WEEKLY WHINE

Why not white?

Recently it has come to our attention that some of you don't think MLS teams should wear all white.

What the hell.

Okay. Didn't we just spend eight and a half years getting all the US's football fans on the same page? We all agree now as to the need for our own fields, All-Star games against foreign opposition, a clock that counts up, no regular season overtimes, and a two leg series to begin the playoffs.

And now this.

The most vocal opponent of all white is good old Jeff Bradley, who seems like quite a nice guy otherwise. Back in JUN 2004, he called for a uni change in the league, wherein teams choose what their first and second outfits look like. This may sound like a good idea, but... why?

Who is demanding this besides you, Jeffy?

Haven't you ever watched an MLS telecast on Fox Sports World, where they come back from halftime and all of a sudden the camera crash zooms into the centre circle and then whip pans all across the field? And all Max Bretos can do is go, "Whoooah!"? Anyway, over in the corner their little score box shows the shirt and short colours of each team. And guess what! In MLS, the visiting team is usually all white! Easy to spot! There they are! No guessing!

But when you watch, say, the English Premier League, it's all scrambled. For instance, take the Tottenham-Birmingham match from last year's season. Tottenham wore white shirts with blue shorts, and Birmingham wore blue shirts with white shorts. You can still tell the teams apart. But when two or three players are getting into pushing matches in the area on corner kicks, it's even easier to distinguish them if one was all white and the other was all blue.

Let's be clear, though. MLS teams would still have choices. For example, on several occasions DC United have decided to wear their white away shirts with their black home shorts for home matches. Nothing wrong with that. There was also one occasion on which Kansas City wore white shorts with their blue home shirts. Of course, they forgot to tell the league office ahead of time and got hit with a fine. Under "ridiculous reasons to be fined", that has to rank right with "encroaching the referee secure area".

And in the same paragraph, Jeffy calls for all the MLS teams to rework their logos to include Year Established dates. Is your memory already failing you, Jeffy? Hint: Chicago is 1998. All else are 1996. And the expansion teams for next year will not need to remind anyone that they're new.

Jeffy also requests "'classic' badges for all MLS teams". I think I know what you're getting at, and you already got it, in the form of the MetroStars' new logo for last year. We all agreed that this was the third most ill advised logo change in recent memory, behind the Houston Rockets' "Sharky the Cartoon Rocket" and the Seattle SuperSonics' "Big Old Block Letters That Went Out of Style Faster Than the Intel 486".

Which teams even require logo changes? Back in the day we would have said "Dallas, please! Anyone!". But you know what? That flaming horse kinda grows on you. Columbus has the most fitting logo: a badge depicting three guys in hard hats. The only teams that actually need to make changes are New England, whose "US Flag with a Football in the Canton" thing was done already, and Colorado.

The Rapids are an interesting problem. They have a primary logo, which depicts rapids flowing past the word RAPIDS, and a secondary logo, which is basically a circle with a football in the middle. And yet, just because it's got a football, everybody likes the latter. Please, can we just put some rushing water inside the circle with the football? Please?

Why isn't this a law? "All logos of sports teams shall contain both the team name in text and a graphic element that illustrates the team name." For example, the Red Sox' logo depicts... hold on... a pair of red socks. Actually, perhaps we shouldn't enforce this too strongly, or else we'd have to drape a pair of pants over the basketball in the Knicks' logo.

And whilst we're at it, just say no to vertical stripes of white with some other colour. You know what happens every time Fulham visit Newcastle? Can Fulham wear their white shirts? No, because Newcastle's stripes are white. But can they wear their black shirts? No, because Newcastle's stripes are black. AC and Inter, and their MLS friends the MetroStars and Rapids, have learned this lesson already.

Chivas USA, look. We think it's great that you're coming to share in our league and will bring a much needed toilet paper throwing element to MLS. But you're going to have to leave your red and white stripes behind, or else Chicago will have a fit the first time they visit you.

I'm sure Jeffy won't mind if you select teal.