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They Should Sell the Stadium Naming Rights to Off!

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I know minor league baseball teams often have wacky names. I also know the Houston area has a lot of mosquitos. And yeah, I realize there’s already a team called the Savannah Sand Gnats. Still, isn’t it a little strange that the newest minor league team is naming itself after a pest that just annoys everyone? (Hmmm, maybe that’s where Wally Backman should manage.) “Skeeter” is a pretty cool word, though. Go Skeeters!

Here’s the weirdest part: If you look at the image above, you’ll see that the Skeeter logo guy looks all rough and tough and on the attack, like every cartoon mascot these days. But if you go to the team’s official site, you’ll see that he’s not attacking — he’s stuck! Or at least that’s what it looks like to me. Poor li’l fella, just waiting to be swatted. (Here’s their logo spec sheet, if you’re so inclined.)

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New ESPN column today — my annual holiday gift guide. Some of it is stuff that’s been featured here on the blog, and some of it will probably be new to you. Enjoy.

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Uni Watch Stirrup Club: I now yield the floor to Comrade Robert Marshall, who brings exciting news from the frontlines of the hosiery wars:

There have been a few changes since the last Revolutionary Stirrup Party communiqué. For one, we’ve moved our bunker form Chicago to Kansas City. This will bring a significant change to our mail-order activities, because every stirrup order for the last two years was personally processed by the lovely Betty at the Cesar Chavez postal facility in Chicago. The Revolution sheds a small tear at that loss. The other big news is that after our last production nightmare with Twin City Knitting, the Revolution had a long talk with TCK’s top dog, and that should not happen again.

On to the important business at hand — this month’s new stirrup offerings. With bowl season just around the corner, the Revolution wanted to wax fantastic about college. Nothing says Alma mater like stripes in school colors, so we’re proud to offer Ivy League-style stripes in a splendid variety of color combinations.

Depending on the popularity of this idea, I hope to offer at least one Ivy-style pattern, based on school colors, in every new batch of Stirrup Club offerings, so feel free to make suggestions. Please note that color schemes will not be repeated. For instance, Indiana, Oklahoma, and Alabama are all crimson and white (TCK does not offer cream) — although I call this color combo “Bloomington,” it can also cover other schools with the same color scheme.

One last order of business: There are still some football socks left over from last year that I never list. If you can’t decipher the teams, feel free to contact me. To see the full hosiery listings and ordering details, click here.

Have a happy holiday everyone, and remember”¦. from each according his stirrvp, to each according his strype.

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Uni Watch News Ticker: NBA teams marked World AIDS Day by wearing red warm-ups, sneakers, wristbands, and headbands last night. … Hinchliffe Stadium in Paterson, New Jersey, which I wrote about a few months ago, is now the subject of a PBS TV segment, which you can watch here. ”¦ Remember that news item about the Cavaliers banning anti-LeBron T-shirts from tonight’s game against the Heat? Turns out they’re not the only Ohio team with some T-shirt issues. ”¦ Here’s a piece on why Rob Schremp of the Islanders chose uniform No. 44. ”¦ Speaking of the Isles, Bruno Gervais was reportedly wearing a full cage at practice yesterday. Remains to be seen whether he’ll wear it for tonight’s game against the Rangers (with thanks to John Muir). ”¦ Durene-o-rama: I just got this simple but very nice jersey on eBay. And if you were paying attention yesterday, you should know where I just scored this amazing-looking basketball warm-up top. These and several other recent acquisitions will be featured in a new “Closet Case” entry that I’ll be running soon. ”¦ A few uni-numerical adjustments for the Colts. … Yesterday I linked to this great Lions jacket. The player shown on the patch is wearing No. 10, but Mike Hersh has found photos of different versions. Did they have a different-numbered patch to match each player’s uni number? ”¦ I’m not sure what took them so long, but the state of Louisiana has produced a run of Saints Super Bowl license plates (with thanks to Troy Griggsby). ”¦ When Auburn and South Carolina play for the SEC title this weekend, it will mark the first time two Under Armour-outfitted teams have met in a championship game. Of course, the real feather in Under Armour’s cap will be if Auburn wins and gets to play for the national championship, which would be a milestone for the upstart company. ”¦ The Chicoutimi Sagueneens — that’s a Quebec Major Junior hockey team — have added a “16” memorial patch for owner Gervais Munger, who died last summer in a boating accident. He had worn that number as a player in the late 1970s (with thanks to Jean-Philippe Laroche). ”¦ Next best thing to a Meats shirt: the shirt on the left in this photo (carnivorous thanks to Matt Mitchell). ”¦ This photo is so frightful that you might not even notice the adjusta-strap caps (disturbing find by A.J. Spring). ”¦ After introducing Juan Uribe to the media, the Dodgers gave him a tour around the office. I like the whiteboard roster (as noted by Charlie Ryczek). ”¦ Andrew Greif sent along this Civil War retrospective slideshow. “As truly bad as Oregon has looked at times (and I say this as an Oregon grad), I was stunned to see how bad OSU’s unis were from 1997-98,” he says. ”¦ You’ll never find a pair of nicer hockey sweaters than this and this (great finds by Mike Powers). ”¦ Dan Sankar notes that Purdue basketball has changed the uni number design on the black uniforms. ”¦ Nice Missouri Southern helmet cart! (With thanks to Ryan Adams.) ”¦ Judging by these pages from Adidas’s Fall 2011 football catalog, it looks like the shoulder seams on the super-stretchies have been lowered a bit, which bodes well — or at least better — for shoulder stripes (with thanks to Andrew Harrington). … Minnesota-Duluth will be playing one last series in their old hockey arena before moving to a new one next door and will be wearing these very nice throwbacks to close out the old rink (big thanks to Sean Donovan).

 
  
 
Comments (145)

    Skeeters is better than one of the other three finalists: the Lizard Kings.

    Useless trivia: the Texas Mosquito Festival is in Lake Jackson, which is not too far from Sugar Land. And if you’re ever in Galveston, eat at the Mosquito Grill. Try the black bean quesadillas.

    And I’m sure all kinds of college guys are going to buy a shirt that has skeeters on it, and not because they like the team.

    Um, yeah…Maybe it’s because I’m a college kid but a mosquito is NOT what I think of when I hear the word “skeeter”

    Urbandictionary.com would be a good start for those who want to learn what “skeet” means…Kind of like the Wichita State “Shockers”

    obviously NSFW. But maybe in some twisted way, they felt they could sell a ton of shirts that said “Skeeter” on them…Count me in as a college kid who has nothing better to spend his money on.

    Yes. The green and yellow stirrup should probably be called ‘eugene.’ But that wouldn’t make much sense, either, because the ‘eugene’ stirrup should probably be black and silver. Maybe it should just be called ‘waco.’

    da bears don’t wear that shade of gold…

    maybe it should just be orange and black

    Illini in Champaign; Boilers in West Lafayette. But hey, 3 out of 6 ain’t bad.

    And at least he spelled Bloomington correctly.

    You know I hate telling you you’re wrong, Phil, but you’re wrong. The football team wears vegas gold, but most of the other teams wear athletic gold. The baseballers even have an athletic gold alternate jersey.

    well…shame on me for thinking roberto was only considering college football with those rup offerings…if he was indeed thinking about their baseball team (after all, they are baseball rups), then sure, baylor’s colors would work with the “corvallis” rup

    but if we’re talking about the football team, then, indeed, vegas gold is needed…if we’re talking about baseball, you’re correct, as usual — “corvallis” would better be called “waco”

    of course, eugene might be better still, but then white, carbon, steel, black, athletic gold and kelly green (or “thunder” green & “lightning” yellow) might apply…hey…they could have a seven striped (all different) rup!

    No State College stirrups (worn with black shoes, of course)?

    Glad this was brought up today. That reminded me I can wear the UW stirrups
    link
    when I watch the Cavs beat Miami tonight.

    i think he wanted only rups for good teams…

    wait…then there wouldn’t be bloomington on there either

    Yes. As an OSU alum, all I could think of when i saw that was “Oh, that is buuuuuuuullllllllSHIT!!!!”.
    Orange and Black in Cow-vallis!

    you can’t steal cowlumbus’ cow.

    and mothervilker, the original plan was to have all 11 intercollegiate conference of faculty representatives teams so we could welcome nebraska next year on stirrup friday. the problem was with the move everything got delayed, and without a job i couldn’t take the risk of being on the hook for 11 teams worth of stirrups if i only sold one of each.

    “Chicoutimi Sagueneens” is a name I will use for future fantasy teams. When finances get better, will have to commission some appropriate attire too.

    Sigh. What fails about this design is the unnecessary over-thickness and over-saturation of outlines, and the needless sharp thorns and jagged edges that seem to show up on almost every new design. It’s like these designers all came from the same damn school (stating the obvious, I know).

    Crudely done without completely re-drawing it, this is what I would have done: add a more hand-drawn approach, make the spirit of the logo more fun, replaced the gold with Athletic Gold, cleaned up the font outlines & reversed the wordmark scheme for the white background & replaced the Texas graphic (political tones aside, black would’ve looked too anti-Texas, and the image would have been lost behind an Athletic Gold state).

    link

    Maybe an interview with Dan Simon, Joe Bosack or the Plan B guys is in order (maybe Rickabaugh, too). I’d be interested in finding out more about why all these different designers give these minor league teams and colleges logos such a similar illustration treatment.

    Interviews like that would be really interesting. Plan B and Studio Simon are both doing a ton of work in minor league baseball and are shaping the look of that huge sports body.

    … the unnecessary over-thickness and over-saturation of outlines, and the needless sharp thorns and jagged edges that seem to show up on almost every new design.

    Yes, but I think this is the rare case where that style actually works. For one thing, the iconography justifies it, since the mosquito is a very small thing, and so the overly thick outlines create an appropriate sense of scale. It looks like a small drawing blown up. Finer lines and more detail would be all wrong for something that’s supposed to look like it’s a tiny thing. For another, the color scheme all but requires this approach to work – and it does work. Blue and black are tough to integrate, but it can be done, and the Skeeters do so nicely.

    CNBC has lately been airing a pretty good business documentary about Pixar. The folks at Plan B really need to watch it and draw some lessons about building on past success without falling into a self-derivative style.

    I could have done with a smoother font.

    As a guy on cartoon overload when it comes to minor league logos, I don’t mind this one. He feels like a sort of fun play on Georgia Tech’s logo.

    The downside to so many of these logos is that they don’t make a bid at creating imagery that will stand up in a decade for teams. They’re too rooted in present trends and don’t call out imagery that has stood out over time.

    I don’t know about that. There’s plenty of logos out there that are basically dated as hell that still stand up just fine. Being able to identify approximately when the logo was created by it’s overall design style doesn’t mean that it can’t last.

    The biggest reason for that logo to die is the team failing.

    Good point, The Jeff.

    The thing that separates classic and dated can be an organization’s commitment to a look.

    I’m trying to find the right way to formulate what it is that doesn’t quite hit my sweet spot about a lot of the recent minor league designs. There’s a common thread, I just haven’t hit on the right way of defining it.

    Is there any substance to this article posted on Mets Police? Basically saying MLB and New Era are selling minor league team caps as if they are Brooklyn Dodger caps.

    link

    Please don’t yell at me if it’s some crazy photoshop job and I’m an idiot.

    Any substance? Kind of.

    It’s true that the blue caps currently sold as “Brooklyn Dodger” caps bear only superficial resemblance to those worn by the Boys of Summer.

    I don’t know where New Era got their logo from, if it originated with Bakersfield or not. Maybe they like it because it’s “theirs.” But wherever it came from, it’s not the classic Brooklyn “B”.

    The only place to get anything approaching authentic 1957 caps was Cooperstown Cap Company, which shut its doors last year.

    The Australian Football League’s Essendon Bombers use a link, but other than a play on the name I don’t know if there’s any other significance. Then, laying claim to the mozzie isn’t exactly link.

    Personally, I don’t mind the name (I love a sense of whimsy), although I’m not wowed by the logo.

    If you are going to refer to them “Ivy-league style” and the colors are “Crimson and White,” you might want to name them “Cambridge.”

    Made a boxing style poster. Just in time for the civil war!
    file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/Drews%20PC/Desktop/CIvil%20War%20poster4.jpg

    You can’t link to stuff that’s still on your computer, man. You gotta upload that somewhere.

    link

    Very interesting. Nobody will buy it. It’s a compression shirt over pads…Regardless, what interested me was what kind of football helmet the mannequin was wearing? Too bad you can’t see the full picture. It’s nothing I have seen judging from the chinstrap and the bottom of the mask.

    I don’t think it’s intentionally designed to look like a cross but if so, the swoosh in place of the INRI inscription is a touch of class.

    That was from last year.

    Didn’t think of a cross when I saw the picture, but I also didn’t hear the magic words “I’d wear that” in my head, either. Meh.

    Thanks for the Hinchliffe Stadium clip. Praise to Brian LoPinto for fighting the good fight.

    Meanwhile, that Skeeters logo is truly awful. What an abysmal illustration. Not likable at all. Not cute, not stylish, not even, er, intimidating. And, yeah, it looks stuck in the granite representation of Texas…and LEGLESS, too. Poor thing.

    Likeable isn’t a feature teams look for anymore in a mascot. Unfortunately. It’s all about intimidation, and you’re right – it’s not that either.

    Actually, I like this better than the Flying Squirrels design. Slightly.

    We’ve reached a point where just about all minor league logos look like they came from the same crappy template. It must take Plan B about 3 minutes to do these things.

    You know what else is a bit “off”? Look at the Skeeters script… the blockshadow on the “t” seems to be heavier than the others; the k, r & s have no left-side blockshadow, the capital S looks like it belongs in a different font family & just odd shading in general. But I guess that’s what’s plausible these days.

    1.) Uribe is dead to me.

    2.) Marge photo is priceless. I went over to her house once- ‘want a doughnut, honey?’

    Then once (this is all due to my radio job) I had to pick her up @ the stadium, to take her to our studio for an interview. Picked her up in my Miata.

    MS: “This is an awfully small car, honey.”
    me: “Yes it is.”
    MS: “Mind if I smoke?”
    me: “Yes I do.”

    And I won’t mention the time I fed Lorna Doones and YooHoo to Schottzie in the back of a limo, or the time Schottzie sat on my chest in her office while Jim Bowden laughed in the background.

    True story: When I donate blood (which I do every two months or so), the standard post-bleed snack offering at my local donation center is Lorna Doones and apple juice — but one time they had YooHoo. Made for a very good combo.

    And I didn’t even slobber all over everyone or take a dump on the carpet….

    Up until maybe a generation ago, after you gave blood in New Ulm, Minnesota (home of Schells Brewery) they handed you a beer.

    —Ricko

    “MS: “This is an awfully small car, honey.”
    me: “Yes it is.”
    MS: “Mind if I smoke?”
    me: “Yes I do.””

    (the rest of the conversation):

    MS: “you don’t really want to keep your radio gig, do you?”
    me: “no, i don’t”

    Nah she really liked me. Had lots of friends in the Reds front office, and she always had a small goody bag of giveaway stuff for me.

    Another true story- I did her commercials for her local car dealership. When they announced Pete got suspended, I was on the phone with her at that moment talking about a script, and I had ESPN on on the tube in my living room.

    “Guess what’s on Sportscenter now, Mrs. Schott?”

    “1.) Uribe is dead to me.”

    Being a Giants fan, it sucks so much seeing Uribe in that hideous uni. But when he gets his world series ring, is it going to be in front of the Giants fans or are they going to send it to him? If they do present it in front of the Giants fans, I wonder if they are going to boo, cheer, or be silent when they say his name.

    If I had a vote, they’d award the rings the first date the Dodgers come in.

    And if they hand a ring to Uribe, everyone stands up, and turns around with their back to the field.

    Sorry Juan, you were great for us. I normally won’t don’t begrudge your right to earn more—–but not with LA. Not ever.

    Poor Chris in Cincinnati. link A guy pays serious bucks for a ticket. In all likelihood he lives in Cincinnati and his taxes built the stadium. The T-shirt he’s wearing is not profane nor even coarse. And he gets the boot. You’d think somebody’d raise a First Amendment stink.

    We’ve got our priorities seriously out of whack in this country. Billionaire sports magnates hold communities hostage. We give them what they want, when they want and how they want. Hell, we’ve even given them a political party. In the face of deficit spending, these billionaires STILL want tax cuts they didn’t have 10 years ago. It really sucks to be an average Joe, who’s probably right about the Bengals’ offensive coordinator.

    /rant over.

    True, but the sympathy is a tiny bit mitigated by this:

    “Tenable’s Director of Security Operations Nick Whitecotton said Chris left of his own accord. Whitecotton said the message on the shirt wasn’t why Chris was asked to leave. “He was waving it in people’s faces,” Whitecotton said, “and he was warned the next time (he waved the tee) he would have to go.”

    Chris admits to being warned, and he admits to ignoring the warnings.”

    If one single other fan at the games complained, then security was right to warn him, and toss him when he failed to comply.

    “Dan Sankar notes that Purdue basketball has changed the uni number design on the black uniforms.”

    Somebody finally got their noodle straightened. Iowa next?

    Ugh. Both Purdue and Iowa need to redo the team name too then. The filled number with the outlined name looks kinda bad.

    Yep. I didn’t care for the blacked-out numbers last year, but at least the overall look was better with the wordmark’s color matching the numbers. The mismatch of the contrasting numbers with the black wordmark looks half-assed.

    And with the new rule about jersey certification being voluntary this year, why did they need to change them at all?

    Oh, right. If they didn’t, there could be no swoosh on the right shoulder.

    I really liked the outline jerseys. The redone ones don’t look as bad as I would’ve imagined, though. I still give them a thumbs up.

    two things: first if i did the year counting correct the “ugly” osu jerseys are fricken awsome actually never saw a bad osu jersey until later on.
    the adidias template is still horrible with it still being super stretchy the shoulder stripes will end up somewhere on “sleeve” and not to mention will be wavey and nasty. please stop they have killed ucla unis enuff

    Speaking of Page 2… have you seen link

    * denotes sarcasm

    Granted, it’s more about the team, but still, it’s an entertaining read.

    i was thinking about the game this weekend in corvallis, and just beep-bop-boop, processed things wrong in the ol commodore 64. nothing like coming out of uni-hibernation with a major gaffe. stupid forgetting to measure twice to cut once, i am sorry eugene levi.

    I flipped through the pics of Oregon-Oregon State games, and guess what I found? In 2006 in Corvallis the teams went color vs. color. Oregon was wearing their “Lighting Yellow” uniforms which I liked but many don’t. I thought it looked good, and I think an NFL team (okay, the Rams) should go to that philosophy full-time.

    As an aside, Flip, I know of sites I can go to for political commentary. None of them are called “Uniwatch.” Please keep politics away from this site.

    yep…and there might be a little something this saturday on the civil war

    /just sayin

    yep…there might be a little something this sunday on the rams gold alt

    /BFS, i know spanky

    But weren’t those old Rams jerseys yellow, just like the 1994 throwbacks? I’m not an expert on the Rams, but 2000 was the first year I’ve ever seen gold on a Cleveland/LA/St. Louis Ram uniform.

    Instead, I can think of two other better candidates for a gold jersey. New Orleans(which had a mustard type alternate several years ago), and the 49ers. Even better, I’d like to see a true gold monochrome uniform, and those two teams could pull it off. Gold would look superior to the solid yellow(Minnesota Golden Gopher example) we’ve been subjected to in recent years.

    Yellow is more what highlighters look like — bright, fluorescent. Oregon has worn yellow uniforms in recent years.

    Gold can be either the color of the Oakland A’s jersyes in the 1970s and 1980s or the color of the Notre Dame helmets. Just like blue can be either navy blue or Carolina blue — different colors, but both blue.

    But have you noticed that the yellow traffic light you run through every day is really gold, or amber?

    could the champagne stirrups be purhcased for use as auburn ones? i’m thinking yes.

    i’m thinking if auburn wasn’t in auburn, making it a horrible cover, i would have called them auburn instead of champagne.

    i was expecting to hear from phil on that so i could get all ba-dum-bump on illinois, but then i ruin it by keeping the “e” on my response? fail. i’m out of practice. the eugene was a brain-cramp ball-drop, champagne/champaign was supposed to be a been gone a while gift for phil.

    and it’s 2 out of 6, the correct spelling is cowlumbus. i was too busy earlier responding to eugene emails to see that you guys discussed all this. phil, do 30,000 people tell you you messed up every time you have a brain cramp like eugene? and yes, i was only considering football, and not fencing. and yes, carbon and grey would have been more fitting, but i assumed that there would be 12 quackers who might want to wear their school colours for their rose bowl loss to wisconsin after they are tripped the beavers. clearly i was wrong, there are zero at this point. temple is out selling oregon. you can beat yourself oregon, but you can’t beat the beaver.

    sorry for questioning the corvallis thing…i was half awake when i saw it…but im sure someone else would have wondered…

    and aren’t you being a little hard on the beaver teh rob?

    no, i should have been hammered, i am not saying i shouldn’t have been, what i meant was i got a billion emails. i i had two orders for stirrups or socks, and 30 emails telling me i injured oregon, and then a couple friendly pokes from long time revolutionaries.

    well played retort.

    maybe it’s because i browse with IE at work, but that produced both a 403 AND a 404 error spanks

    cut and paste the link into another browser, it’s a come on feel the illinoise T, it’s pretty funny because that’s how buffoons from illinois like jth pronounce their state. then again, i am from bawlmer murlin which is daown dee raoad fum baoff naplis an worshnin, so, i’ll just shut it.

    by the way phil, i think i may need to colourize that THE pixture i used today if i can find time away from being unemployed.

    Not the place for it, I’m sure, but:

    2018 FIFA World Cup to Russia.

    2022 FIFA World Cup to Qatar.
    The Oil Sheikh World Cup.

    Been on the phone to friends in England – gutted right now. I thought they were a perfect fit, with all the new venues.

    Guess the lure of first-time hosts was too great.

    Russia winning the World Cup against objectively stronger bids from England and Netherlands/Belgium was almost enough to ruin my day. But, I figured, at least that meant that FIFA was getting the bribe-based-voting out of the way early, and either Australia or USA would be awarded 2022. After all, the US bid was scored 100 out of 100 by the firm FIFA hired to assess the quality of the bids, and 1994 remains the highest-attendance World Cup in history. And Qatar has zero world-class stadiums and summer heat that under FIFA’s own standards represents an unacceptable health risk to players. The Qatari bid hinges on spending $50 billion to build 12 fully air-conditioned stadiums for the World Cup and then tear most of them down as soon as the tournament is over, which at least one engineer I’ve read estimates might be the most wasteful and CO2-profligate construction project in human history. So, you know, no way the Euro-dominated FIFA would vote for that, right?

    On topic, here’s the link and link bid logos. The Russia one is par for the course – giant red lettering! because it’s Russia! – and the final event logos will probably be a bit more subtle. But the Qatar logo is probably well representative of what the actual event logo will look like, given some very specific cultural issues with representational art in that part of the world.

    Still can’t believe Qatar was chosen for 2022. So illogical in so many ways…except that they are swimming in money. I know that beyond being crooked, FIFA probably wanted to stage the Cup in a region that’s never hosted, but this seems like it’s going to be a disaster. I’m sure the US will be the last minute backup plan, as it usually is.

    It’s illegal to be drunk in public in Qatar, so I wish the soccer hooligans good luck.

    Oh, I found an official Coors Light light-up sign at one of my local sports bars that depicts a fictional Atlanta Hawks player with his jersey on backwards… film @ 11.

    Hi folks. I’m doing a story for my local paper on high schools running into trademark problems with their sports logos. If you’re aware of various schools in your area which are using NFL team logos on their football helmets, I’d love to hear about it at link so I can get an idea of how widespread that trend is. The NFL has said it doesn’t prohibit such use, which makes the crackdown by big-time colleges all the more interesting to me. Thanks!

    There’s this link with massive links organized by state:

    link

    As I recall when I went to HS, one school used the Falcons logo & another used the Vikings logo, and my HS ripped off NCAAF’s West Virgina.

    I took a peek. FWIW at least two in Colorado are out of date (Manual and Denver South). There are a couple others I’m not sure about, so you may want to take this cum grano salis.

    Going through the Michigan helmets, I found a couple of hockey logos… one I knew about, the Plymouth Wildcats (using the Nashville Predators logo, because the class of 2006, the first graduating class, wanted to be the Plymouth Predators, but paranoid parents vetoed it due to a misplaced association of the word “predator”).

    But the other threw me, because it’s not an NHL logo… the Waterford Kettering Captains (alma mater of Kirk Gibson and Pat LaFontaine) is using the 1998 version of the then-IHL Milwaukee Admirals logo!

    RE: The Saints license plate comment… everything takes forever in Louisiana government. Surprised they didn’t release these in 2012!

    Although, to be fair, the law was passed very quickly after the game. They just needed to design and manufacture them.

    Either way, I’m going to try to get my hands on one… they only made 4,100 so I bet they’re already sold out.

    Considering the local New Orleans newspaper the day after the Super Bowl had to be re-printed FIVE times over three or four days because of the demand… Saints fans are rabid, I tell ya. I had a good friend who’s an early riser get me one by waiting in line at like 5am.

    My previous comment included a reaction that was harsh and out of place on someone else’s site; I apologize.

    I’m unhappy about the FIFA decision. Pflava’s remark that the U. S. Can be a last-minute backup sure seems on the mark, though–if any country spits the bit, the U. S. can host a World Cup requiring zero stadium construction with many of the logistics already taken care of. Seriously, Texas probably has enough qualified stadiums on its own.

    You and Pflava are right about the US as a backup: In fact, since 1994, the US has been FIFA’s designated backup site for most international events, and in a couple of cases we’ve saved FIFA’s bacon by stepping in (as when China was unable at the last minute to host the Women’s World Cup).

    I, for one, hope the US federation tells FIFA to find another backup site for all international events as of right now.

    I noticed that on the Dodgers’ whiteboard, all the retired numbers were absent (of course). Among the absent numbers is Fernando Valenzuela’s jersey #34.

    Garvey’s formerly-semi-retired jersey #6 is even “available” (as Joe Torre has retired), but that’s probably a case of the owner not knowing what’s going on in his own house. According to wikipedia, Garvey’s number hasn’t seen on-field action since he went to San Diego, except for a few coaches post-’02, and Jolbert Cabrerra (?!) in 2003.

    Wonder if there’s any plans to formally retire Fernando’s jersey, would be only the second Dodger to have their number retired w/o a HOF plaque. They haven’t even retired Gil Hodges.

    It’s a tough call about Valenzuela, he certainly earned a special place in LA Dodgers history, even if he faded after several years. They may well end up formally retiring his number at some point.

    Regarding Gil Hodges, don’t think his number will be retired by the Dodgers. Hodges was a force for the old Brooklyn Dodgers, and managed the ’69 Mets, but he had only two good years as a player in Los Angeles. Had the Dodgers remained in Brooklyn, or had he put together several quality years in LA, his number would have likely been retired long ago.

    while his HOF credentials are debatable, his accomplishments AS A DODGER should not be determined whether he accomplished them in brooklyn or in LA…either you retire his number as a member of the franchise or you don’t…not based on his importance to LA

    should the LA dodgers unretire jackie robinson’s number (i mean, if they could) because he had absolutely nothing to do with the city of angels? will JRR be remembered as anything other than a dodger?

    sometimes i really don’t understand what you’re thinking

    No, Jackie Robinson was a different case than Gil Hodges, a much higher level which transcended his statistics. On the other hand, Hodges has the bad timing of having his peak years in a different city, and that makes a huge difference in the issue of retiring numbers. No confusion at all, whoever owns the Dodgers will likely not be a Brooklyn Dodgers expert, and there won’t be a groundswell of support in LA for Hodges.

    I wasn’t putting down Hodges, but that’s the reality of the situation.

    Oops, forgot to mention if Gil Hodges was ever formally elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame, then yes, the LA Dodgers should go ahead and recognize that by retiring his number. This has been done many times by other franchises in similar situations. I don’t believe Hodges has ever been very close in gaining induction, especially now. I’m guessing he had more support in the 70s or 80s.

    my point wasn’t to debate hodges’ HOF-worthiness…it was to point out that he either merits retiring or he doesn’t…to say “well he only had 2 good years in LA” should have ABSOLUTELY NO BEARING on whether his jersey gets retired…every year he was a dodger, whether it was in brooklyn or whether it was in LA, need to be considered, not just how “important” he was to LA

    if his cumulative numbers as a dodger don’t merit retiring, or they require him to be in the HOF in order to meet that criterion, then his number shouldn’t be retired

    but the city in which he acquired those numbers doesn’t matter…he still was a member of the dodgers franchise

    Wouldn’t say Jackie Robinson “had absolutely nothing to do with the city of angels”, Phil. For instance, he was the only athlete to ever letter in four sports at UCLA (football, basketball, track, and baseball): link

    Whoops, I think my post just above was a major brain fart…I can’t even figure out what I was thinking three minutes later. Need. More. Coffee.

    They played like an away team at the tail end of a west coast road trip…

    But yeah, I agree with Jason.

    And I think it was a mistake to wear the dark road uniform, CLEVELAND or no CLEVELAND. They LOOKED like visitors in their own building, especially unfortunate on this night. James walks in all confident with those bright, shiny, good-guys threads, when he should have been decked out in bad-guy black. (Not that it would have changed the outcome, but–you know–for the story, the aesthetics.)

    Hey Paul, the Round Rock Express (AAA Baseball) unveiled new logos and uniforms today – to match their new affiliation with the Texas Rangers. I sent you and e-mail earlier about it. I’m patiently waiting for the Is It Good/Stupid verdict.

    Arizona State wearing gold pants with the white jerseys tonight- usually wear the maroon pants with the white jerseys. Arizona wearing red jerseys with white pants. I think they usually go mono-red when they go red.
    link

    This business of comparing football to war is getting to be too much.

    Nike and their hideous jerseys and now this:

    link

    He thinks he got booed before, what do you think will happen now?

    well…if he was a fuckin’ soldier…he’d get shot, maybe killed

    but, you know, these guys — they’re the real warriors…those guys in iraq and afghanistan and everyplace else…they’re just keeping it so mr. rolle can utter *genius* like that

    I am tired of players bitching about people booing. Dominic Raiola in Detroit complains about the fans booing all the time. If I spend my hard earned money and you false start five times in a game and YOU ARE THE FREAKING CENTER, I am going to boo you.

    Speaking of booing, I’m both impressed and disappointed in the Cavs fans. Impressed that as a whole, they seemed to keep it clean and free of any incidents, but the booing for LeGone really tapered off as the game went on.

    I remember after “the shot,” whenever Jordan touched the ball he was booed mercilessly from tipoff to final buzzer. These modern fans gotta learn to pace themselves…

    A friend and I were just discussing the impressive grudge-holding ability of Cleveland fans tonight.

    It never failed to crack me up that Jordan would receive a solid chorus of boos EVERY TIME HE HANDLED THE BALL.

    Jordan — not Dennis Rodman or John Paxson or Craig Hodges or someone else who might get the ball a couple dozen times a game. We’re talking about a guy who was a virtual lock to get the ball at least once on every offensive possession where he was on the floor.

    And you aren’t a fricking solider either. I don’t see anyone shooting at you on the field or any IED near the end zone. You are paid (and paid very well) to play a GAME. End of rant.

    Really?
    link

    Cavs fans had a chance to shred their old LBJ shirts before the game.
    link
    Then the Heat returned the favor and shredded the Cavs…

    Hockey logos note: SportsLogos.net finally added team logos to the old International Hockey League section: link

    It’s just too bad he got the Kalamazoo Wings/Michigan K-Wings wrong. They only wore the italicized “K” with “WINGS” superimposed from 1995 on (as the Michigan K-Wings), and then only in the Dallas Stars colors (darker green and old gold); the red and blue italic-K logo has only been worn by the current ECHL/former UHL Kalamazoo Wings, which were founded after the old IHL K-Wings folded.

    In looking up the correct classic K-Wings logos, I found this page: link – Some nice looking jerseys there, including that 1990-91 K-Wings “ice sheen” jersey.

    He is also missing the following teams

    Flint Generals
    Flint Spirits
    Saginaw Generals
    Saginaw Hawks
    Denver Rangers
    Salt Lake City Golden Eagles

    Just off the top of my head.

    The K-Wings were also red, white and blue for at least one season.

    It obviously still needs some work, but the K-Wings really stood out for me, having seen them play the Vipers up at the Palace a few times back in the day.

    More minor-league unis on this page: link – including another of the “ice sheen” K-Wings, and a black Dallas-style Jere Lehtinen K-Wings jersey – note the sleeve numbers on that one are up higher, almost completely above the gap in the half-stripes. I have no idea what they were thinking, because it’s a bad look.

    Also, the K-Wings were red-white-and-blue from 1974-1988, when they became the North Stars’ farm club.

    Somewhere around here I have an old IHL media guide from the time the Vipers were in the IHL. It might have some of the logos. I will look tomorrow.

    Question: the prevailing opinion on here is you don’t put your own name on your favorite team’s jersey (doesn’t bother me either way)…but what if you’re a celebrity? Drew Carey was at the Cavs game wearing his last name on a #21 jersey. Bernie Kosar and Josh Cribbs were there, wearing their numbers from the Browns. Didn’t see their backs, but if they have their numbers, I’d assume they had their names too. Thoughts?

    I have no problem with Own name on back. But I think Cribbs and Kosar can get away with it since they actually wore that number on the field. (Unless, when they wore it on the field it was NNOB). That is one man’s opinion.

    I’m guessing the jerseys were given to these guys by the team, right?

    To each his own, but my personal preference is not to wear my name on the back of a jersey. Although you can bet that if I’m given a jersey with my name on the back by the team, I’m wearing it.

    I think it’s way cooler when a celeb wears a player name. I remember Mike Myers attending Leaf playoff games in good-not-great seats wearing a Steve Thomas jersey. Clearly there to be a fan, not to be seen.

    When the backs of the jerseys were visible on the big screen, they had the wearers’ names. (Cribbs is the one I particularly remember.)

    Don’t have a photo but the Australian Open is live right now and John Daly’s pants are the Australian flag. Right leg the Union Jack and left leg, the stars

    Aussie flag: link

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