When Ohio State's gray "Land of the wolves" jerseys came out recently, there was a lot of hoopla about the message or the theme of the jerseys.
Ranging from anywhere with the justified "What do buckeyes have to do with wolves?" to the "Wear the scarlet jerseys, these jerseys damage Ohio State's eliteness" takes, overall the reception has been fairly interchangeable. Especially after the jerseys came out and more pictures were seen, with red accents on the Buckeye Leafs and the all red LeBron Soldier XI's, people started to warm up to the threads.
X.XXVIII.XVII#GoBucks #BeatPSU pic.twitter.com/kiNPMelGwK
— Ohio State Football (@OhioStateFB) October 24, 2017
But really, I guess the message to all of this, and as a point to both sides of the gray jersey justification joint effort committee — be thankful that Ohio State is Ohio State, and that Ohio State isn't Maryland.
That's right, Ohio State isn't the only Big Ten team breaking out special shoulder-pad covers for Saturday contests. Maryland is too. But why haven't we known about it? Why hasn't it been the talk of the town? Well, frankly, because they're hideous, were announced in August and haven't been mentioned since.
Head-to-Toe! #RaiseHigh || #Terps125 pic.twitter.com/4XG55zMg35
— Maryland Football (@TerpsFootball) August 21, 2017
You want to know the real mark of how good or not your jerseys are? Take Maryland's brand and marketing strategy into example.
Maryland has not tweeted about the jerseys one solitary time in the week leading up to the game. Ohio State rolled out an Emmy-worthy hype video for the jersey release.
So yeah, while the jerseys are different, take into consideration that if you announce a jersey in the middle of August that won't be worn until October, it's not because they're sweet, but more like "What did we just do?" or a breaking news story that a public relations firm is trying to get out in front of early.
"Get them out early, so they'll forget about how bad they are until the team is playing in them." said D.J. Durkin, probably.
Here's to four first half touchdowns in gray uniforms and the top half Ohio State's jerseys not resembling a bottle of mustard.
