So here’s the thing: The Shirt this year isn’t half bad. The design is acceptable, and the color is great. THIS YEAR. And therein lies the problem.
Good Job! Here’s a Sticker!
Before I go into my semi-regular rant about the program overall, let’s give some credit to those that do this work for good causes. The students and their minders at ND put in hard work to help charity. It’s really nice. It’s a great thing even. And they did a good job this year. Here’s their work in ’12:
But…
So they did a good job, but it just rings hollow. Why? Well, because it doesn’t serve the original purpose of the original Shirt, and it doesn’t help the team win. Every year the color changes, and every game a bunch of folks in from out of town wear every color under the sun in ND stadium. There’s absolutely no unity. It’s actually quite sad that PENN FREAKING STATE can figure this out but Notre Dame cannot. And, of course, ND finds the perfect way out of it: charity.
How can one argue with charity? How do you rant against the status quo in The Shirt without coming off like a jerk. Well, here’s how: there are a MILLION WAYS TO GIVE TO CHARITY. Why does our in-stadium, gameday ’12th Man’ clothing HAVE to be that way? And why does a single, unified color every year have to suffer for it? Why can’t we do both?
THIS IS NOT BEYOND OUR CREATIVE CAPABILITIES!
The History
A little historical context and some words from The Shirt Committee might help here. In terms of the origination of the project (emphasis mine):
The Shirt Project began in 1990 through the vision and leadership of Brennan Harvath, ‘91. As Chairman of AnTostal, the Student Union Board’s spring celebration, Harvath envisioned raising money for AnTostal by selling t-shirts to Notre Dame students. The Shirt, as it became known, was intended to unify the student body in Notre Dame Stadium for the home football game against Michigan on September 15, 1990. With Notre Dame and Michigan having similar team colors, Harvath’s vision was for the crowd to be unified in green, symbolic of the Fighting Irish.
Wait…WHAT??? The original vision was to unify the student body, to unify the stadium? WHAT IS GOING ON HERE? BLASPHEMY! Turns out, the ever-changing color actually goes AGAINST the original goal of The Shirt. The Founder of the project, the person that started it all, wanted to unify the stadium while raising some money for some student efforts. It’s sad that today’s leadership of the project have lost sight of this. Very sad.
And the laughable aspect is that The Shirt web site actually claims to help to unify the stadium.
Also important to The Shirt Project is to provide a unified front in the football stadium. A sea of same-colored shirts gives the opposing team a “twelfth man†to fear.
Oh yeah! So intimidating, this 12th Man with a million different colors. Can really tell that the crowd is unified and behind Notre Dame. Boy, we should give up now.
The rallying cry just isn’t there. I mean it’s there, but it’s likely kinda like this:
“Okay everybody, we’re going to get together and wear the same color to the games this year to ensure we really support the team and show our unity. To do so, we’ll be wearing green shirts.”
“So is it the same green as last year?”
“Nope, no, sorry, it’s a different shade. And next year will be yellow, but don’t worry, we’ll tell you then.”
“Hey I have my Air Force blue shirt from last year is that okay to wear? It’ll sort a be the same…”
COME ON. It doesn’t work. Never has, never will.
The Big Picture
You see, The Shirt is simply a barrier. It’s a big barrier, but just a barrier to the ultimate goal here: which is a stadium that, when you walk in, SCREAMS UNITY AND FIGHTING FREAKING IRISH support. That is all. The goal of this movement is a unified stadium – that includes jackets and sweatshirts and parkas and every manner of warmth-inducing clothing. Because, you see, once there’s an official gameday color, everyone will wear it. They’ll pick things out that fit that color scheme because, well, THAT is the color scheme. Every layer, every piece of gear, would be that single color.
But we won’t ever get there with The Shirt changing colors every year. It’s too strong of a force, and if we got to an official gameday color, it would simply ruin it. If the official, permanent color were Kelly Green, or Gold, and this year’s The Shirt came out – guess what? SKITTLES. That’s right, back to the rainbow baby.
Fix It. #fixtheshirt
Ultimately, only ND fans can fix this problem. You can help by signing the petition which is located here. You can email Jack Swarbrick and spread the news on social media. You can stop buying The Shirt too – but honestly I don’t want the cause to suffer. I just want them to wake up and realize that changing color every year is a lazy way to continue to build demand. The best way is to have a winning team, and design a cool shirt. That’s it – it achieves all of the goals we could all ever have – helps unify the fan base on game day, helps charity, and allows me to go on ranting about other things. Like 33 cent quarter dogs. DON’T GET ME STARTED!!!!
Sign the Petition. Rant. Spread the word. Rant. #FIXTHESHIRT!
Don't take me, yourself, or life so seriously. This is supposed to be fun.
Biscuit co-founded HerLoyalSons in partnership with his ND roommate (Dillon Hall baby!), MQ, in 2006 and has been ranting about ND Football and everything Notre Dame since. He strongly believes in the mission of ND and its football program. Biscuit expects logic and data in arguments and will absolutely crush you if you come to a debate missing one or the other. He despises everything Michigan, and his favorite pastime is mocking Purdue.
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Get a grip, must be a slow news day. Who cares what color the shirt is. The twelfth man is about crowd noise! PERIOD. An opposing team has never been intimidated by what color the shirt is.
Biscuit,
This is your second effort on this issue, and I signed your first petition but I’m not sure I will this time – – let me explain why.
First, with all due respect, I don’t agree with Bill, I agree with you… Having the Stadium in one color could indeed be a help towards making our crowd louder.
However – – although you are 100% right “in principle” my own research in this issue convinces me this is a losing cause practically speaking. Here’s why:
I’ve been working on trying to get our Notre Dame crowd to be “all it can be” literally since 1993. For reasons I won’t bore you with, Lou Holtz got me engaged on this issue, and I’ve been able to publish numerous articles, meet with hundreds of folks over these two decades who have significant roles to play in dealing with our crowd, presented analyses to four athletic directors and their staffs, etc etc… So far, for naught mostly.
There is evidence to show that our crowd has been less energetic and noisy since about 1990 (that is, even when we were winning). The problem is not for the very big games like USC in 2005 and last year – – if the crowd can’t get up for those games, there is no hope at all. The problem is when we are playing some dangerous team where our own team is “flat”( because of midterms or a big game the previous week or something) and needs a lift from the crowd. This never happens.
There are two big issues which are very tough to solve. First, the crowd needs igniting. It’s the team that occasionally fires up the crowd and not the other way around.
Second, our crowd is incredibly not “savvy” – I have compiled a lot of physical evidence that shows that our noise peaks after the other team snaps the ball. We are habitually late and slow in making noise.
There are plenty of reasons for all this, including demographics, ticket policies, and University policies at large, many of which have been commented on in your (excellent) site, as well as in other sites. Like any multifaceted problem, these are hard to correct if there is not one single point of contact responsible – – which for a variety of reasons, there is most assuredly not. This especially affects the “inputs†which ought to be able to help this problem (band, cheerleaders, the Voice from the press box, the scoreboard, TV timeouts, etc. etc.). While individually all of these areas are characterized by having wonderful people who are 100% fantastic Notre Dame fans and contribute to a very nice “buzz” in the Stadium, collectively none of them are orchestrated towards producing the desired effect.
Case in point: the Shirt. Your arguments, Biscuit, are completely correct. Armed with them and my own analysis, in the last few months I tried to address this problem and was able to spend quality time with the faculty advisor for the student Shirt committee, as well as have significant exchanges with the student Shirt leadership. Unfortunately, the cart is going to stay in front of the horse. No matter how many names we get on your petition and how good your arguments are, the Shirt has in fact devolved to be not just a major contribution to charity but a significant vehicle to develop student business acumen, etc. There is no constituency within the University which is willing to take that one on.
Bill, in the final analysis I’m with you in one sense: even though we look like M&Ms, we can still be loud as hell when we need to be. So Biscuit, let’s join forces and focus our efforts in constructive directions.
Go Irish!
The “Shirt” needs to be one color and that color should be green.
The whole argument comes down to one reason why we need the stadium to be one color: recruiting. The fact alone might not sound like a big deal, but when high schoolers come to ND for a game and see an entire stadium of green that will make a much bigger difference. It’s inexcusable to be the only big time program without one color for all of the fans to wear.
The shirt will make for a much more imposing crowd and help “wow” recruits on their visit and hopefully that will in turn lead to more wins. From there it’s clear why we should make it one color.
Having it green every year and the entire crowd green will make it seem that ND fans are serious about football
I agree it’s an uphill battle and it may be one I can’t win, but what’s right is right and I will continue to fight the good fight.
Arguing that we can’t have a single color AND teach students business skills AND raise money for charity is simply silly. Had I been in that room the others would have left convinced or feeling stupid for not being convinced. I appreciate your support and your efforts, but ND thinks it does no wrong because of the ND Bubble. But so much is wrong. This is just one symptom. I will never yield!!!!
Im interested in what you think the solution is.
One, consistent color for game day. The official color of ND Stadium, every year, forever. The Shirt would match that color every year, yet the design would change. That’s pretty much it.
I think Biscuit makes a good point in feeling like this is just yet another round of “color roulette”; however, for The Shirt to truly change into a unifying color, it has to start somewhere.
This blue is finally a ND blue and not some strange off-blue that will “pop” on TV. While, I personally think the design is overly busy, I’m good with this year’s version.
The way I see it: 2012 Shirt committee is trying to set a new standard. It’s up to 2013 to not screw it up.
1990 was my freshman year and I don’t know where or when the Shirt lost the plot, but I remember that during my time on campus, the Shirt was green or blue. The blue from last year, what some refer to as “Air Force Blue” or “Unicorn Toot Blue,” actually first appeared in 1991, so there’s historical precedent for the Shirt sucking. Where it gets horrible is when they roll out “Flesh” (1998 or 2009). Bill Widdly in the first comment, though, nails it: The Shirt don’t matter. It’s who’s wearing the shirt. Celtic Football Club has a saying, “The Celtic shirt does not shrink to fit inferior players,” and Notre Dame fans would be well-served by remembering that. PSU aren’t better fans because they’re all in white and wave white towels, they’re better fans because they are AMPED. I actually don’t think they’re better fans in the way you think I mean, but you just don’t get that ND. Yes, I’m all in for the JumboTron. Yes, I’m all in for Field Turf. I want electricity. I want everyone doing the huddle. I want “Just Can’t Get Enough” every time we score. The point I am trying to make is that The Shirt is meaningless if everyone wears it and they sit. On their hands. A monochromatic backdrop without passion and energy is nothing more than Kim Jong Un’s birthday party. A great Shirt is kindling. The man (or woman) inside must be the wood. Be the wood, people. Fuel the fire.
Jumbotron OK if no commercials. Keep the plastic and rubber grass out of the stadium unless is hybrid.
I even disagree that the Shirt is a good color this year…good in the sense that it is navy blue, one of our traditional colors, I get that. But since it is worn primarily in the Stadium, you have to think about how it looks there. And a dark blue section like that looks weak.
By that logic, blackouts are awful–which is, you know, exactly what the place will look like during any night game and as the majority of our home games wind down in the fourth.
Blackouts ARE awful.
College football’s overlords are off negotiating a new playoff structure, Jack Swarbrick will have to earn his stripes elbowing the big conferences on behalf of Notre Dame independence, and here at HLS, megaphone for Notre Dame football independence, Biscuit, is squealing about….the color of cotton!!!
Just kidding with you, Biscuit. I think we are in good hands with Swarbrick – though, his task isn’t enviable trying to squeeze the best deal out of the ‘new’ BCS and possibly finding a new home for all other ND sports.
Personally, I really like the color and design of the shirt. However, I also agree with Czar that it may not be the best color if we’re trying to make a “unity” statement within ND Stadium. I think if we were trying to achieve that, a nice deep gold color would look great for a night game. Can’t help but to wonder if a night game and day game shirt will be in the conversation when designing it in the future. Of course, that will only happen if we have more night games scheduled at ND stadium.
It would be hard to settle on a color when a good number of fans and students are divided on should it be “green” or “blue”. When you get down to it, the University itself probably favors both colors strictly from a merchandising perspective.
Honestly, I’d be fine even with a stadium full of either green or blue. But it’s the Red, Orange, Yellow, etc that really screw it all up
What if it were always a Kelly Green with a NEW design every year?
I signed
I hate BC. With that said, and it seriously pains me to say this, I’m jealous of the Boston College Superfan shirt program. While the particular design of the Superfan shirt isn’t my favorite, the use of the same shirt color, limited print colors, same frontal graphic, and overall simplicity of the Superfan shirt is what ND should be shooting for with The Shirt.
http://www.bceagles.com/trads/bc-superfan.html
Confession: My best friend from high school went to BC. A good deal of our conversations since high school graduation have involved insulting the other’s collegiate alma mater. Nevertheless, we remain great friends to this day. Every year during my time at ND (i.e., 97-01) the two of us would send each other the respective “shirts” from our schools. I love ND (too much according to my wife), but the 97-01 versions of The Shirt were terrible. The colors ranged from baby poop to dog vomit, and the graphic design was obviously outsourced to a blind grade school art teacher. Each fall, the Superfan fan shirt arrived in the mail with the same goldenrod color, same frontal graphic, and an inspirational quote on the back. It was simple, it was clean, and it looked good. If it hadn’t been a BC shirt, I probably would have worn it around campus. Each fall, I was embarrassed to send The Shirt to my friend.
More than a decade removed from my time at ND, I still have the four “The Shirt†shirts and the four BC “Superfan†shirts from those years in my closet. Each year during my annual closet clean out I have to convince myself that, for loyalty’s sake, I have to hold on to the four “The Shirt†shirts despite the fact that they suck and I have not worn any of them since the respective home openers the years they were sold.
To be fair, The Shirt the last few years, as well as this year, has been better than any of the offerings during my time at ND. However, I agree with Biscuit that The Shirt can, and needs to be, better. While a lot of this has been said before, this is what I want from The Shirt:
1. ABSOLUTLEY NO PRINTED PHOTOGRAPHS – ugh.
2. Kelly green fabric every year – This one is a no brainer. No color says Irish more than kelly green.
3. Limit the printed material (designed graphics and text) to two colors – Blue and white, blue and gold, gold and white are the combo’s I’d like to see. Maybe a darker green with one of those other colors would work too.
4. The front needs to be simple and consistent. E.g., Approx.. 3×3 inch ND monogram on the breast with small text below it that says “The Shirt†and the year.
5. The back can be the thing that distinguishes the shirt from year to year. Simple designed graphic of the leprechaun, outline of the dome, a helmet, etc., would work. Id’ be fine with just text of the game schedule on the back.
6. Above all, keep it simple. Simple design is both easy and timeless.