In 2017 the Lions released uniforms that were average in our view. We gave them a grade of "C".
In the Nike world of uniforms that were not nearly as bad as we had seen at the time, nothing as bad as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Jacksonville Jaguars or Cleveland Browns, for example.
All those teams reverted to a more classic look as soon as possible -- teams are stuck with any new uniform for a minimum of five years. After that teams can change.
Well, the Lions didn't do the exact same thing. They wore their uniform seven years -- two years longer than they had to.
In 2017 the Lions introduced these uniforms—
The white numbers on the Honolulu blue jerseys are an improvement. They have a two-stripe pattern on their sleeve stripes rather than the old Northwestern Stripes.
Apparently, the striping was inspired by that of the Ford Mustang and not the Dallas Cowboys.
It seems the new shade of blue is brighter. They dumped the grey over grey uniforms and added a black alternate, not unlike the ones they wore from 2005-07. This time, though, they have black pants to match.
The primary uniform, blue over silver is an improvement. So our grade goes from a C to a B/B+.
The rest of the stuff, white over white, black over black, black over blue, white over blue ... is just ... meh. Call all that a B-, okay but but great.
The Lions stepped out of the Nike world and reverted to uniforms closer to the 1980s and 1990s and that is a good thing. Nike has introduced some pretty awful uniforms and now teams are catching on and using old templates of classic uniforms and updating them.
Hopefully, the Rams will be next to do something similar, and after that maybe the Falcons will follow suit and follow the trend of updated classics.
This is what the Lions said—
Just asking.
As far as the black ... not sure who does it better the Panthers or the Lions—
Yep, primary unis = B/B+. The rest? B-.
what's with silly comment by the Lions about the 1990s teams "helped define Detroit football"? with all due respect to Dutch Clark, the (positive) image of the Detroit Lions is swagger and the poster boy will always be Bobby Layne and that crowd.....some contrarians might argue George Plimpton stumbling backwards from center, but Bobby, Joe Schmidt Leon Hart, and Les Bingaman are the true heroes in Honolulu blue.....
ReplyDeleteHey can you re-post that article Bob Gill wrote about Roman Gabriel for the Coffin Corner a few years ago? Was titled “Roman Gabriel: A Tale of Two Careers” or something like that.
ReplyDeleteIt was my artice---a reposted it a while back, here is the link if you are a PFRA, but it was basically the same as the 2014 version
Deletehttps://www.profootballresearchers.com/members-only/coffin-corner/CC-v36n5.pdf
Never liked black alternates on teams just to wear black. There are only certain teams that should have black uniforms like the Steelers, Raiders, Saints, Falcons etc but sadly it's all about the money and some teams just can't find an identity. I liked when teams just had one home uniform and one away. It's all the Oregon Ducks' fault.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite Lions uniform was from the late 70's - early 80's.