Infrared41's Best And Worst Presented by BBTV - 2021 Week 7

[BBTV]

Standard disclaimer: This thread is for the best and worst uniform matchups for any particular week.  These are simply my opinions, you're welcome (and encouraged!) to disagree. 

• Usually, the color matchup is the biggest factor.  While I like both the Raiders and Panthers uniforms, Raiders in standard road vs Carolina in standard home probably isn't going to win just due to similarity.  Same with Seahawks in mono-navy against Patriots in their standard road.  
• I'm neither a modernist nor traditionalist.  I think that things that look good to me look good, and things that look bad look bad.  There's modern uniforms I love, and some that I hate.  A uniform design could ruin even a spectacular color matchup - or maybe it won't.  It's unlikely that the Titans or Cardinals will ever show up on the 'best' list, regardless of matchup.  But maybe they will.  I also don't automatically penalize teams for wearing monochrome - It's likely that the mono-navy Seahawks will find their way to the best list on occasion, however the Chiefs in all red won't.
• Lighting and weather play a role too.  Some matchups just look better in bright natural light, some look great in snow, and even the best one might look crappy in a dome under 5,000 kelvin light.
• Going to try and do 3+2 (three best, 2 worst) but in reality, I'll just do whatever I want.  Also, I rarely watch games that aren't the Eagles, so I'm going mostly by watching highlights or google searching for images of the games.

 

Week 7: After #1, the best was an open field.  Not many lead-pipe locks this week.  Probably going to get some flack for one of the omissions, but I'm a big boy and can take it.  That being said... LET'S F'n GO!!!

 

 

BEST

 

1.  Bengals at Ravens

A year ago I'd never think that either of these teams would be making the best list, let alone making it consistently.  The Ravens are here mostly just because of their purple and how it looks against most of their recent opponents.  The Bengals are here because they wore their black pants, which make their white tops bearable.  

 

 

 

 

2. Bucs at Bears

This was tough, but ultimately I had to include it.  Two traditional looks, with the Bucs adding a tad of contemporary contrast to the Bears classics.

 

 

 

 

3.  Broncos at Browns

This one is all about the colors.  I've always hated Denver's uniform, but I really liked how their orange trim seemed to be magnified as a result of the Browns wearing their awesome orange pants.  Normally white over white wouldn't get you on this list, but I just liked this game, so whatever.

 

 

4.  Washington at Green Bay

Yeah, I'm going there.  I thought about including this as an honorable mention, but I liked it too much so I'm giving it a "best".  This was only made possible because Washington wore their proper burgundy pants.  In a vacuum, I thought Green Bay looked kinda dumb, but this game was an example of the whole being more than the sum of its parts.  This was a rare case of Washington's plain helmets with just the number actually benefiting them as it brought them more in line with the throwback Packers look than their previous decorated helmets would have.

 

 

Honorable Mentions:

 

Texans at Cardinals

The Cardinals would normally never end up on the 'best' list, but they wore their least-offensive combo, and it looked really good against the Texans look.  The Texans kinda ruined it by wearing solid navy socks, but I'm feeling generous so I'm giving them an HM.

 

 

Colts at 49ers

This one suffered from being at night under the lights.  Had this been a day game, it might have fared better.  I'm not one that always gets boners for "old-school traditional" matchups, but this one looked good.

 

 

What could have been:

Had the Eagles worn green pants, their tilt vs the Raiders would likely have been honored.

 

Just couldn't do it:

The Chiefs at Titans.  I think the Titans look too gimicky to honor, but the colors looked pretty cool in this game.

 

 

Worst:

 

Jets at Patriots

Not the worst-looking game ever played, but it just looked like a hairy high-school game to me, especially with some of the Patriots wearing red slob shirts and most of the Jets wearing long white ones.  The combo of the Patriots in solid navy and the Jets with their silly spikes and oversided wordmark just sucked to me.

 

2.  Lions at Rams

Probably going to hear it from some people about this, but the Rams really should have worn yellow pants.  It probably wouldn't have improved this game enough to be "best", but their bone pants look ridiculous with their blue jerseys.  The Lions don't look terrible, but their jerseys simply aren't good enough to earn them the benefit of the doubt, so it would need to be a near-perfect match up for them to be honored.

 

 

 

[AnPheitseog]

37 minutes ago, BBTV said:

 

2.  Lions at Rams

Probably going to hear it from some people about this, but the Rams really should have worn yellow pants.  It probably wouldn't have improved this game enough to be "best", but their bone pants look ridiculous with their blue jerseys.  The Lions don't look terrible, but their jerseys simply aren't good enough to earn them the benefit of the doubt, so it would need to be a near-perfect match up for them to be honored.

 

 

 

Let us not also forget that the all white "socks" look like CRAP on the bone pants. I know, they're supposed to be blue but not all players wore like they should.

[ManillaToad]

I didn't realize how bad this week's slate of games were until I looked them up for this thread. So many teams ruined these matchups by intentionally making their uniforms worse with bad pants/socks pairings. Congrats to Green Bay on the laziest uniform I've seen in a while.

 

Good vs Good:

Bucs/Bears

Ravens/Bengals

Panthers/Giants

Broncos/Browns 

 

Good vs Bad:

Chiefs/Titans

Skins/Packers

Falcons/Dolphins

Raiders/Eagles

Seahawks/Saints

 

Bad vs Bad:

Jets/Patriots

Lions/Rams

Texans/Cardinals

Colts/49ers

[MJD7]

Yet another nice list. I pretty much agree with the “Best” section, the Bengals & Ravens matchup works especially well for this time of year, it feels very “Halloween.” Also, the Ravens uniforms have grown on me a lot this year (mostly because my attempts to redesign them have turned out mostly futile).

 

 The only change I’d probably make to my Best list would be to put Washington at Green Bay higher. I was genuinely surprised at the general distaste here towards the Packers throwbacks; even though they’re obviously not better than the normal home uniform, I still think it’s by far the best throwback they’ve ever worn. Washington’s burgundy helped with that game too.

 

For the Honorable Mentions, I personally don’t think I could ever include Arizona, just because I think they’re in desperate need of a rebrand as the last remnant of the Reebok piping era. The Texans don’t really do much to bring that matchup up either, in my opinion.

 

As for Colts at 49ers, I think it would have been a sure lock for best matchup of the week, and possibly a contender for matchup of the year, if the 9ers wore their regular home uniforms and if it was in the daytime. As it was, there was too much white compared to what could have been, and personally I’m not much of a fan of the 49ers throwbacks. Seeing the rain in San Francisco of all places was fun though.

 

For the worst list, Lions at Rams would easily be my #1 worst matchup. There was just way too much blue, and the Rams’ pant choice was simply a bone-headed decision. The Lions going with blue pants for this game wasn’t great either.

 

TL;DR, my personal list would be:

 

Best

1. Bengals at Ravens

2. Washington at Packers

3. Bucs at Bears

4. Broncos at Browns

 

Worst

1. Lions at Rams

2. Texans at Cardinals

[Crabcake]

3 hours ago, ManillaToad said:

I didn't realize how bad this week's slate of games were until I looked them up for this thread. So many teams ruined these matchups by intentionally making their uniforms worse with bad pants/socks pairings. Congrats to Green Bay on the laziest uniform I've seen in a while.

 

Good vs Good:

Bucs/Bears

Ravens/Bengals

Panthers/Giants

Broncos/Browns 

 

Good vs Bad:

Chiefs/Titans

Skins/Packers

Falcons/Dolphins

Raiders/Eagles

Seahawks/Saints

 

Bad vs Bad:

Jets/Patriots

Lions/Rams

Texans/Cardinals

Colts/49ers

I agree with most of this, but having Colts-Niners as bad vs. bad is absolutely criminal. 

[B-Rich]

Last night to me was bad.
 

No. 1, anytime my Saints wear black pants, to me that is bad-- I don't care whether it's the monochrome black -on-black or with the white jerseys.  Those black pants are an abomination and must be done away with. 

 

No. 2, while I know it is Seattle's "look",  I just aesthetically don't like the look of a monochrome uni in football unless it is white/white.   Red/red, green/green, blue/blue, black/black, yellow/yellow; even brown/brown.  Just looks bush league to me. 

[ManillaToad]

18 hours ago, Crabcake said:

I agree with most of this, but having Colts-Niners as bad vs. bad is absolutely criminal. 

 

I have a grudge against Indy for wearing white socks instead of blue. Never liked SF's "throwbacks", including when they wore them in 1994

[BBTV]

2 hours ago, ManillaToad said:

 

I have a grudge against Indy for wearing white socks instead of blue. Never liked SF's "throwbacks", including when they wore them in 1994

 

Looking more at them, and thinking about their uniform in general, I wonder if there's ever been a matte or satin 'gold' helmet.  Might work well for them... or might look like my dad's old VW Rabbit.  (that's just a random internet image of the same car... not the actual one.)

 

 

 

[MJD7]

2 hours ago, BBTV said:

Looking more at them, and thinking about their uniform in general, I wonder if there's ever been a matte or satin 'gold' helmet.  Might work well for them... or might look like my dad's old VW Rabbit.  (that's just a random internet image of the same car... not the actual one.)

The closest example I can think of is FSU’s original attempt at a gold helmet post-Nike-redesign:

Probably the most disastrous branding moment in the program’s history (and, retroactively, kind of a signal of eventual decline in other areas, as well). I imagine any attempt by the 49ers to do something like this would turn out largely the same. I’d argue it’d be even worse since it’d be a distancing from the “Gold Rush” theme of the 49ers namesake.

[DG_ThenNowForever]

3 hours ago, BBTV said:

 

Looking more at them, and thinking about their uniform in general, I wonder if there's ever been a matte or satin 'gold' helmet.  Might work well for them... or might look like my dad's old VW Rabbit.  (that's just a random internet image of the same car... not the actual one.)

 

 

 

 

We had a VW Dasher growing up. Like a Rabbit, but smaller. I loved that car.

(Not my car either)

 

[BBTV]

Reminds me of the Scirocco, which I thought was super cool at the time.  Of course, at the time, each town had exactly one place you could take your VW to for service and it cost more than the car itself.  One of my friends in HS got an '88 Scirocco and I was jealous AF, even though I couldn't drive stick.  Was disappointed when they were discontinued in the states, only to see a ton of modern ones in other countries, but like most cars, they completely lost their charm with each "update".

 

 

Like... for real - WTF is this soulless POS?

 

[The_Admiral]

Late '80s/early '90s cars were hideous. The jellybean cars of today are pretty soulless, yes, but I don't miss the days of my dad's rusted-out '87 Bonneville. No redeeming features. I'm not a car guy, I'm really quite the opposite, but I know the nadir of automaking when I see it.

[AFirestormToPurify]

1 hour ago, the admiral said:

Late '80s/early '90s cars were hideous. The jellybean cars of today are pretty soulless, yes, but I don't miss the days of my dad's rusted-out '87 Bonneville. No redeeming features. I'm not a car guy, I'm really quite the opposite, but I know the nadir of automaking when I see it.

Not just that, 80s to early 90s car were also slow as hell

[SFGiants58]

6 hours ago, the admiral said:

Late '80s/early '90s cars were hideous. The jellybean cars of today are pretty soulless, yes, but I don't miss the days of my dad's rusted-out '87 Bonneville. No redeeming features. I'm not a car guy, I'm really quite the opposite, but I know the nadir of automaking when I see it.

 

That's funny that you didn't say 1973-early '80s.

 

 

[The_Admiral]

'70s cars were trying and failing, '80s cars weren't even trying.