Comments on: The NCAA denied Iowa’s request to wear Chris Street jersey on Saturday

By: fatediesel

fatediesel — Tue, 22 Jan 2013 16:50:33 +0000

It’s not like Iowa would have been the first team with the same name on their jerseys. In 2008 Kentucky’s entire team had the same last name on their jerseys in a tribute to their equipment manager that had died, and earlier this year everyone on Providence had Sandy Hook on the back of their jersey. In addition there are teams that don’t have names at all so refs should be trained to look at the number and not the name.

By: myopinionisrighterthanyours

myopinionisrighterthanyours — Tue, 22 Jan 2013 13:37:34 +0000

I think that’s called the Phil Knight effect ($$$).

By: mrbgood315

mrbgood315 — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 23:31:55 +0000

But yet Oregon can wear all black jerseys with completely illegible player names which are also in black. Makes sense.

By: myopinionisrighterthanyours

myopinionisrighterthanyours — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 20:29:05 +0000

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As a rec league ref, I can understand this sentiment, but you might want to check out what Gonzaga had on the back of their uni’s Saturday night. I understand it’s the team name versus an individual’s … but it kind of shoots your arguement.

By: binarymath

binarymath — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 18:45:09 +0000

For decades now, there has been a well-accepted standard for memorializing players, coaches, or owners on team uniforms. We saw that again this weekend with the black and white patch for Art Modell on the Ravens’ jerseys. Iowa requested to go outside of that accepted standard, and the NCAA did the right thing, even if it was unpopular.

In college basketball, it is a technical foul for players to have the same number, and Iowa wisely chose not to duplicate the number 40. But they were out of bounds in thinking that duplicating a player’s name on the jersey would not create issues.

Imagine if all the Hawkeyes had “Street” on their jersey. Ref sees a Hawkeye foul, but is screened off from seeing the number. He then has to take a couple extra seconds to verify the culprit and report the correct player number to the official scorer. Assuming the refs make no mistakes, figure 8-10 fouls per half for Iowa x a few seconds extra per foul, and it’s not a big deal either way (unless you are the producer of the telecast).

But if a foul was assigned to the wrong player, the refs would be called to task. There would certainly be a game delay – regardless of whether such an event could be corrected under the replay rules. And if the error was NOT corrected, it would become a “cause celebre” for youtube and chat rooms.

Bottom line: there is an accepted way to honor the dead on sports uniforms. Iowa wanted to do something different, and the NCAA stepped in and denied the request. But that does not make the NCAA a villain in this case.