UUOTD-Turning Back The Clock A Little More

In 1994 and 1995, the Iowa Hawkeyes wore these jerseys with horizontal stripes on the shoulders. I don't know that they were trying to prove. I guess they thought the stripes looked like wings. They also had the Tiger Hawk logo on the front of the jersey, with the word "Hawkeyes". This uniform was repulsive. Though these uniforms are long gone, they are still worthy of mention. Yuck. Tim Dwight is shown above in the road version of the jersey. The home black version was even worse.

When Kirk Ferentz took the head coaching job in 1999, the Hawkeyes reverted back to their simple black, gold, and white uniforms they wore in the 80's and early 90's. It was a smart move.

Goofy stuff on the shoulder pads should not be tolerated.

Getting Close To One Another

This is a classic ABC Sports clip from last season's game in College Station between the Fightin' Texas Aggies and Texas Tech.

The Ags had taken a late lead, and were kicking the ball off to the Red Raiders. This is a clip of some members of the Corps of Cadets.

Texas A&M has a lot of funky traditions relating to the Corps. One of them is for the Corps members to demonstrate their empathy, commitment, and willingness to endure pain, by choosing to "man up", or to stand in a line and grab themselves between the legs.

I'm ok with some Aggie traditions, but this one is a little too much for me.

For what it's worth, Tech went on to win the game.

From AJ In Omaha: 50 Reasons to Hate the Huskers

This has been floating around the Internet on message boards of various Big 12 schools. This is the creation of a Missouri Tiger fan in Omaha, who is upset, mad, and bitter due to Husker overkill in the state of Nebraska. I can only imagine what it is like to be a non-Husker in Omaha. Still, I wouldn't get so bitter about it.

This posting does not reflect the editorial position or language preferences of this blog. This blog celebrates the greatness that was once the OU-Nebraska rivalry.

Here it is, from AJ in Omaha, Behind Enemy Lines:

The College World Series is over. Football is coming. To celebrate, I give to you 50 of my favorite 853,657 reasons to hate the Huskers. Remember kids, these are in no particular order and collected in a non-scientific manner.

Enjoy

==========================================

50 - Jim Rose. "The old Grey lady on 10th street is truly rocking now". Phrases like this and referring to football helmets as "Gleaming white bonnets of battle" makes me want to rip my ears off.

49 - Lil Red. He was stupid and lame before all puffy mascots were stupid and lame. 'Oh look at me, I'm upside down'. Who cares. He looks like the bastard step child of Matt Davison and Colonel Sanders

48 - If not for Penn State, the most visually unpleasing uniforms this side of Pop Warner. And no, calling it "Scarlett and Cream" instead of "Red and White" makes you sound like you flunked pre-school.

47 - Post 1997, Nebraska baseball sports a sold out stadium of 5,000 plus per game. Prior to that, average attendance during Darren Erstad's senior year? 48.

46 - "Greatest Fans in College Football"'s number one celebrity ambassador? Larry the Cable Guy.

45 - "Lawrence needs football in his life"

44 - Things like this:

43 - Lyle Bremser's ancient radio calls of "Man, woman and child did that put them in the aisles!" That's fine if it made any damn sense at all. How could they all fit in the isles? (Especially now with the weight problem in America) Whacked out old bastard.

42 - Lee Barfknecht travels to "neutral" Big 12 football games to show wide-ranging "conference coverage" from the Omaha World Herald. Lee uses that print space to bash the other 11 schools for not being as good as Nebraska. Same writer still gets death threats from Husker fans for voting Michigan #1 in the 1997 AP poll.

41- Fairbury Franks (Official hot dog of NU athletics for decades) is actually made with ground up puppies and kittens.

40- 1971 to 2004: Most important aspect of Husker football is world-class strength and conditioning program, as well as exemplary walk on program. 2004-present: Both are for losers, as Rivals stars outweigh everything short of having the ability stand upright.

39 - So much love for their team, they must share it with other teams when their own sucks. (ie - Creighton 12th in the country in basketball attendance in 2007)

38 - Johnny Rogers pimping Lil Smokies 742 times a day on Omaha television.

37 - Giant foam cornhead-hat...cool in any language.

36 - While 62 Husker athletes are heralded as Academic All-Americans on the side of Memorial Stadium, public completely unaware of mural below south stadium that celebrates the nearly 4 dozen individuals arrested from the Husker football team since 1993.

35 - Random and bizarre "rivalries" with out of conference teams (veiled with jealousy and contempt). Calling Florida State a football "rival" is stupid when you realize that Iowa State has beaten NU more times in the past 15 years.

34 - College volleyball. Not cool. Not exciting. Not ever....no matter how many people you have who claim to be "fans". 3 million Iowans love college wrestling more than breathing...that doesn't make it enjoyable to watch.

33 - 1992 to present, Husker fan mocks Kansas State's schedule by playing the likes of Western Kentucky and Illinois State. Ironically, in 2005, Maine is suddenly a 1AA power that "can surprise you by playing scrappy and hard-nosed".

32 - Naming your dog, "Osborne". (Don't laugh..I know two different people who did that)

31 - 2004 "John Blake is the greatest recruiter in college football." In 2007 "John Blake really didn't make that big of a difference"

30 - Bo Pelini..if even for only a couple of seasons. (a jackass is a jackass is a jackass)

29 - NU fans continuously calling players and RECRUITS by their first names. It's not "Marlon". It's not "Cally". it's not "Blaine". It's Lucky, Callahan and Gabbert, and if they were in any other line of work, they wouldn't' give you the time of day because you're a complete douchebag. Stop pretending your best buds by the language you use. Idiots.

28 - Listing National Title game date on all pocket schedules and posters.

27 - Film breakdown every Tuesday during the season at a small church in south Omaha is considered cool and the place to be. Updates and recaps are distributed like presidential mandates throughout Husker cyberspace.

26 - Steve Pederson (Yeah, like I can pick out ONE thing to list here)

25 - Only in Nebraska can somebody think this is cool.

YouTube: I Love Nebraska (hokey country song)

24 - Channel 6's Dave Weber actually CRIED on live television when the Huskers made their first College World Series.

23 - "Sal is dead..Go Big Red!" oozes class to this day.

22 - Husker fans claim the world is out to get them, yet somehow lose sight of this when a last second pass is kicked from 2 yards out, over the heads of two defenders and into the arms of a pasty-white wide-receiver, who was 12 yards away from where he was supposed to be.

21 - Stealing an elderly Husker fan's hat at a Penn State game: NOT COOL because the poor soul did absolutely nothing to deserve the inhumane treatment for doing nothing but attending a game with his favorite team. Punching a Missouri fan: COOL because the little bastard deserved it.

20 - Heisman trophy winners who sign and quit during their first pre-season game to live the life of a professional poster signer back home.

19 - Throat slash

18 - "F*ckin Hillbillies"

17 - Husker fans root for Tennis Player Andy Roddick because he's an admitted Husker fan. (Although born in Omaha and a resident for 4+ years, the family got the hell out of dodge and moved to Florida)

16 - Being charged with assaulting Miss Nebraska in a bar is fine and dandy if you can play the D-line.

15 - Steroid scandals with smoking gun-type evidence conveniently pushed under the rug by Lincoln authorities in 2005. Ironically, less than 10 articles appear in the Omaha World Herald, despite the fact that a convicted pusher lived with several Husker football players.

14 - Nebraska officials praise 55,000 attending NU spring game in April as "unprecedented". Meanwhile, nothing is mentioned of the Alabama spring game that drew nearly 40,000 more.

13 - Scott Frost whining his way to the 1997 (1/2) National Title.

12 - Kirk Herbstreit's comments in December that the 1995 Huskers were not the greatest college team of all time, nearly cause rioting in several eastern Nebraska communities.

11 - Tom Osborne's longstanding campaign against porn.

10 - Striped turf is not cool. Oregon can get away with it. You can't.

9 - Mascot, overalls, corn. Enough said. The only character on earth proven more frightening than the Burger King Mascot.

8 - "That was the most out of control situation I've ever seen in college athletics" - Steve Pederson describing the scene in Missouri as fans rushed the filed celebrating the first win over NU in 24 years. Ironically, only 6 months prior to saying, "This is what it's all about" when NU fans stormed the court in Lincoln in a win over Kansas.

7 - Stealing the Chicago Bulls' tradition of following the players out of the locker room to the beat of the Alan Parson's project, and bastardizing it as your own to the squeals of your own fans isn't cool.

6 - Traveling 50,000 strong to road games does not make you "great fans". It means driving 5 hours is more enjoyable than going to Oakview Mall...which is pretty much the only thing to do in Nebraska..other than go to the zoo for the 86,356th time.

5 - Two words: Trev Alberts

4 - Starting the wave while a visiting player lies temporarily paralyzed on the turf = Classiest fans in sports. Drawing a cartoon about it mocking the situation by poking fun at the opposing coach's weight? Priceless.

3 - Omaha World Herald columnist Tom Shatel's infamous "The Nebraska athletic department would be foolish to fire Frank Solich", just days before claiming "Sorry..I meant to say Frank has to go" the morning after his firing. Apparently the fear of covering Omaha Beef football while his NU press pass is suspended was a bit too much for Tom to keep his journalistic integrity.

2 - Calling Osborne's decision to go for two in 1984, "gutsy", when it fact it was quite possibly the stupidest decision on earth to throw a roll out pass when you average 15 yards per rush.

1 - "The Media is out to get us" (Not to be outdone by my new favorite, "The Lincoln police department is out to get us")
Let Husker bashing season begin.

UUOTD-Turn Back The Clock (A Little)

Today's installment of Ugly Uniform of the Day goes back to 1999. Therefore, we are turning the clock back just a little.

BYU, for years, had a classic look. They wore royal blue jerseys, with white pants and white helmets with a "Y" inside a blue circle. Someone at Nike grabbed the BYU people and told them that they had a really "cool" design for them to wear.

So, the Y changed the shade of blue from royal blue to navy blue, and rolled out this awful monstrosity of a uniform. It has been referred to as the "bib" uniform, because the home edition is navy, with a big white circle on the front containing the number, resembling a bib. It was so bad that the NCAA later passed a regulation requiring the numbers on the front of the jersey to match the numbers on the back.

This was a bad, bad look. Why didn't they just put "I Love My Daddy", or Mickey Mouse, or a similar bib design on the front?

BYU threw out the bib uniform, but kept the rest of the uniform until two years ago, when new coach Bronco Mendenhall brought back the old uniform, only with navy blue as the color. It was not a moment too soon.

Ugly Uniform of the Day

Just as I was running out of ideas for ugly uniforms, ESPN2 came to my rescue tonight. I was flipping channels, and there was an Arena Football game on The Deuce. The professional football team representing Los Angeles was in action tonight. By the way, it wasn't the Rams or the Raiders. The LA Avengers were representing the City of Angels at Staples Center.

I saw these things, and I had to find a picture. They don't wear these very often, but tonight is a playoff game for them, so I guess they are special uniforms.

This is a putrid combination. This makes the Tennessee Titans' baby blues look good. What makes this stand out isn't the sponsors' logos on the shoulder, or the two different shades of blue on the jersey. The logos do make them look European, but the Arena League needs the money. The red helmets make this look ugly as sin. They do not go with this look at all. The red helmets ruin an already bad look.

The Avengers, from what I can tell by looking at their website, normally wear red at home. Those looked more like normal Arena League uniforms. This combination of red and baby blue is just awful. They weren't dressed to avenge, but were dressed to offend. Who knows: a team called the Los Angeles Offenders might go over well in SoCal.

For what it's worth, the Avengers were beating the Utah team to a pulp, when I last checked.

Maybe they'll have to play a road game in the playoffs and wear white. This red and baby blue look has got to go. Ugh!