though it seems the magazine was forced to commit the error of putting Jeter's name on the back of his home jersey so people would know who it was -- not that a generic Yankee player wouldn't have served the same purpose. The Yankees and Giants are the two teams that rightly keep players' names off both home and road shirts. (Are there others?) I have long wished the Red Sox would drop the names from their road uniforms.
(Tom Verducci's cover story here)
I like the idea of having just numbers on the home uniforms, and having the names on the road uniforms, from a purely traditional standpoint. You should know the numbers of your home players, but you wouldn't know the numbers of the away players. etc.
ReplyDeleteWell, what time period are we calling "traditional"?
ReplyDeleteWay back when, there was nothing on the backs of the uniforms -- if you couldn't recognize the players by sight, you weren't much of a fan.
(Even so, players were assigned numbers in the scorecard and those numbers were put up on the scoreboard.)
I'm with you, Allan. The Sox capitulated fairly recently, in 1990, according to a truly fanatic discourse on Sox uniform design on the blog "letsgosox." It's not too late to fix the error. You can fault the MFY for many things, but not respecting tradition isn't one of them....
ReplyDeleteThat was Jere's blog.
ReplyDeleteI love how Jack Marshall saw something on my blog without knowing it was me! That's also happened with people I know in real life--I once got "fan mail" from someone who didn't realize they'd met me in real life several times.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the cover is still wrong, but it's not the home jersey, it's the road--which is still doubly wrong since A. they don't wear names on the road jerseys anyway, and B. the picture is IN Yankee Stadium, despite the egregious error of having a pole extending down from the front corner of the upper deck.
I also read on Uniwatch recently that the Yanks might go to names on the road grays next season.
The SF Giants do have name on back on the road, but not at home. But I think them, the Yanks, and us are the only ones with any kind of nameless uni.
My apoplogies, Jere---never visited your most-impressive blog before, and have a bad habit of focusing on the content rather than the writer. Remarkable work on the uniforms!
ReplyDeleteThanks!
ReplyDelete"and having the names on the road uniforms, from a purely traditional standpoint."
ReplyDeleteWhich just goes to show you can use the word "traditional" to mean whatever you want. Pick an era, and follow that tradition.
You can fault the MFY for many things, but not respecting tradition isn't one of them....
ReplyDeleteYeah, Cotton Eyed Joe at the 7th Inning Stretch, that's a really important tradition. And scoreboard subway races, another important tradition to respect.
I'm glad the Yankees don't have names on their uniforms, but the experience at their ballpark is anything but traditional.
Never been to Yankee stadium. I have no problems with new traditions (as in "Sweet Caroline") as long as a team's links to the past are preserved. I've always felt the Yankees did that pretty well.
ReplyDeleteTo be fair, the artist was told about the cover Thursday and had to have it over to the inker by Saturday, according to this, which is a pretty big rush.
ReplyDeleteAnd anyway, Mark Bagley's not known for the quality of his drawing so much as he's able to tell a story clearly with his art and put out stuff quickly.
Why are tradinalist so offened by names on the jerseys ........The reason they probably left them off in the old days 1.They couldn't afford them and 2. guys came and went so fast and only had a few jerseys with numbers.
ReplyDeleteGarciaparra looked cool going down Nomar's sleeves.
ReplyDeleteWhy are tradinalist so offened by names on the jerseys
ReplyDeleteI'm not offended. I simply don't like the way they look -- especially with long names like Nomar, Grudz, Salty, etc. that don't really fit.
The uniforms with the plain number look much nicer.
Sidepoint:
Lamest fuckers in the world? The ones wearing Yankees shirts with 3/Ruth or 4/Gehrig or Boston uniform shirts with 9/Williams. Horrible. Those shirts never existed in real life.
Uggg, remember when Curt arrived at spring camp one day wearing a Red Sox top with a 3/Ruth on the bag? I-yi-yi.
Never been to Yankee stadium.
ReplyDeleteThen take my word for it. They don't give a crap about tradition.
Lamest fuckers in the world? The ones wearing Yankees shirts with 3/Ruth or 4/Gehrig or Boston uniform shirts with 9/Williams. Horrible. Those shirts never existed in real life.
ReplyDeleteThe absolute lamiest lame-os. I never thought about the 9/Williams (didn't know they existed) but the Ruth and Gehrig shirts with names...! Abominations.
9C, I'm not offended by the names on the jerseys. I would just love to see the Red Sox go with the tradition that they had for so long, of no names. I think it just looks really classy and terrific.
The cover is Bizarro World so anything that is not usual - Jeter on back of Jersey is well - bizarro world.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of Jeter - Jeterate (verb) meaning “to praise someone for something of which he or she is entirely unworthy of praise.” - J. Posnanski.