Lots of stuff!

A lot of stuff:

• The Titans field looked terrible yesterday.
• Once again, the Chargers knocked my socks off yesterday.
• The Chargers were also back to their 50th anniversary logo.
• Do your kids play for 60 minutes a day? They do in Houston, Minnesota, Tennessee and Denver.
• Not only does Denver want you to have a happy Thanksgiving, they also want you to notive their outstanding end zones. This is what they looked like back on November 9.
• LSU does a great job on their field! Their midfield logo is one of the most unique in college football. I also love their yard line markers. They do every five yard line, not just every ten yard line. They also use a drop shadow!
• The Edmonton Eskimos mark their ten yard lines in yellow.
• Louisville and Arkansas recently tangled on the college hardwood. You'd have thought they were playing for a giant peanut butter cup.
• The Winter Olympics are coming up! Here's center ice from Torino in 2006. I hope Vancouver looks as nice.
• Lastly....the Irish got screwed.

Until next time!

How Did I Miss This?!?!?!?

Shame on me!!

I was doing research for another item about time sharing when I found some clips of the November 8 Bucs/Packers game.

The game was notable because the Bucs wore their throwback 'creamsicle' orange jerseys. The guys at NFL Network had a lot of fun with Lee Roy Selmon and James Wilder jokes, but I was stunned when I saw what the grounds crew had done on the field.

It was 1976-1995 at the Sombrero all over again!

The grounds crew did a fantastic job recreating the look of Tampa Stadium from back in the day.

• The end zones once again had 'Tampa Bay'!!
• The Pièce de résistance was the midfield!!! Only the Colts have their helmet at midfield. The Bucs helmet was twice as big as the Colts. It was HUGE!! It spans 16 yards, while the Colts covers 8. Maybe my memory is corroded but it seemed that everybody had their helmet at midfield in years past. Oh well.

Until next time!!

Changeover!

Here's a nice video of the changeover at Air Canada Centre, home of the Maple Leafs and Raptors.

New Layout!

Like it?

I do!

It's wider than the old one which will allow for videos, and bigger pictures.

Let's Hit The Hardwood

Basketball season is here! The NBA tipped off in late October, so let's take a quick look at a few things:

• Holy retro, Dr. J! The Philadelphia 76ers have a nice retro center court this year.
• Everybody who has a product ad on the bottom of their scoreboard take one step forward. Not so fast Portland! Thank you for the restraint.
• As nice as the Philly center court is, the Toronto one isn't.
• New Jersey....I don't know what to say. And, you don't know when to stop with the ads. Okay, there are ads for: Peak (fitness?), something under the Peak ad, Doublemint gum, Izod, something under the Izod ad, and State Farm. That's six ads on the stanchion. Too, too much. You want to move the Nets to Brooklyn? That stuff doesn't fly there. Brooklyn is much hipper than that.

Until next time.

Time Sharing

Heinz Field is home to both the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Pitt Panthers. The Miami Dolphins and the Miami Hurricanes both play at Joe Robbie Stadium....err Land Shark Stadium. So, what is a grounds crew to do? It would be too much to expect, and too hard on the grass, to be constantly painting over the other tenants logo in the end zones and midfield. But, you still want to have some identity. Here's how these two handle it.

• Midfield - Earlier in the season, there was nothing in the Heinz midfield. Saturday, November 14, 'PITT' was on the midfield. The next day, the Steelers lost to the Bengals, but thanks to the hard work of the grounds crew, the Steelers had their own logo on midfield. Joe Robbie Stadium had the Hurricanes 'U' logo for the October 3 tilt against the Oklahoma Sooners. Three weeks later the NFL Dolphins lost to the Saints but had their Dolphin logo on the 50.
• End Zones - The way these two teams handle this mimimizes the work for the grounds crews. One Heinz end zone has 'PITTSBURGH', the other just has diagonal lines (which I love). Joe Robbie is even simpler, each end zone has 'MIAMI'.

I know that USF and the Buccaneers both play at Raymond James but I don't have any shots from those venues.

Last note: Al Davis has had his battles with the NFL over the years. It must make his eyes burn when he sees the NFL logo on his field.

Until next time!

Catsup!!

No major theme today, just lots of little things that have been building up.

• November 3 I posted about how I saw some college conference logos were placed between the yard line markers and the hash marks. I thought, at the time, this was unusual. Further research shows that it's pretty standard. Here's the Cincinnati Bearcats, they put theirs on the 20 yard line. Also, notice also their yard line markers are in red with the white drop shadow. The Clemson Tigers have theirs on the 25 yard line (which seems to be a standard placement) and also have a ribbon. The undefeated Florida Gators have theirs on the 35 yard line, and have their Gator logo out there too. I haven's seen any Big Ten schools with the conference logo at all.
• Speaking of the Big Ten, the Iowa Hawkeyes have been having a good season. I've been waiting a while to post this. Let's take a look at this shot from the Iowa/Michigan game about a month back. Take a look at the 10 yard line marker. It seems every football team has a different look for their yard lines. What does Iowa use? A check of this site reveals the Hawkeyes use....helvetica!!
• I can't tell what typeface LSU uses but they like to label every 5 yard line, not just the 10s. I also love their 'tiger eye' logo at midfield. The way they 'fade' it at the edges is outstanding. One of my favorite college midfields.
• Clemson University has their paw at midfield and in the end zone. Nice!
• The Denver Broncos end zone is unchanged since October 9. They have a Legacy game November 22, we'll see if they make any changes then.
• How many football teams put their city (or state) name in one end zone, and their nickname in the other? I don't know, I'm going to have to start keeping track of this. This past weekend reveals the Chicago Bears do it.
• College basketball season is ramping up. Here's a shot from a 1955 NC State/Clemson game at Reynolds Coliseum. Notice how narrow the lane is. And how short the shorts are.
• Ahh the Raiders. A once proud NFL team on hard times. Their field is on hard times as well. To be fair, their facility is also home to the Oakland A's. The conversion to football is not going well. The sad looking area is the second base area. I'm not sure why the area behind second base was replaced, but it looks terrible.
• The Miami Dolphins midfield classic logo.
• The Steelers recently replaced the 'main street' down the center of Heinz Field. Looks like the Chiefs need to do the same.
• Lastly...NASCAR! I love racing and it was in nearby Martinsville recently. When entering their pit box, it is critical that the driver parks their car/truck in the right spot. Check out the detail that Kevin Harvick's team achieved in marking his spot. Not so much for this team.

Well, that should do it for now.

Until next time!

Sweetness

I'm under the weather so this will be a short one.

On November 1, 1999 Walter Payton died. The Chicago Bears marked the anniversary of his death with a simple blue football with an orange "34" on the 34 yard line.

Walter Payton's wife, Connie, and their two children, Brittney and Jarrett made an appearance at halftime while a Payton highlight film was shown at Soldier field.

I had a tough time getting a good picture of the markers.

Here's one, and here's another.

Until next time!

Quick hit!

Just a quick one today!

The Black Knights of the Hudson have registered the wordmark "West Point". You can see the "r in a circle" in this photo.

Don't violate it or you could end up in front of this.

also....

Holy flying football players!!

Until next time!!

Let's fire up the Way-Back Machine!!

I recently spent some time nosing around some lesser known corners of the internet and have returned with some pictures of some interesting things:

• First stop, Metropolitan Stadium in Minneapolis! (Now site of the Mall of America) Way back on October 20, 1968 the Vikings hosted the Dallas Cowboys. Let's check out their midfield logo. Very simply a Viking "V". Also notice how close the yard line numeral is to the hash mark.
• Still at Metropolitan Stadium, the Vikings had the classic 'diamond' pattern in their end zone. Here's a shot of the other end zone. Not sure of the dates of these.
• Remember the Raiders? You may not have heard from them lately but they were quite the team back in the day. These two shots are from November 17, 1968 (the infamous Heidi Game). Diamond end zones again, but with a silver background and black diamonds. Shot #1 and shot #2.
• Let's stay in the AFL. Kansas City used to play in Municipal Stadium, and like many football teams have their helmet painted on the field. But how often do they paint the other team's helmet on the field? I've never seen it before but I located a shot from November 1, 1970 between the Chiefs and the Raiders showing both. By the way, in the shot, George Blanda is attempting a 48 yard field goal. He made it to tie the game in the fourth quarter. The game finished tied.

Until next time!

Ever feel like you're being...watched?

Of course you feel like you're being watched! It's because you are! The ever-present Google satellite is watching us all. Constantly snapping pictures of our fair planet and stitching them together so we can see ourselves from above.

Which brings us to today's post. The google satellite snapped a nice picture of Camp Randall Stadium, home of the Badgers. It was taken at a most opportune moment. It was the off season and they were in the middle of repainting the end zones. They have to do it sometime, and now it has been captured for posterity.

Along the same line, the Yankee Stadium photo was taken on game day. Judging from the crowd in front of the stadium, it appears to be a little before the game.

I'll keep my eyes open for further interesting satellite shots of stadiums and the like.

Until next time!

Quick hit!

I don't have much time today, so this is a quick one.

I was watching a little college football this weekend and noticed the conference logo on the UCF Knights field was between the yard line marker and the hash marker. Picture here.

This seemed a bit odd to me. I had thought they did those on the outside of the yard line marker.

But...a check of Virginia Tech shows theirs is in a similar position.

The NFL puts them outside the yard line marker. Another example.

I'm going to have to do some more checking on this.

Until next time!!!