2024 NFL Season week by week uniform match-up combos: From HOF Game to Super Bowl LIX

[DCarp1231]

13 minutes ago, HOOVER said:

 

 

I don't think Nike lets anyone outbid them to keep the Swoosh on NFL uniforms and sidelines, but I am curious to hear all of your thoughts about alternative scenarios where another brand outbids them.

I believe Nike will remain the uniform provider, but Fanatics takes on a bigger role, likely in manufacturing.  Nike offloading manufacturing of the uniforms to Fanatics, like they did with MLB, probably makes more sense to them, and perhap Fanatics takes over as the official sideline brand.   I still don't think that part makes sense for Nike from a brand positioning/alignment perspective, or the NFL for that matter, but I also can't see anyone other than Fanatics paying to do a deal. 

 

New Era is the official headwear brand and also paid to slap their logo on CFL uniforms; would they pay to put their brand on NFL sleeves, while someone else makes the uniform?   

 

NOBULL is the official NFL Combine brand now, taking over for New Era, who took over from Under Armour.  Tom Brady's BRADY brand folded into NOBULL, but again, another company that's not in the uniform business.  

New Balance has made a push into football with footwear, finally debuting their cleats a few years later than originally planned - with Marvin Harrison Jr, Will Anderson Jr, and Chase Young as their sponsored athletes - but I can't see them taking this big of a leap.  They're in the football uniform business, but at a very low, low level.  

 

adidas doesn't seem to have much invested in American football anymore, other than Patrick Mahomes, Aaron Rodgers, about a dozen major college programs, and various other marketable athletes across the league.  However, it seems they were content to let the NBA & NHL deals go away. 

Under Armour appears to be hanging on, but not by much - the only scenario I see that gets them in the discussion is if Dwayne Johnson ponies up with his investor friends to get Project Rock in on the deal.  I could see them trying to drive up the price on Nike (winning the contract would be a downgrade, as UA unis sadly stink).

Fanatics is the elephant in the room.  Let us all pray that we don't end up with this worst case scenario.

We already saw the disaster of Fanatics being in control of manufacturing to the point of MLB & Nike walking back on the deal to fix the issues. I believe NHL is also already having issues as well. It be a shame to see the NFL fall victim to the tissues Fanatics calls uniforms.

 

Anyway, I wouldn’t mind a second big manufacturer step up and we get each conference outfitted with a different company. For example, NFC with Nike & AFC with UA or Adidas. Then the conferences switch manufacturers every few years.

[HOOVER]

49 minutes ago, DCarp1231 said:

We already saw the disaster of Fanatics being in control of manufacturing to the point of MLB & Nike walking back on the deal to fix the issues. I believe NHL is also already having issues as well. It be a shame to see the NFL fall victim to the tissues Fanatics calls uniforms.

 

Anyway, I wouldn’t mind a second big manufacturer step up and we get each conference outfitted with a different company. For example, NFC with Nike & AFC with UA or Adidas. Then the conferences switch manufacturers every few years.

Yes, Fanatics would be a worst-case scenario, as we've seen. 

I don't see the league splitting the duties; that would be unprecedented.    I don't think any of the brands would go for it, either. 

 

WILD way to achieve something similar:  teams get to choose their official uniform & sideline apparel brand partner, all facilitated, manufactured, and distributed by Fanatics, who is uniquely positioned to both do it and likely able to pony up the money to propose it.

 

Imagine a deal where everything goes through Fanatics, which is where things are trending now.  The NFL could give teams the ability to choose their official uniform & apparel brand partner.  The Seahawks would theoretically choose Nike, but the Ravens would most definitely choose Under Armour.  Maybe the Bills partner up with New Era, who is headquartered in Buffalo.  Maybe the Raiders go with NOBULL because Tom Brady is now a minority owner.   The Patriots might choose New Balance, which is headquartered in Boston.   

 

Brands partnering with the individual teams, rather than one brand partnering with the entire league, but all managed by Fanatics for efficiency and parity.

At that point, you might even have players being swayed by brands to go to certain teams, based on them wanting to wear Nike over adidas, etc. similar to the high school & college level.

What I think is more likely, if for some reason Nike bows out, is that the NFL chooses Fanatics to manufacture and distribute everything for them, but does it under either an all-new label that they own, or no label at all...just NFL-branded everything.  

[Carolingian Steamroller]

16 hours ago, HOOVER said:

Either way, Orange/White/Black/? sucks.  They could wear White pants or Orange pants and it’d be better, but they’re choosing the worst possible combination just because they can.

 

Okay so this is personal preference but I could not disagree more.

I think the Bengals white over black is outstanding. From the start, they've correctly paired it with white socks. I don't know if it's my favorite look in this set but the fact that I cannot decide is testimony to how well it works.



I've cited this particular set as a reason why the 2021 Bengals redesign is such a smashing success and some of the best work Nike has done since taking over.

[Carolingian Steamroller]

1 hour ago, DCarp1231 said:

We already saw the disaster of Fanatics being in control of manufacturing to the point of MLB & Nike walking back on the deal to fix the issues. I believe NHL is also already having issues as well. It be a shame to see the NFL fall victim to the tissues Fanatics calls uniforms.

 

Anyway, I wouldn’t mind a second big manufacturer step up and we get each conference outfitted with a different company. For example, NFC with Nike & AFC with UA or Adidas. Then the conferences switch manufacturers every few years.

To be honest, I think Nike's NFL tenure has been on balance excellent and I would want them to continue to hold the contract.

[spartacat_12]

1 hour ago, DCarp1231 said:

We already saw the disaster of Fanatics being in control of manufacturing to the point of MLB & Nike walking back on the deal to fix the issues. I believe NHL is also already having issues as well. It be a shame to see the NFL fall victim to the tissues Fanatics calls uniforms.

 

Anyway, I wouldn’t mind a second big manufacturer step up and we get each conference outfitted with a different company. For example, NFC with Nike & AFC with UA or Adidas. Then the conferences switch manufacturers every few years.

 

Fanatics was never the reason for the MLB's uniform issues, they were simply manufacturing them based on Nike's specifications and got thrown under the bus when players & fans started complaining. The NHL hasn't had any issues so far, and the jerseys are practically identical to what Adidas was using. 

[MJD7]

12 minutes ago, Carolingian Steamroller said:

Okay so this is personal preference but I could not disagree more.

I think the Bengals white over black is outstanding. From the start, they've correctly paired it with white socks. I don't know if it's my favorite look in this set but the fact that I cannot decide is testimony to how well it works.



I've cited this particular set as a reason why the 2021 Bengals redesign is such a smashing success and some of the best work Nike has done since taking over.

 

11 minutes ago, Carolingian Steamroller said:

To be honest, I think Nike's NFL tenure has been on balance excellent and I would want them to continue to hold the contract.

Agreed on both counts.

 

At the very least, I’d much  rather Nike keep the contract than another supplier like Adidas or Under Armour taking over.

[kaleb_girod]

Looks like the Buccaneers announced red jerseys and white pants for MNF against the Ravens.

 

I’ve always liked this look, but I’m sure all the Buccaneers players will wear mono-white socks instead of the proper contrasting black socks. It definitely makes a difference.

 

Was also hoping for white/purple from the Ravens…

[MCM0313]

13 hours ago, kaleb_girod said:

Yeah my thoughts as well. So what if they had two gold helmets? You’d have both that matched their respective uniforms. The normal lighter champagne gold would match their normal set while a brass gold would be able to be worn with BOTH the beautiful Color Rush and beautiful black throwbacks.

 

Such a huge missed opportunity and of course the Saints went BFBS with their alternate helmet.

 

Helmet aside though, the Saints throwbacks are still beautiful, just lacking a key matching piece.

Their uniform decisions are consistently [MOD EDIT]. Their play on the field since that 2-0 start (which is looking more anomalous every week) has been [MOD EDIT]. Pretty much everything the ‘Aints do anymore is [MOD EDIT]. 
 

Also, this comment was not edited by mods. 

[MCM0313]

44 minutes ago, MJD7 said:

 

Agreed on both counts.

 

At the very least, I’d much  rather Nike keep the contract than another supplier like Adidas or Under Armour taking over.

Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t…

[HOOVER]

1 hour ago, Carolingian Steamroller said:

To be honest, I think Nike's NFL tenure has been on balance excellent and I would want them to continue to hold the contract.

Outside of some of the terrible uniform & helmet designs, which we now know aren't fully (or at all) the fault of Nike,  I agree with this 100%. 

 

The upgrade in both uniform quality, design, and fan apparel is light years ahead of what Reebok gave us.  Under Armour, New Era, New Balance, etc. cannot design & deliver the same quality and depth of product, and while adidas could probably match production scale, they've never excelled in fan wear and their uniform builds have always been second or third rate in quality & aesthetics to Nike.  

So, that truly only leaves Fanatics, in my opinion, with Project Rock/UA as a wild card, because Dwayne could source additional investors to do that kind of a deal, but they'd still need Fanatics for production on fanwear.  

I don't see a better option than Nike at this moment.

[PittsburghSucks]

 

[SportsFan12]

There were so many better opportunities for the Browns and Bengals to wear these looks, but of course they have to wait and wear them against each other. So damn aggravating.

[PurpleHayes]

15 minutes ago, PittsburghSucks said:

 

 

'Bout freaking time.

[kaleb_girod]

1 hour ago, MCM0313 said:

Their uniform decisions are consistently [MOD EDIT]. Their play on the field since that 2-0 start (which is looking more anomalous every week) has been [MOD EDIT]. Pretty much everything the ‘Aints do anymore is [MOD EDIT]. 
 

Also, this comment was not edited by mods. 

It’s almost like the Saints should go back to just wearing their traditional black/white jerseys and gold pants and quit trying to be trendy every week. It’s not working anymore, but we know that won’t happen…

The all-black isn’t as trendy as it used to be. The Saints used to be one of the only teams who had an all-black uniform, but that’s not the case anymore.

 

As a lifelong Saints fan, the entire state of their organization has become such a mess. From their uniform decisions to their gameplay and performance, they’ve become a joke.

[PurpleHayes]

6 minutes ago, kaleb_girod said:

The all-black isn’t as trendy as it used to be. The Saints used to be one of the only teams who had an all-black uniform, but that’s not the case anymore.

 

Right, it's not innovative if everyone is doing it. This, fortunately, is how fashions die...and I say the death of mono-black and icy whites can't come too soon.

 

All black unis: Cardinals, Falcons, Ravens, Panthers, Bengals, Lions, Jaguars, Saints, Jets, Eagles, Steelers, 'Manders...12 out of 32 teams right there...and I'm not including the all-navy atrocities which are getting harder to distinguish from all-black.

[kaleb_girod]

2 minutes ago, PurpleHayes said:

 

Right, it's not innovative if everyone is doing it. This, fortunately, is how fashions die...and I say the death of mono-black and icy whites can't come too soon.

 

All black unis: Cardinals, Falcons, Ravens, Panthers, Bengals, Lions, Jaguars, Saints, Jets, Eagles, Steelers, 'Manders...12 out of 32 teams right there...and I'm not including the all-navy atrocities which are getting harder to distinguish from all-black.

Exactly. So essentially half of the league has some form of an all-black uniform. And some of those teams don’t even use black as their colors, like the Lions, Jets, and Commanders. And how could we forget about the 49ers all-black disaster…

[Lights Out]

2 hours ago, spartacat_12 said:

 

Fanatics was never the reason for the MLB's uniform issues, they were simply manufacturing them based on Nike's specifications and got thrown under the bus when players & fans started complaining. The NHL hasn't had any issues so far, and the jerseys are practically identical to what Adidas was using. 

 

I find it difficult to believe that Fanatics had no responsibility in the MLB's issues when their own products are every bit as cheap and low-quality - and when Nike hasn't had this many problems in other sports. I think they're just trying to dump all the blame on Nike to avoid scrutiny themselves. What Nike does deserve blame for is partnering with a company that is synonymous with cheap crap and then being surprised that the result was cheap crap.

 

And if the MLB is any indication, it's also far too soon to start celebrating the job Fanatics is doing with the NHL. Remember, the MLB was still using Majestic's specifications for a while after the Nike/Fanatics deal started. Once Fanatics eventually starts tinkering with the NHL's uniforms, I expect the quality to plummet.

[Colin56]

16 hours ago, Cujo said:

  Fix those helmets

 

Sshhhhh. We don't criticize the Saints when they do the bare minimum to not look like pajamas

[SportsFan12]

 

[HOOVER]

37 minutes ago, MCM0313 said:

Their uniform decisions are consistently [MOD EDIT]. Their play on the field since that 2-0 start (which is looking more anomalous every week) has been [MOD EDIT]. Pretty much everything the ‘Aints do anymore is [MOD EDIT]. 
 

Also, this comment was not edited by mods. 

 

Self-MOD EDIT...engaged.