In the Trenches: College football's new uniforms
CBS.SportsLine.com's Dennis Dodd and J. Darin Darst talk about what the best- and worst-dressed players will be wearing this fall.
| Which schools have the best new uniforms? | |
| Dennis Dodd | J. Darin Darst |
 Wasn't it Jerry Seinfeld who said we're all just cheering for laundry? The question is where to start in this bold new world of revamped thread count? New Jersey is hard enough to tolerate, but all those new jerseys? I understand colleges are just trying to make a buck. Duh. But some of these marketing dudes and dudettes need an editor. There is a fine line to be walked here between good taste and bad judgment. Michigan State seems to have managed it. So has Boise State. Both changed their uniforms this season, for the better. Frankly, I can't tell what Nike really did to Michigan State's uniforms. They're still that garish green. Maybe the Spartan on the helmet is in sharper focus, I don't know. The marketing folks would have been better off painting a giant maize-and-blue shadow over the entire program. How's that for a redesign? Anyway, anything that doesn't trash up the Spartans' classic uni is good enough for me. Boise State is a new classic. Maybe they converted me with that Fiesta Bowl. All those colors make me want to buy a snow cone every time I see Boise State play. I kind of like that stylized bronco on the helmet. It's cool without being intrusive. Capitalizing on the fact that good teams, in general, dress well, the school has taken the radical step of reducing the amount of orange in the uniforms. Less orange? Anything to distance itself from Syracuse is a good thing. |  How come every time we talk about teams getting new uniforms, I never hear anything from Penn State, Michigan and Alabama? Because there's no need to change them! Some of these schools need to stop with the flashy, strange colors and swirls all over the place. Classic uniforms are what make college football. But I'm also a realist like Dennis. Schools update their jerseys based on a marketing/sales perspective, which is fine. But can we at least keep it simple? What's the point of updating a flashy uniform only to redesign it two years later? I don't see Notre Dame changing its uniform every two years, and I'm going to guess they are selling plenty of them. The best update has been Texas A&M, which kept the classic look but just added a stripe down the pants and put an outline around the number. Kansas State's is nice, too, replacing the stripes on the sleeve with the jersey number. The touches Miami (Fla.) made were for the better, too, shrinking the big stripe across the front and making the jersey numbers larger. |
| Which schools have the worst new uniforms? | |
| Dennis Dodd | J. Darin Darst |
| They're smoking something in the state of Oregon besides ham. First, Nike uses nearby Eugene as some sort of sweatshop laboratory. ("Shut up and get me some more off-puke dye!") It's almost old news that the Ducks have 48 different color combinations. Their helmets change color depending on what angle you look at them. Hits of meth are optional to get you through the experience. Apparently, Oregon State felt jealous this year and developed its own clown suits. I don't know what's worse, having a uniform for every mood or wearing training bras. That's what they're calling the Oregon State jerseys that have some kind weird design on the front. You don't even have to squint. They look like orange 'bros. The Civil War used to look like a gang war between M&Ms. Now it looks like the Jets and Sharks, throwing sorbet at each other. Maybe that's the idea. The "designers" at Nike want us to write and talk about this slop. Anything to get the swoosh in the public eye. But when do parents start complaining? Hell, when does Mr. Blackwell start complaining? The best way to describe what has happened in the uniform "industry" is to quote that great philosopher Austin Powers. "Oh no, I've gone cross-eyed." | There is one and only answer here -- Oregon State. Not even Vince McMahon would have come up with that design for one of his XFL teams. I was looking forward to seeing if UCF had new uniforms, considering it has a new logo and helmet, but nothing yet, so I can't make fun of it. I'm not a big fan of Colorado's change; I used to love the black jerseys with the white lettering. The outline on the number is a nice touch, but the white jersey and gold pants just don't do it for me. As for the Beavers' uniform, it looks like somebody's 7-year-old kid pulled the orange and black crayons out of the box and tried to create some jersey from the year 2078. The father might hang it on the fridge for the family to see, but deep down, he knows they look atrocious. Who in their right mind would actually purchase one? Congrats Oregon State, you can now join your rival Oregon as having the worst uniforms in college football. |
