics we have seen are the Dodgers, D Backs, and maybe one other team. Everything else we have seen has been the lower grade fan replica. I know Uni Watch said the Cardinals still plan to use chainstitching but they have to apply it to a patch and then sew it on (as opposed to direct embroidery). I believe that’s the same process the Phils currently use.

I’m a Braves fan and hate this change. It’s fairly minor and I’m sure I’ll get used to it a few weeks into the season, but the whole reason for the change is preposterous. The Braves have worn some version of their current uniform for dang near 80 years. I know they’ve had some moments of change here or there but they keep coming back to the current design. Milwaukee Braves Boston Braves And now the design will change all because the manufacturer won’t sew on an additional thin braid around the end of the sleeve? Ridiculous. Edit - two more thoughts as I stew on the insanity of this change. I can hear the Nike marketing speak dripping as they got all of MLB on board with the move. “We can make the uniforms lighter and more seamless. There will be less distractions for the ballplayer because he won’t have an extra seam sewn across his sleeve! Instead it will be built into the cuff!!” Meanwhile, nobody cares about the ad patches. Second thought - since everything is fair game now, have we seen the last of the box shaped trim on the Braves pants above the striping? That’s absolutely a detail that belongs on a Braves uniform and would look out of place without it. You can kinda see it in the retro photos above.

I am with you. The away is very bad. Home is good though I wouldn’t go as far to say I love it. Germany has had much better shirts at tournaments over the last 20 years. The first real photo of Argentina leaked and it’s fantastic. Might be their best in a long time.

Do you think Michigan will do special shoulder graphics again or was that just a Rose Bowl special?

What in the heck was Washington doing at the end there? The game was won, it was over. Just run the ball 3 times and make Texas burn all their time outs. The clock would have been down to 15-20 seconds and they’d pin Texas deep. No one can get hurt on a kneel down. Not to mention the kick catch interference. Those two were coaching malpractice and UW won in spite of it. Otherwise the Huskies (and particularly Penix) looked great.

Super subtle detail, but I’ve noticed Nike has changed the diamond swoosh for their CFP participants. For the longest time, it looked like this. The black outline was fairly thick and there wasn’t much definition to the diamond detail. This year’s diamond swoosh looks like this. The outline is much thinner and the swoosh has much more texture and definition to it. Interestingly, some of the Nike media day outfits have used a diamond swoosh like this version. I haven’t gotten a great look at Michigan. It’s harder to tell because theirs is contrasting against dark blue so it’s less obvious. I think they are using the same diamond Jumpman they have the last couple years. The outline looks a bit thick.

I’ve watched every single semi final and title game in the CFP era and have never seen the logo used outside of the championship. It’s nowhere on the field, sidelines, or television graphics for the semifinals.

Germany home and away have leaked. A bit underwhelming considering they’re the hosts for Euro 2024. Both leaks are replicas, so hopefully the on field look is a touch better. It looks like the shoulder pattern may be evoking the pattern from World Cup 1994. The away shirt is horrible, though it is rare Germany wears away shirts at big tournaments, so it may not be worn at all. Perhaps the colors are inspired by the 1990 goalkeeper shirt.

Why are Bevo’s handlers wearing the title game patch? They haven’t qualified yet.

Yesterday’s Orange Bowl highlighted so many things that need fixing in college football. I’m getting on my soapbox. The media narrative about Florida State’s opt outs is frustrating. They disregarded that Georgia was also missing 27 players, including 6 starters out due to injury, in addition to 20 transfers (some including starters, and many rotational pieces). But this is the new normal in college football. Florida State isn’t Charleston Southern. They were a 13-0 P5 conference champion. According to 247, they have the 20th best overall roster in the country. They have talent. To lose by 60 points in a NY6 bowl is shocking. I think it exposes several cracks in college football’s foundation. The CFP has diminished non-playoff bowls. Florida State is only a couple years removed from having losing seasons so Norvell had to quickly turn over the roster. Most of their opt outs were kids brought in via the portal. I support player movement and the portal, but when a team is built around mercenaries, is it surprising they all left when adversity hit by being left out of the playoff? I can empathize with the players and coaches. Being an undefeated P5 champion and getting left out of the playoff sucks. That’s absolutely wild. That should be fixed next year. That doesn’t solve all the problems, though. As we watch a power shift from the Power 5 to Power 2 through consolidation and TV contracts, the value of winning one conference compared to another isn’t there. This isn’t me just being anti Big 12 or ACC, but the level of competition just isn’t there. Going back to that same 247 roster composition, 14 of the top 25 rosters in college football are SEC and B1G schools. If you want to include where those schools will play in 2024 (ie Texas going to the SEC, USC to the B1G), that number jumps to 19 of the top 25. College football’s power brokers are consolidating and quickly. Winning the Big 12 and ACC isn’t what it used to be. Especially when you look at TV contracts. There is a reason FSU is desperate to get out of their ACC agreement. They’ll be earning half of what a B1G or SEC school earns every year, over the next 13 years. That is absolutely paralyzing and would crush them going forward. SEC and B1G schools already have, and will have, many more resources available to them for recruiting, facilities, marketing, NIL, and likely collectively bargained payouts down the road. A mid tier ACC or Big 12 team will not be able to compete. It all comes back to money. Then there is the issue of the calendar. Coaches are moving from Thanksgiving through the CFP, some while their current team is in the playoff. Early signing day has become the de facto signing day, so now coaches are signing kids in mid December. If you are a coordinator who gets a promotion to head coach, the calendar forces you to leave your current program because you need to build a staff and sign players. You’d be doing yourself a disservice to stick around at your current school. But it’s a disservice to your current team, too. Meanwhile, these coaches in the CFP are trying to sign players and re-recruit their own roster as kids debate hitting the portal while game planning for the playoff. The calendar needs to be rewritten top to bottom, but I don’t know what the fix is because kids need to be able to join their schools when the semester starts. I think the long term fix is the top 50 or so schools that are revenue generating need to branch off from the NCAA and regulate themselves. Kids should get paid. Make them employees and collectively bargain. That would help with opt outs and hopefully prevent another 63-3 Orange Bowl (these schools can already purchase insurance for the players should they incur an injury). But that should also include stipulations to prevent annual free agency. The portal is good. NIL is good. The two combined with zero regulation leads to tampering and open free agency every few months. I can see how it’s a nightmare for coaches between needing to game plan, manage your roster, recruit high schoolers, recruit transfers, and re-recruit current players to prevent them hitting the portal. It’s too much. I’m a Georgia guy and love Coach Smart. But he is not long for this game. He doesn’t know how to give less than 110% all the time. But if you listen to his comments, he will not be like Saban or Bowden coaching until he is 70 years old. These guys are working 90-100 hour work weeks. They get paid handsomely for it. But I look at photos of Kirby Smart just eight years ago when he started at Georgia and it looks like he has aged twenty years. College football needs regulation and guardrails to ensure the sport is still here in twenty years. It’s different in that there is no central organization leading the charge to stabilize it. The NCAA is powerless, the conferences are acting in their own best interests, as are the schools. It’s time to reel it in.

Penn State has moved their conference patch under the swoosh to make room for the bowl patch.

Giants - they look fine. I think this would be very hard to identify as being different unless you’re someone like us who follow every minute detail. The sleeve trim appears to have changed from a thin braid to a thin cuff sewn into the end of the sleeve. The change wouldn’t be my first choice because it causes the end of the sleeve to bunch up a bit. But overall, rather harmless. Player names appear to be smaller across all of baseball, and must be a Nike driven change. I think I’m ok with it because there are so many clubs with massive nameplates that look ridiculous if the name is anything more than 8 letters. The smaller player name also helps keep the number in roughly the same spot. It doesn’t appear too low on the back, which was a concern when the MLB logo was moved outside the headspoon.

The new Nike template confirms that front numbers will have the perforated holes and that classic teams are not exempt. Not ideal, but it looks like it’s mostly unnoticed until you zoom up close.

Maybe I’m missing something, but what do they mean by “laid for our future this season”? They are 5-6. There is no future this season. Maybe next year. Georgia Tech is going with white lids and jerseys with gold pants against Georgia tonight. Not my favorite Tech look, but it’s still good. I prefer when they wear white at home and Georgia is in red. White feels like the right look for them, similar to LSU. But I prefer a gold helmet.

I asked this on one of the Georgia football message boards and was told apparently they’ve had issues with the red collar on the new template white jersey bleeding into the white causing discoloration and giving the jersey a pink hue. I haven’t seen that myself but maybe they’ve had to work extra hard to keep them white. They wore the new white all season up until Tennessee, and most recently against Florida. I can’t see any pink here but it’s hard to say.

Weird development for Georgia’s upcoming game against Tennessee. It appears they are wearing the old Vapor Untouchable template despite updating to the new template this year. It’s unclear if this is for all players or just a few, but I’ve seen at least 3 players wearing the old template (and haven’t seen a clear shot of a player wearing the new template). Perhaps they packed the wrong jerseys, but you’d think the EQ team would be all over that. Edit - further confirmation.

Didn’t someone from the Browns acknowledge this was already in the works like a year ago?

Florida lost so hopefully this was the one and only time we see these dumpster fires.

One positive we have for the new Nike replicas is that the ASG jerseys did have numbers on the front, unlike the Majestic and Nike replicas of the past decade or so. You had teams like the Dodgers sold without front numbers and you had to pay extra for the authentic to get the number. Hopefully this remains the case with team replicas in 2024 and wasn’t just a ASG thing.

I agree with you. Gold and garnet decals would do wonders for that helmet. And even then, it should only be worn on the road. Florida State can keep their garnet and white pants and mix and match home and away. They can even do black once a year or so. But the moment they started mixing the white helmet with the garnet jersey, it looked horrible. When you have a helmet so iconic as the gold, it should be worn most of the time.

My longstanding complaint of Jacksonville treating the endzones the same as the team’s home stadium continues. It creates a mismatched look when one team is presented with a white wordmark and the other is in team colors. There have been a few instances they deviated from this. I particularly liked this design. It felt balanced and both team’s colors were equally represented. This one was quite good, too, but I’d have like it better if Georgia had a black wordmark or perhaps a black endzone with red wordmark. I just like the balance since Florida has both of their primary colors heavily shown. Or Florida could go with a blue endzone with white wordmark outlined in orange. Anything beats 2020, but that was simply due to covid causing the schedule to get shuffled around. The Jaguars had a game the following day which caused plain endzones and a small midfield logo. I think the Jags always play away the week of the Georgia-Florida game.