Away Teams Wearing White Uniforms is Stupid

I have a dream… That one day… These leagues will get this damn rule right. This frustrates me. Probably irrationally so, but nontheless, it irks me to no end. Why in the world home teams are allowed to wear dark colored jerseys is beyond me. I don’t understand the logic behind it.

Crispy Whites

Hold on, before we go any further, I wanna make a disclaimer. The only exception in this article is the MLB. While they will sometimes introduce dark colored jerseys for games, they tend to stick to white vs grey (also dumb, but not the topic here). So, we can consider them off the hook for the time being. Okay, with that out of the way, let’s get to the real issue.

I don’t care how unique the color scheme is. You can have the freshest color pairing the spectrum has ever imagined, you don’t get cleaner than icy white. Excuse me if I sound a little old fashioned, but it seems to me like you’d want to look your best at home. The fans come out, support the team, fill the seats (or don’t fill seats, *cough* Carolina Hurricanes *cough*), and occasionally throw things on the ice. You’re gonna tell me the team isn’t going to come out lookin’ as fresh as possible in them whites? For the fans? Where’s the love?!

Black and White TV

The inception of that screen you stare at every Sunday (and weekdays during hockey season) is the reason we even have this debacle. Before TV broadcasts, it wasn’t as imperative to contrast jersey types. After all, the people at the game could tell who was on what team, and everyone else was listening on the radio. However, when television came into play, it was absolutely essential to contrast the two teams. Especially considering TV was black and white. This meant you couldn’t have green jerseys playing against blue jerseys. On a black and white TV, they would appear the same.

So, the leagues wised up and mandated teams to contrast colors. The easiest way to do so was to have each team don a mainly white uniform, and a mainly dark colored uniform. The NBA had the longest standing tradition of the home team wearing white, and the road team wearing a dark color. That was changed last year. Morons. Now, the home team gets to choose whatever jersey they want, and the away team must differ.

The NFL has a similar rule. This year, they softened up on their uniform regulations as far as alternate jerseys go, but they, too, have been giving the jersey choice to the home team. The NHL might actually be the league to blame here, though. Starting in 1970, the home team was required to wear white, with the road wearing dark. Nice. However, that all changed in 2003. Since ’03, home teams are now required to wear a dark colored uniform. Not nice. That’s the worst of them all. REQUIRED!! Shame on you, NHL. 

“Home Whites”

It needs to be a hard and fast rule, and it needs to be one way only. The home team wears white, the away team wears a dark colored jersey (or something contrasting white, according to team colors). I am actually somewhat okay with the NBA allowing the home team a choice, but I still believe they would do better to enforce the home whites. What we don’t want, is every league to trend the way the NHL has trended. It looks like the NFL is getting close, and the NBA has certainly strayed from its long standing tradition.

I’m not saying we stop getting creative, either. Have fun with the jerseys, mix and match until your heart is happy. Remember, though, the more you do it, the less and less interesting it gets. Each. And. Every. Time. So maybe we keep the dark alternates for road games and limit the mix and match at home? I dont know, just an idea. 

It’s quite simply too mundane, the way it is now. I’m a Red Wings fan, so every home game I watch is red vs. white. If all leagues trend this way, the Cowboys will eventually always be playing blue vs. white, or the Steelers always playing black vs white. That’s no fun. Let the home teams looks fresh in white. It also allows us fans to see other colors as they come into town. That actually used to be one of the cool perks. Tell me if I’m getting too technical with it, but I say no tradition looks cleaner than wearing white at home. 

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