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Look better, play better?

New star, new city, new ownership, new push from fans – why do professional teams remodel their 'look'? A glimpse inside the iconography and visual culture of sports apparel.

from the November 23, 2007 edition

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"Part of the story is about the shift from external [branding] companies being involved to Reebok really being the barometer of fashion on sports teams because of their stranglehold on licenses," says Tom O'Grady, who heads Gameplan Creative, a Chicago firm that has repositioned teams in several leagues.

"We never push [teams] to do anything," says Travis Gonzolez, a spokesman for Adidas in Portland, Ore. "We say 'We can be a partner, we can help with design.' "

Mr. O'Grady knocks the overuse of throwback jerseys, an NBA theme this season, as "a straight merchandising ploy." He calls himself a traditionalist who favors tweaking fonts or piping to blink-and-it's-different change. O'Grady describes such fads as the "teal bandwagon" that crossed basketball, baseball, and hockey (with the Hornets, Marlins, and Sharks, respectively). He decries some newer trends.

"The [Colorado] Rockies running out [for some World Series games] with the black-on-black vests was brutal-looking," he says. "The black alternative uniform is probably the scourge of what I've seen in my 15 years of experience across sports."

O'Grady says he wouldn't mind seeing a rumored reprise of the Kansas City Royals' light-blue road uniforms from the George Brett days come to pass. While he sees the point of uniform updates, O'Grady says he'd like it to involve careful consideration of tradition.

In fact, "older teams [like the NFL's Cleveland Browns] tend not to mess around as much," says Lukas. Newer teams, he says, especially ones formed in the past 15 "era of merchandising" years, haven't established an aesthetic heritage, and perhaps never will.

"The Arizona Diamondbacks had a completely new design this year," Lukas points out. "On Monday their colors were X, Y, and Z, and on Tuesday they were one, two, and three. And I think newer teams like that are going to change all the time ... because they're just part of an era where it's a given that your look is going to change with contemporary fashion – not so much because that's how you want to look on the field, but because that's what people want to buy."

Capturing a city's vibe

Designers have had help crafting intricate and clever. Perhaps too much.

In the 1990s many designers switched from working freehand to using Macintosh computers, says Radom. "Things got sort of out of hand in terms of the level of detail in these identities," he says. "I think the overall trend now is a sort of a return to simplification."

Radom enjoys the fact that, for example, St. Louis is a very different city from Boston or Los Angeles. "It's really [important] to come up with something that is locally evocative." As hot a color as light blue is, he says – think Denver Nuggets or San Diego Chargers – "you would not want to impose a powder blue on the Boston Bruins."

Different sports have developed distinct visual traditions. Baseball's visuals are deeply rooted. Football is loaded with traditional Packers and Giants looks. "In the NBA it's a fast-moving game," says Radom. "The physical demands … offer up a different dynamic."

Gameplan's O'Grady expects continued focus on the "performance attributes" of jerseys – good fit, a smart use of lightweight new materials. "That's more the measure of success, rather than what's the latest in teal. Make sure players like playing in it." But designers will also keep in mind those tribal hordes of fans.

Radom reflects on a successful logo designed for UPS by the great Paul Rand, and gently tweaked over the years. Then he compares it with the unique challenges of the sports-logo world. "Nobody ever went out in public," he says with a laugh, "and painted a UPS logo on his body."

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