What will the Thunder wear?
Thousands have claimed their seats for the inaugural season of the Oklahoma City Thunder.
Just what are they going to see from those seats? And I’m not talking about what kind of team this will be. Improved? Good? Bad? Those sorts of discussions can wait for another day. For now, I’m wondering what the team will look like, and that comes down to the jerseys.
What will the Thunder wear?
Watch my latest video commentary or continue reading below:
The design of the jerseys has yet to be revealed. We’re told that when the team reports for preseason camp in a few weeks, the jerseys will be unveiled, and really, this will be another big moment in the branding of this team.
Getting a name was the biggest moment. That’s how most people will identify this team — by its name — but next in line is the jersey.
There was much wailing and gnashing of teeth about the Thunder logo. Many lamented that it wasn’t good enough, wasn’t cool enough, but really, what the team wears is much more important than the logo it has. Sure, that logo will be used, but the jerseys will be seen so much more.
Think about it. When the Hornets were here, you saw their logo from time to time, but it wasn’t constantly front and center. Their uniforms, on the other hand, were seen all the time. At games. On TV highlights. In news photos.
I have a much clearer picture in my mind’s eye of their home whites with Hornets across the chest than I do of their logo.
And so, the Thunder jersey will be important. Here’s hoping it’s a strong, classic look. Simple color scheme. Clean design.
These jerseys, after all, aren’t going to be seen only by the thousands who’ve bought ticket at the Ford Center. They’re going to be seen by the world.
Heisman headin’ toward a quarterback?
Two weeks into the college football season, and already Heisman Trophy favorites are starting to emerge.
And quarterbacks are the ones rising to the top.
Tim Tebow and Chase Daniel look like the class of the bunch right now, which I’ve reflected in my latest vote for the heismanpundit.com/Orlando Sentinel poll. Tebow had another big week, this time in Florida’s beat down of Miami. He threw for 256 yards and two touchdowns and ran for 55 yards. I know Miami is no great shakes, but that’s still a solid day.
Daniel was darn good, too. Granted, Missouri was playing a foe even worse that Miami — Southeast Missouri State — but Daniel completed 14 consecutive passes during one stretch. That’s stout no matter who you’re playing against. He finished the day with 245 yards passing and three touchdowns.
Three other quarterbacks are likely to figure seriously into the Heisman discussion before the year’s over.
Pat White dropped a bit this week because of West Virginia’s loss to East Carolina and because of his so-so performance. He had 72 yards passing and 97 yards rushing, and the Mountaineers managed only three points. Thing is, White is too good to fall off the Heisman radar forever.
The other two quarterbacks likely to factor in are USC’s Mark Sanchez and Oklahoma’s Sam Bradford.
Sanchez could make a big-time statement this week against Ohio State. He threw for a career best 338 yards this past weekend, and if he has another day like that against the Buckeyes, he’ll be in the mix.
Bradford is also stacking up great outings. After a nearly flawless opening week against hapless Tennessee-Chattanooga, he was stellar once again in the second week of the season. He threw for 395 yards and five touchdowns against Cincinnati. It was a performance that caught the attention of the Davey O’Brien Award voters, who chose Bradford as the quarterback of the week, and if he keeps up these kind of numbers, it won’t be long before lots of people take notice.
Here’s a look at my vote for the Heisman after Week 2:
1. Tebow: The Gators have a bye this week, but a big game looms at Tennessee in a couple weeks.
2. Daniel: The big numbers should continue with Nevada up next.
3. Beanie Wells, Ohio State: The Buckeye running back didn’t play against Ohio, and we saw how much Ohio State missed him. Ohio nearly scored a big upset. A big day against USC this week might vault him to the top of my ballot, where he was before being injured.
4. Knowshon Moreno, Georgia: The Bulldog running back is being overlooked a little. He shouldn’t be. He’s averaging 8.7 yards a carry; he’s just not getting many carries against the likes of Georgia Southern and Central Michigan. The next three weeks will be telling — at South Carolina, at Arizona State and vs. Alabama.
5. White: Even though he had 169 yards of offense against East Carolina, quarterbacks are judged on wins. Losing to the Pirates doesn’t kill his Heisman chances but it sure hurts them.
Get your hopes up, football fans
Two weeks into the college football season isn’t enough time to know everything about the local squads.
Still, two weeks is enough time to know this — it’s OK to be excited.
Watch my latest video commentary or continue reading below:
If you’re a college football fan in our fair state, go ahead and feel good about your team. Like where they’re headed. Speculate about what this season could be. Because it looks like things could be even better than expected for Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and Tulsa.
The reason is two-fold — these teams are as good, maybe even better, than expected and their competition isn’t as good.
Let’s start with Oklahoma. A blowout of Tennessee-Chattanooga in Week 1 meant little, but beating up on Cincinnati in Week 2 showed that the Sooners have a stout squad. The offense is smooth, and the defense is able to adjust.
And if you look at the other teams at the top of the heap nationally, what the Sooners did in these first two weeks looks even better. Several of the top teams have struggled. Ohio State escaped Ohio. West Virginia lost to East Carolina. Those sorts of things open the door even wider for OU.
Oklahoma State’s door has opened even wider, too. The teams that the Cowboys are going to be trying to climb over in the Big 12 South are vulnerable. Texas A&M is weak, and Texas and Texas Tech aren’t as good as their rankings suggest.
And the Cowboys look like they might be better than expected, too. Their offense is stout, and maybe that isn’t a shock, but when you lose Dantrell Savage and Adarius Bowman, missing a step wouldn’t be out of the question. Instead, Kendall Hunter and Dez Bryant have emerged. A pair of blowouts to open the season make a strong statement for the Cowboys.
Tulsa has scored a pair of beat-downs, too, prompting some pundits to ask if the Golden Hurricane could be this year’s BCS spoiler. Could it be this year’s Hawaii or Boise State?
Heck, why couldn’t it? Tulsa lost Paul Smith, a guy who’s now cashing an NFL paycheck, and yet, David Johnson steps in and things just keep humming along.
Now, granted, all three teams have questions, but their questions are no bigger and certainly no worse than those of their closest competitors.
So, go ahead, and be excited about your team. We may not know everything we need to know after two weeks, but there’s enough evidence to feel darn good about the teams in our fair state.
More from The Q&A: Curtis Lofton
Curtis Lofton, the former Oklahoma star, is expected to start at middle linebacker for the Atlanta Falcons on Sunday.
But does he ever miss being a college player?
Check out what the Kingfisher native had to say about that and a few other topics:
Jenni Carlson: Stupid question probably, so I’ll admit that up front, but are there ever times when you say, “I should’ve stayed in school”?
Curtis Lofton: As soon as I made my decision, I never really looked back. The first OU game … I was thinking, “Man, it sure would be nice going and playing in front of 85,000 and being with all the guys.” But that’s the only time I really looked back. I think the thing that I miss is just being around the guys and just the college atmosphere.
JC: So, how is a guy from Kingfisher adjusting to life in
CL: Well, it’s a big city, and I will say that I hate the traffic. I mean, you’ve got to map your day around the traffic, so I don’t like that too much. But I live about 20 minutes from our facility, so I go to the facility and I drive home and I don’t really go too many places after that. I really haven’t got to experience the whole
JC: I remember last year when there was talk about you jumping to the NFL and you seemed in awe of the thought. Now, you’re going to start your first game. How to you process all of that?
CL: It’s been a whirlwind. I started my first year, and I never really thought about going to the NFL. Going through (organized team activities) and training camp and finally getting the starting nod, it’s crazy. I just try to stay humble and just take it day by day, really.
JC: You’re playing alongside Keith Brooking and Michael Boley. What’s that like?
CL: Keith Brooking, he’s been in the league 12 years, four Pro Bowls. He knows what I’m going through. He tries to help me out. If I line up wrong, he bumps me over. And Michael Boley, he’s a great player, makes a lot of plays. He has a world of knowledge of the game. Those guys just help me out as much as possible.
JC: Your first regular-season game week — what’s it been like?
CL: It’s just a different atmosphere. Everybody’s just intense and ready to go.
Thunder fits in nicely
There are lots of folks hatin’ on the new name and logo of Oklahoma City’s NBA team.
Not me.
Watch my latest video commentary or continue reading below:
Oh, sure, it’d be easy to nitpick at the Thunder nickname or the OKC shield logo. I could lament that there are stronger names. I could argue that there are better logos.
But you know what? I think these are pretty darn good.
Wednesday when the team finally made its name and logo official, it gave a sheet to the media with all of the NBA insignias on it. All 30 teams were there, side by side, row after row.
And that’s when it hit me — the Thunder and its logo fit in just fine.
I let my eye wander over the sheet, wanting to see if I’d be drawn to the Thunder because it was different than the others. Would it stand out? Would it look inferior? Would it seem cartoonish?
No, no and no.
The Thunder name and logo fit right in with the other NBA teams.
Granted, the logo bears a striking resemblance to the Nets’ logo, but frankly, there are other logos that look alike. The Phoenix Suns and the Portland Trail Blazers have similar slanting rectangles. The Los Angeles Lakes and the Detroit Pistons both have basketballs with their names across the front. The Orlando Magic and the Philadelphia 76ers both have logos with basketballs streaking to the right.
Just as Clay Bennett admitted after the press conference Wednesday, there are no new nicknames. Ditto for the logos, I say.
Frankly, I suspect that the folks who are down on the name and the logo are just not used to either of them. Things that are new tend to be jarring, even if they are good things. A beautiful new building, for example, looks out of place simply because it wasn’t there the last time you drove down that road. Eventually, you get used to seeing it and you realize how good it looks.
The same will happen with the Thunder nickname and logo. In time, we’ll all realize that they aren’t out of place at all.
Not blue about Thunder colors
All the talk Wednesday centered on the nickname and the logo of Oklahoma City’s new NBA team.
The name Thunder is growing on folks.
The logo is not.
Least talked about are the team colors, but frankly, they might be what I like best about the whole shooting match.
The main color, sky blue, is fashioned after the blue on the Oklahoma state flag. It is a little deeper that that state flag blue, though. Look at the T-shirts worn at the announcement ceremony, or check out the ones being sold on the team’s online store. You’ll notice that the blue is a couple notches darker than the color of the flag.
It is not only vibrant but also strong.
That is a unique but grand blend. I like that this blue is the color we’ll see most often in association with the Thunder.
The complementary colors — the yellow and the red-orange — are good choices, too. If the team decides to do special jerseys and use either of those hues as the primary colors, they’ll still look good.
I also like that there’s a nod toward the two major colleges with that red-orange color. Just as Clay Bennett said on Wednesday, it’s not too red and not too orange, and he’s right. Look at it, and you’ll think it’s more red one minute and more orange the next.
Nice touch.
All in all, this team’s color scheme is solid. You can debate the name and the logo all you want, but there’s no need to argue about the colors.
Football’s ho-hum week one
The opening week of the college football season has come and gone.
Ho hum.
Watch my latest video commentary or continue reading below:
Or at least, it was a ho-hum opening week compared to opening week last year. Appalachian State beat Michigan, shocking the sports world and starting a trend that continued throughout the season. That game in Ann Arbor wasn’t the only shocker. Georgia Tech throttled Notre Dame. Texas narrowly escaped Arkansas State.
Ah, those were the days.
This year’s opening week was hardly the fun that last year’s was. Sure, Virginia Tech lost to East Carolina and Pittsburgh lost to Bowling Green. But even though the Hokies and the Panthers were ranked in the top 25, neither loss can be considered a huge surprise. East Carolina and Bowling Green are both successful programs that have beaten ranked teams before.
About the only thing that came close to an honest-to-goodness upset during the opening week was Utah’s 25-23 victory at Michigan. But really, everyone in Ann Arbor knows what a true upset looks like.
Utah might not have the kind of squad it had a few years back, but for Michigan, losing to the Utes is hardly the crime that losing to the Division I-AA Mountaineers was.
So, what does all of this mean?
We can only hope that the lack of sizzle in the opening week isn’t a sign of things to come. Last season was so much fun because of the upsets. They were the hallmark, from Appy State beating Michigan at the start to Texas Tech beating Oklahoma, Arkansas beating LSU and Pitt beating West Virginia at the finish.
Upsets made 2007 great.
Let’s hope that 2008 follows suit, even if Week One didn’t.
Tebow tops Heisman heap
Beanie Wells had a heck of a week.
Until he tweaked his foot.
The Ohio State running back injured his right foot in the second half Saturday, and now, his status — and his health — is up in the air. Had he not gone down, he’d still be my Heisman Trophy favorite after a 13-attempt, 111-yard day.
Instead, I’ve got to give the nod this week to Tim Tebow.
The Florida quarterback had a modest day by his standards, throwing for 137 yards and rushing for 37 yards and scoring just one touchdown. But hey, the Gators were routing Hawaii. Chances are good, had they found themselves in more of a game, Tebow’s numbers would’ve shot up.
Here’s my vote for the Heismanpundit.com/Orlando Sentinel Heisman poll:
1. Tebow: He’ll have to do more this week against Miami.
2. Wells: If he’s healthy, he may soon rise back to the top.
3. Pat White, West Virginia: Known as a running quarterback, he was 25 of 33 passing for 208 yards and five touchdowns against Villanova.
4. Chase Daniel, Missouri: The Tiger quarterback cracks my top five after throwing for 323 yards and three touchdowns against Illinois.
5. Knowshon Moreno, Georgia: He rushed for only 59 yards but had three touchdowns, exiting early against out-manned Georgia Southern.
Fallen out: Michael Crabtree, Texas Tech: Receiver had a nice outing — nine catches, 73 yards — but someone had to make way for Daniel.
