After all these years I finally get to do one of these for the Giants.
So this season the Giants are celebrating their 100th anniversary. Honestly that’s pretty cool. For the seasonal festivities, they unveiled their new alternate for the year, the Century Reds. The immediate reaction was laughter and comparing them to the Habs. A few people liked them. I am one of those people.
To be clear, I do not like them because I think they look good aesthetically. I think they look very silly. I like them for the same reasons I like Color Rush or the other classic early-era throwbacks: they are fun novelty alternates. This isn’t the Giants new uniform, it’s a throwback to ancient history that we will see maybe twice this year. That’s the perfect time to make a uniform like this! I feel like much of the hate comes from people missing that point. These don’t have to look great, they are fun experiments. A novelty. A perfect opportunity to be a little silly. I much prefer a historical modernization for funzies like this over the trend of “everyone gets the same basic black alternate”.
One of my earliest comics is making fun of the Steelers Bumblebees. The new Century Reds have the same energy to them. They fit nicely into the same category as the other ancient throwbacks, like the Packers dot jerseys, or the Philadelphia Piss, or the Broncos Poop Stripes. Uniform designs cribbed back from when the helmets were leather and the sport was still basically modified rugby. These old uniform designs were never intended to work on modern NFL uniform structures. All of these throwbacks look rather horrendous. And yet…I kind of love them all. The fact that they use designs that simply aren’t used in the current league makes them stand out. Stripes? Vertical striped socks? Bright yellow? The number in a big dot in the center of the uniform? It’s weird in such a fun way. No other team in decades has used a uniform like the Giants century reds. A thick middle stripe right across the torso, outlined in white, with the white numbers contained within. Does it work? Not really (I do love the socks). But who gives a shit, it rules. Also, it looks better in casual motion than it does in the promo photos.
This is what an alternate uniform should be. Fun. Silly. Unique. A chance to stand out and in this case, embrace history. To this day I still only own jerseys from the 2007 squad, but I’m tempted to pick up a Dexter Lawrence Century Red just for the novelty. When the games come up everyone will get a few yucks in and everything will be fine. Meanwhile the Rams will still look terrible every week because they are stuck with that garbage as their main look until someone wises up.
There are people who probably wished for a Giants Black Alternate and it makes me sick to know I share a planet with those people.
