Nike Makes The Lions New Uniforms
A little piece of news kind of snuck under the radar this week. The Detroit Lions unveiled new uniforms. The Lions have gone under a subtle and understated re-design. They eliminated pretty much all the black trim on both the uniforms and the logo, they adjusted the stripe pattern on the shoulders, they made a chrome facemask, and they made a grey color rush uniform. It was a lot of small changes.
I’m pretty happy with what we have now. Nike didn’t get too crazy, they just took a pretty ugly uniform (The Lions uniforms were at best unremarkable before this) and cleaned it up. It reminds me of the Vikings uniform re-design, just a sleeker, cleaner version of a mediocre look. The black trim on the logo and uniform was pretty unnecessary and dropping it was addition by subtraction. It just didn’t add anything. The old numbers were pretty stupid, too: they had this weird internal serif thing going on that was hard to see but stupid. They reduced the colors on the uniforms to 3 (Blue, white, and grey) and every uniform looks best with that sort of balance of a main color, a secondary, and a tiny tertiary color. A 4th just muddles things up.
Nike still does that incredibly terrible “partial stripe” on the shoulders. That needs to go away. It looks bad and dumb.
The main issue I have with the new uniforms is the word LIONS and the WF thing on the shoulders. It’s not necessary, and it would have looked really clean and smooth without it. I just don’t think it adds anything, especially since it appears the goal of the new look was to clean up the extra fluff. It feels like they started from the ground up, got to the new look, and got edgy because someone at nike just won’t let simplicity take the wheel even when it’s clearly the right option. Admittedly I’m less bothered by the LIONS and more by the WF graphic thing. Asymmetry is balls on uniforms and the WF fits even less. For the record, I also hate the GSH on the Bears shoulders: it ruins what should be a good shoulder stripe. If you want to throw a patch on a uniform, do what the Jags did and throw it on the collarbone.
Oh dear god I just realized I quoted the Jags uniform as a good example. Kill me.
i feel like it’s relevant that in the Nikedrome it is still Niketober 2015
It’s ALWAYS Niketober 2015
Holy shit can’t even remember the last comic that had the words “photoshop” in it
The new Lions and new Jags unis are still better than what the Philly Soul and the Baltimore Brigade (Hiiiiiiiiiiii USFL Breakers, haven’t seen you since 1985).
The Brigade played just as bad as I thought they would against the Valor, falling behind 27-0 on the fuck up that was QB Chase Cartwright with his 2-9, 13 yards, and 2 picks to go with 3 fumbles. Just comparing the first drives for the Valor and the Brigade tells the whole tale. Valor: started at own 1, 3 plays, 3 completed passes, 49 yards (3, 3, and 43), touchdown. Brigade: started at own 3, 4 plays, 0 completed passes), -2 yards [bad snap high (which I didn’t even know was possible without shotgun, which isn’t used in the Arena League), bad snap low, pass about 20 yards over everyone’s head, and Arena punt (purposely shanked field goal so the other team can’t start inside your 5-yd line)]. Noticed how I said ‘was’ in when talking about chase cartwright, because he got benched 5 minutes into the 2nd quarter. His replacement was QB Shane Carden, who was last seen getting owned as an East Carolina Pirate by Blake Bortles the Golden Knight in Orlando, before Blake Bortles became Molding Shite in J’ville. Carden played alright, actually leading the Brigade to back within 10 before the Valor, led by 2015 league MVP QB Eric Meyer and all-time receiving records holder WR T.T. Tolliver (woot-woot), pulled away at the end to win 52-38 at the Verizon Center in front of over 15,000 fans. Valor are 1-0 and on their first of 4 byes (18-week, 14-game schedule), while the Brigade are 0-1 and headed to Cleveland. Speaking of Cleveland…
THE STORM WON A ROAD GAME! THE STORM WON A ROAD GAME! THE STORM WON A ROAD GAME! The storm beat Cleveland 46-40 in a game that was won by one man: 69 game-recieving-TD-streak-extending-WR Joe Hills, who’s back from China (and the J’ville Sharks) to lead the Tampa Bay Storm. The storm actually didn’t look too bad. The Storm didn’t look good, but they didn’t look bad. They were okay. But holy fuck was I wrong about Cleveland. The coach from last year is now Washington’s offensive coordinator, Geno Smith the linebacker (Arvill Nelson) is now a linebacker again :(, and I was able to watch the game on the Arena Football League website, which was much easier than ESPN3. To do a DFO/Jay Gruden’s big brother on MNF thing here for a second: “THESE CLEVELAND GLADIATORS, I CALL THEM THE NEW YORK JETS BECAUSE THEY REPLACED GENO SMITH WITH JOSH MCCOWN”. Whom is Arena League Josh McCown, you’re wondering (if you’re actually reading this and not scrolling past it)? It’s QB Shane Boyd. Seriously, Shane Boyd is the minor league version of Josh McCown. They’ve both: been on like every single team [9 for McCown, 11 for Boyd counting his stints in the NFL, CFL, UFL (United Football League) and AFL(Arena)] despite being long-time vets the still look and play like rookies, and their most famous moment is likely to be a triva question at sports bar (McCown knocked the Vikes out of the playoffs in 2003; Boyd scored the first TD in UFL history).
Cleveland is 0-1 and will host Baltimore tonight, while Tampa Bay is 1-0 and headed home to host the well-rested (and hopefully rusty) Philadelphia Soul.
Both week 2 games start tonight at 7pm (Eastern time).
The CBS Sports Network game features the defending champion Philadelphia Soul (with essentially the exact same roster as last season) coming into Tampa to start their 2017 season. The spread is Philly by 9.5 with and O/U of 107.5 (57-50/58-50) I’ve got Philly by 17 and I’d recommend the over, as Philly QB Dan Radenbaugh knows how to sling it.
The non-tv game (unless you’ve got Monumental Sports Network, which hosts all Valor and Brigade games)/AfLive (Arena League website) features the week 1 losers Cleveland and Baltimore in Ohio. I’ve got the Brigade to win by 5 because Cleveland is down to street guys after season-ending injuries to 2/3 of secondary and Shane Carden (an arena league rookie) being not-shit unlike Shane Boyd (the one who looks like s rookie), but the spread is somehow Cleveland by 6.5. The O/U is 95 (50-45); take the under because Shane Boyd is, unlike McCown, not fun to watch and can’t score worth shit.
The updates are back! I’d be more excited but… my name says it all
You’ll be happy to know that WR Reggie Gray is still in the league as the only good player Baltimore has (kinda like he was for Portland last year)
My bad, Reggie Gray was the 3rd receiver in J’ville last year
Correction on the start time on the Baltimore Brigade at Cleveland Gladiators game: It starts tomorrow afternoon at 3pm, not tonight at 7pm.
Still trying to decide between the Brigade and the Valor. Both are within driving distance from work for me, and I think season tickets are pretty reasonable for both of them. Valor are making a much better case than the Brigade, but I do like an underdog.
I’m just happy you kept the Sexy Rexy poster in the background
And the 2015 calendar
Can we all just talk about the irony of a grey color rush uniform?
*slow clap*
I’m just happy that they removed that darker blue that make it look like they had a big sweat on their bellies.
http://www.rantsports.com/nfl/files/2015/04/2015-NFL-Draft-Detroit-Lions-Seven-Round-Draft-Mid-April-Edition1.jpg
And the underarm permanent sweat stains? Those were awful.
They should have had the N joining up to the S. Having that trailing end makes it look gonky.
it’s wcf for William clay ford Jr who was their owner until he passed. so they are pulling a bears and browns in that regard
I found SEXY REXY
As soon as I saw the updated Lions uni, my first thought was not “That looks better” or “I don’t see much of a difference”. It was literally “I know what The Draw Play comic is going to be.”
Note: That’s not a bad thing. I always enjoy seeing our favorite sub-basement Nike graphic designers.
I’m not a big fan of the new Lions uniforms, personally. They’re not particularly bad, but I’ve never been a big fan of extra mentions of the team name or city on uniforms. I know who you are, a small version of your logo above the numbers will suffice. Having the team name on the shoulders is just obnoxious. I do like the WCF patch, I’m a fan of asymmetry as long as it’s tasteful, and it looks much better on the shoulder than on the chest.
Blue pants for the road unis looks dumb though. Pants should not stand out, either something neutral like white or grey, or something dark and muted. Only exception is if it’s a one-color uniform where it matches the jersey.