Michigan Football 2011

[GFB]

I didn't want to clog up one of the other two NCAA football threads with this post, but I thought this could be a stand alone thread

I had my hopes for the this year and Michigan football uniforms, but Adidas botched much of it this year.. (Sorry Andy!) Here is what I inferred from pictures, blog posts, interviews, etc...

It started in spring practice when they were too busy providing prototypes to provide the entire team with matching practice uniforms... as you can see, it seemed every player was wearing a different uniform, which made it look like a high school JV practice:

How many different uniforms can you spot in these pictures?

Then we got a glimpse of what was supposed to be the new away uniforms:

Nice, clean, and no piping... we thought we had a winner.

Come August, the focus shifted to the UTL game vs. Notre Dame and the special uniforms for that game... at first I was unsure of them, but came around after seeing them in action. While I still prefer the home uniforms, these were pretty great as a one-off.

However, there were also major durability issues with the fabric... I specifically remember one Notre Dame layer with an entire shoulder of his uniform missing. This would come into play again later in the year.

This leads us to the first road game of the year, @MSU, and while everyone was expecting new jerseys, we didn't get the new uniforms we were expecting. Instead, we got these:

Just not good. It was a poor attempt at rekindling the magic from the UTL game. Without the big, old-style M on the front, the addition of the modern M on the chest, and the competing maize and blue striping, this was a failure.

The next week, Michigan traveled to Northwestern for the second road game of the year, unveiling the new away uniforms. However, for some reason, whether it be that Adidas couldn't replicate the new jerseys for the entire team, or that some players preferred the older cut/material, or even durability issues, Adidas added (or was forced to add) the shoulder piping that was found on the old road uniforms... In fact, Denard Robinson started this game in the new cut, then finished the game in the old cut:

Start:

No wonder durability is an issue when jerseys stretch this much...

End:

Notice the side piping and material difference...

This carried on for the rest of the year... here's the Illinois game:

Old Cut:

New Cut:

[GFB]

Michigan wore basically two different uniforms for road games the entire year, until the Sugar Bowl this past week. A toned down version of the State game uniforms, these would have greatly improved if they used the thicker, one-color numbers from the State game... All in all, not bad, but unnecessary.

Notice that it is not the Techfit cut.

SUMMARY/POINT OF THREAD:

Not that the uniforms Adidas designed were poor (State game not included), and I know that Michigan wanted to jump on the crazy uniform madness bandwagon, but the general cluster**** in terms of providing uniformity and quality that Adidas provided were unacceptable in my mind. Granted, I'm only a fan and have no involvement in the program, but I would be hard pressed to find another program that had such poor support from their manufacturer.

Where do you believe the fault lies in this? Can you ever remember more "disunity" among a major sports team uniforms (not counting misspellings or mixed up fonts, but with the actual design of the uniforms....)? Why would a major supplier, like Adidas, create this type of problem by outfitting one of their largest clients in something that doesn't work and was so flawed they had to go reuse their old uniforms?

[oldschoolvikings]

Excellent recap. I knew they were all over the place, but didn't know it was THIS bad.

I too thought the bowl game number font was crappy... too thin. The MSU look was worth repeating, if that was a possibilty.

UM needs to get a fairly conservative basic road look and stick with it for next year.

[ESTONES6]

I'm not just saying this because I am a Buckeyes fan, but Addidas really dropped the ball when it came to UM's uniforms. They just can't seem to come up with something that keeps tradition in mind, while updating to the year 2011/2. It seems like a piece of every uniform is close, but then they throw something else on there that screws it up.

[YessSir32]

In my opinion I liked all of the uniforms (except the MSU ones). I thought the Sugar Bowl jerseys were fantastic and I wish I owned one.

[gdu]

Nicely done analysis and summary.

[deliver2david]

adidas is lame. They tried to outdo Michigan State's Nike pro combats and ended up making Michigan look like bumblebees. It's pretty sad that they can't make a solid road uniform for Michigan. Nike had pretty much nailed Michigan's timeless look when they had the contract.

[Sport]

I've always liked how Michigan played around with their road uniform, but kept the homes the same. They're kinda like their Michigan brothers, the Detroit Tigers, in that way.

That said, they haven't had a good road jersey since switching to Addidas.

[BRice16]

SUMMARY/POINT OF THREAD:

Not that the uniforms Adidas designed were poor (State game not included), and I know that Michigan wanted to jump on the crazy uniform madness bandwagon, but the general cluster**** in terms of providing uniformity and quality that Adidas provided were unacceptable in my mind. Granted, I'm only a fan and have no involvement in the program, but I would be hard pressed to find another program that had such poor support from their manufacturer.

Where do you believe the fault lies in this? Can you ever remember more "disunity" among a major sports team uniforms (not counting misspellings or mixed up fonts, but with the actual design of the uniforms....)? Why would a major supplier, like Adidas, create this type of problem by outfitting one of their largest clients in something that doesn't work and was so flawed they had to go reuse their old uniforms?

The biggest problem with the Adidas Techfits is that when certain players prefer the old cut, it is extremely noticeable when that player wears it. Michigan elected not to wear them altogether in 2010 when the other Adidas schools started wearing them mid-season. This season, they elected to wear the modified Techfit template. Then, after the season started, certain players decided they were uncomfortable and wanted to go back to the old cut. That caused problems with consistency in the looks and number/letter fonts. It wasn't nearly as noticeable for home games.

The Under the Lights jerseys were Techfit, as were the road version.

For the bowl game, Adidas wanted to put them in a new set that everyone would wear, so they put them in the new Ripon cut that Wisconsin wore this season and Tennessee did for their second set of white jerseys. Cowboy and Packers using this cut in the NFL as well. UCLA wore a version of it, but with a stretch mesh for the USC game. That will probably be what you see Adidas schools in next year.

What I find odd is that, Notre Dame player in the UTL game excluded, Michigan was the only team that had major durability issues with the Techfits. Tennessee had to change from them because the numbers were a shade off, but other than that had few issues with ripping. Ditto for ND and UCLA. Nebraska, even with the physical style they play, didn't experience problems.

As far as the practice shots, they do that with a lot of their teams, having different jerseys and pants tested in practice. It's usually not as noticeable because most teams wear plain white pants or striped in practice, so if somebody is out there in plain white test pants, it's not easily noticed. I know that Hoke also wanted linemen wearing the tighter game jerseys in practice so D-linemen couldn't just hold the looser jerseys. Robinson also wore a game-cut jersey for practice. That part isn't on Adidas, in my opinion.

Overall, I think your observations are valid, but I think it's more a result of Adidas being proactive and trying to get the team in what suited them best, rather than them failing at something. The practice shots illustrate this by having the team test out new products as well.

[MC2]

Couldn't agree more, in fact during the Sugar Bowl I texted my friend, "How many different road uniforms has Michigan had this season?"

[slapshot]

Couldn't agree more, in fact during the Sugar Bowl I texted my friend, "How many different road uniforms has Michigan had this season?"

No matter the response, the correct answer is probably "less than Oregon".

[YessSir32]

adidas is lame. They tried to outdo Michigan State's Nike pro combats and ended up making Michigan look like bumblebees. It's pretty sad that they can't make a solid road uniform for Michigan. Nike had pretty much nailed Michigan's timeless look when they had the contract.

State's pro combats weren't the best looking jerseys though.

[GFB]

The biggest problem with the Adidas Techfits is that when certain players prefer the old cut, it is extremely noticeable when that player wears it. Michigan elected not to wear them altogether in 2010 when the other Adidas schools started wearing them mid-season. This season, they elected to wear the modified Techfit template. Then, after the season started, certain players decided they were uncomfortable and wanted to go back to the old cut. That caused problems with consistency in the looks and number/letter fonts. It wasn't nearly as noticeable for home games.

For the bowl game, Adidas wanted to put them in a new set that everyone would wear, so they put them in the new Ripon cut that Wisconsin wore this season and Tennessee did for their second set of white jerseys. Cowboy and Packers using this cut in the NFL as well. UCLA wore a version of it, but with a stretch mesh for the USC game. That will probably be what you see Adidas schools in next year.

But doesn't that fall on the manufacturer, not the team or players? It's not the players fault they don't want to wear something that is uncomfortable... Even doing something as lazy as adding two stripes to the shoulders to somewhat match the old jerseys. You think that a better solution would have been providing the team with a new uniform design available in either the old cut or the TechFit cut.

Nike doesn't seem to have that issue for any of its teams...

What I find odd is that, Notre Dame player in the UTL game excluded, Michigan was the only team that had major durability issues with the Techfits. Tennessee had to change from them because the numbers were a shade off, but other than that had few issues with ripping. Ditto for ND and UCLA. Nebraska, even with the physical style they play, didn't experience problems.

I can't answer this, but it is puzzling.

As far as the practice shots, they do that with a lot of their teams, having different jerseys and pants tested in practice. It's usually not as noticeable because most teams wear plain white pants or striped in practice, so if somebody is out there in plain white test pants, it's not easily noticed. I know that Hoke also wanted linemen wearing the tighter game jerseys in practice so D-linemen couldn't just hold the looser jerseys. Robinson also wore a game-cut jersey for practice. That part isn't on Adidas, in my opinion.

Overall, I think your observations are valid, but I think it's more a result of Adidas being proactive and trying to get the team in what suited them best, rather than them failing at something. The practice shots illustrate this by having the team test out new products as well.

I understand the idea behind having players test uniforms in practice, but how many BCS-conference teams have to piece together enough practice uniforms from multiple eras to cover all the players? In those photos, I see:

- TechFit uniforms

- Old Game-used uniforms

- The original practice uniforms Michigan received over 3 years ago:

As someone who played NAIA soccer for a small school, my school was able swing new practice uniforms for us every year. I find it fascinating that a major university is using the exact same uniforms in spring practice that they are using in a game.

[hawk36]

Love this look. Nice job of complementing the helmet.

[BRice16]

But doesn't that fall on the manufacturer, not the team or players? It's not the players fault they don't want to wear something that is uncomfortable... Even doing something as lazy as adding two stripes to the shoulders to somewhat match the old jerseys. You think that a better solution would have been providing the team with a new uniform design available in either the old cut or the TechFit cut.

Nike doesn't seem to have that issue for any of its teams...

That's a valid point, but the players agreed to the new cut after testing it in the spring, then wanted out of it when the fall came around. To me, that's on the school for allowing players to dictate a change like that that leads to inconsistency. I know for a fact that it made Michigan's Adidas reps crazy after the lengths they went to to get every player properly fitted in the spring.

Nike hasn't had that problem because they don't provide alternatives. You get what they send.

I understand the idea behind having players test uniforms in practice, but how many BCS-conference teams have to piece together enough practice uniforms from multiple eras to cover all the players? In those photos, I see:

- TechFit uniforms

- Old Game-used uniforms

- The original practice uniforms Michigan received over 3 years ago:

As someone who played NAIA soccer for a small school, my school was able swing new practice uniforms for us every year. I find it fascinating that a major university is using the exact same uniforms in spring practice that they are using in a game.

But they're not "having to piece together" anything. Michigan received a full set of the Three-stripe practice uniforms this season. They have them. They're not three years old. All Adidas teams use the same design and get new complete sets every single season.

What I see in that first shot, as someone who has spent time on college practice fields at an Adidas school, is most players in the normal practice jerseys and what are probably old game pants, which is what most every school I know of, Adidas and Nike alike, use. I see linemen in old or extra game cut jerseys, which is something that coaches do when other linemen have been using the looser practice jerseys to grab instead of using proper technique. Then, I see a couple of players in the experimental Techfit jerseys and pants (the white pants), that they were testing out.

I don't see anything in that photo that I would say is abnormal for a spring practice or any practice, really, regardless of the manufacturer.

I don't see them piecing together sets. I know for absolute fact that Michigan received enough practice jerseys for all players to wear. That's not an issue.

[Billy B]

I didn't know this was such an unpopular opinion, but I love the MSU game uniforms. I'd love if they wore those as the full-time road without the block M and with maize pants. After that, my choice would be for the Braylon Edwards uniforms in the picture above. I kind of like how adidas switches up the road uniforms, but I don't think they've ever come up with anything too good.

[KJTALBOT]

I know its not addidas' fault, but yellow of the helmet number is darker than the stripe. So, I count three helmets. Standard helmet they were using for decades, the one they broke out for ND with the number and grey facemask and the one with the number and navy facemask. Michigan was a mess this year.

[raysox]

I think Michigan's homes are one of the best in college football. But the roads just kinda kill it. A white version would get the job done and no one would complain. I liked the bumble bees A LOT, but only a one time thing. The rest were just bad.

[jrodsep]

Did they wear the number on the side of the helmet the whole year? Kinda looks out of place...

[henburg]

I didn't know this was such an unpopular opinion, but I love the MSU game uniforms. I'd love if they wore those as the full-time road without the block M and with maize pants. After that, my choice would be for the Braylon Edwards uniforms in the picture above. I kind of like how adidas switches up the road uniforms, but I don't think they've ever come up with anything too good.

I agree. I loved both the UTL uniforms and the MSU aways. I especially liked the maize undershirts.