Spatted Up: Here's The 5 Freshest Football Uniform Looks Of The Weekend

By Richard Boadu / @6magazine

If you’re 25 and up, you’ve heard the old football coach rhetoric, “Play for the team, not for yourselves.” If a player is wearing anything “flashy” like an armband, spatted cleats, etc., he’s selfish, a showoff, not about the team. Fashion sense is fleeting and often completely withers away with age. Kanye West wasn’t lying when he said, “You niggas wear suits cuz you can’t dress no mo’.” Those old people who can’t dress come from all walks of life, even football. They are often over 40, NCAA athletic directors, NFL coaches, execs and people in other powerful positions that decide things like … uniforms.

“If you look good, you feel good. If you feel good, you play good. And if you play good, they pay you good.” — My non-biological father figure, Deion Sanders

The flyest of them all, Deion Sanders, talked a lot of noise during his athletic career from college to the Hall of Fame, and he backed it up like a project chick in the club. Some would call it trash talk, but the fact that he did everything he damn near said made it more than just trash talk — it was fact talk. Deion was not the mold. He never toted the company line; Deion crossed the line once a week just to make sure it was still there. And as you can tell by his quote above, Deion was a superstar on the field and a fashion star on it as well.

The old football coach saw fashion for girls and those fufu boys. In today’s game that game, that coach doesn’t last long. The top recruits in the college football want to go to the schools that wear the dopest uniforms. Hell, NFL players sometimes wish they could go back to college for more than just the parties and atmosphere. They want to go back to college so they don’t have to wear those god awful NFL socks.

I’ve been talking about football fashion since I was a tyke. I’ve been writing about it since 2008, and this year I’ll be doing so for The Sports Fan Journal. Now that the NFL season has started, expect to be hearing from me consistently on the latest and greatest looks in the football ecosystem.

So who was “Spatted Up” this week?

Oregon Ducks

The Oregon Ducks are always spatted up every single week, and I love every single minute of it. Bruh, I don’t even know where to start. It’s Fashion Week in NYC, and I pretty sure I’ll see these jerseys on the runway by week’s end.

Army Black Knights

The Army Black Knights got flashy this weekend too. They rocked black helmets on black jerseys, which they haven’t done in quite some time. Also, Army is notorious for having no names on the back of their jerseys or having “West Point” across the back. They added a new hint of recognition by having the players’ names on the front of the jerseys similar to what you’d see on their Combat Uniforms, Army Green Uniforms and Blue Army Service Uniforms.

Michael Crabtree

Swag Michael Crabtree ALL. THE. WAY. OUT. The Dallas native no doubt grew up a Cowboys fan. He’s sponsored by Jordan brand so he had the folks at Jordan make him some custom Retro 6 Jordan cleats for his Dallas homecoming game. He’s definitely going to get fined by the NFL for wearing these cleats because they violate uniform rules. Crabtree said he’d donate the cleats to charity as well.

Ryan Mathews

And this is why “Spatted Up” happens on Tuesdays. Players know everyone is watching on Monday nights, and those with big names, big contracts or small names and big kahunas that don’t care about a silly NFL fine go all out on MNF. Case in point on Monday, as Chargers running back Ryan Mathews rocked his new bright yellow Under Armour MC Highlight cleats. Not sure if he’ll get fined because they are team colors.

Tulsa Golden Hurricane

A note from the EIC of TSFJ:

"Man, I felt bad as hell watching Oklahoma whoop Tulsa's ass on national television like that. But damn, those uniforms and that helmet was clean as hell. Very dope." — Ed

Indeed, Ed, indeed.

See y’all next week.

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