Uni Watch
by Paul Lukas
New England sets Super Bowl record!
 Don't
look now, but the New England Patriots are emerging as
one of the top franchises in NFL history, at least as
measured by Super Bowl appearances. This Sunday will
mark their fourth trip to the big game, which puts them
in elite company, trailing only such traditional
powerhouses as the Cowboys (eight appearances), Broncos
(six), and 49ers, Redskins, Raiders, Steelers, and
Dolphins (five apiece). Of greater interest to Uni
Watch, however, is a record the Patriots hold outright:
They've worn three different uniform designs in the
Super Bowl, more than any other team.
New England's first Super Sunday appearance came in
1986, when they
faced the Bears in Super Bowl XX. Although they were
hammered by Chicago 46-10, the game nonetheless stands
as the high-water mark for the franchise's
first-generation uni design, symbolized by
Pat Patriot, the football-hiking minuteman figure
who served as the team's first logo.
Pat Patriot's background, it turns out, is at least
as storied as that of the Super Bowl itself. The
character originally appeared in a 1959 editorial
cartoon by Boston Globe artist Phil Bissell, after the
team's original owner, Billy Sullivan, was awarded the
franchise. Sullivan, a notorious tightwad, got
permission to use the character for free and it became
the team's logo, appearing on everything from stationery
to stock certificates. Although Pat's job description
didn't initially include helmet duty—the team used a
colonial-era hat design during its 1960 inaugural
season—he was promoted to helmet-logo status in 1961.
Uni Watch has always liked Pat, but the character has
inspired a surprising amount of controversy. In an
apparent spasm of parental backlash, Phil Bissell
himself has been quoted saying Pat "looks like a
lopsided Chinaman"—this in an essay by Sports
Illustrated's Leigh Montville, who piled on by calling
Pat "the worst logo anywhere." That assessment was
evidently shared by Billy Sullivan's son-in-law, Michael
Chamberlain, who in the late 1970s budgeted $30,000 to
create a new logo, which was introduced to the team's
fans during a halftime ceremony. Enlarged versions of
Pat and the new design were driven around the field,
with the P.A. announcer urging fans to cheer for their
favorite. It was no contest: Pat got a standing ovation,
while the new logo—a copy of which, alas, has eluded Uni
Watch's best investigative efforts—was booed off the
field, never to be seen again.
Pat withstood that challenge but was finally forced
into retirement in 1993 (although he's made cameo
comebacks during the
1994 throwback season and the
2002 Thanksgiving game). His replacement on the
Patriots' helmets, often referred to as
Flying Elvis, has none of Pat's charm and has never
been a Uni Watch favorite. As Providence Journal
columnist Jim Donaldson put it in 2002, "Elvis is cold.
Pat looked like the sort of guy Patriots fans would want
to have a beer with. In fact, Pat looked like he'd
already had a couple of beers."
To be fair, if Elvis doesn't look too jovial, maybe
it's because they keep changing his wardrobe—he's
already been paired with four different uniform schemes
during his first 12 seasons. The
1993 and
1994 designs were a bit, shall we say, confused
(don't get Uni Watch started on those mismatched chest
and shoulder numeral colors), but it was the 1995 design
that really scaled new heights in poor design. First
there was the
oddly italic numbering with the
semi-vibrating drop shadow. The masterstroke,
though, was moving Elvis from the jersey sleeves, where
he'd been in '93 and '94,
to the shoulders, where he looked comically out of
place.
This, unfortunately, is the uniform the Patriots wore
in Super Bowl XXXI, and it gets Uni Watch's vote for the
most unsightly outfit in Super Sunday history. Even
worse, New England's opponents that day were the
league's best-dressed team, the Packers. So not only did
the Pats lose on the scoreboard, 35-21, but the game's
aesthetic battle
wasn't even a fair fight.
Happily, the Pats made amends in 2000, when they
unveiled yet another uniform, which they continue to
wear today. While Uni Watch could live without the
vertical jersey piping,
particularly on the road jersey, for the most part
this design is a keeper, with tasteful detailing and
Elvis back down on the sleeves where he belongs. The
Pats looked sharp wearing this uniform as they
beat the Rams in Super Bowl XXXVI. And barring
unforeseen developments, it's what they'll be wearing
again this Sunday.
Finally, Uni Watch would be remiss not to acknowledge
the efforts of Patriots überfan Chris Lordan, whose
invaluable research assistance made the foregoing
discussion possible. Given the
teal nightmare that is the Carolina Panthers, Chris
can settle in on the couch this Sunday secure in the
knowledge that his beloved Pats have already won the
game's sartorial battle, no matter what happens on the
field.
Questions or suggestions for Uni Watch? Send mail
here.
Paul Lukas is the travel columnist for
Money magazine, the food critic for the New
York Sun, and the brand-history columnist for
Fortune Small Business.
Photo of Andre Tippett by Ken
Levine/Allsport/Getty Images.
This article was taken from
slate.msn.com. All rights reserved.
|
