Hall of Famer Paul Warfield no fan of Cleveland Browns new uniforms
By Thomas Moore
Hall of Fame wide receiver Paul Warfield, a member of the Cleveland Browns’ last championship team, is pulling no punches when it comes to the team’s redesigned uniforms.
He is unequivocally not a fan.
“I am a vocal critic of them changing their uniforms,’’ Warfield told the Sporting News. “Do you see the Yankees changing their uniforms? Certain staples should never change.
“The orange helmet, the markings on the sleeves, the white jerseys at home — that’s the Cleveland Browns, just like the pinstripes are the New York Yankees.”
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The Browns uniforms, which had changed only slightly since Warfield first put one on as a rookie out of Ohio State in 1964, created a link for fans between the original dynastic Browns and the current club, which is continuing to try to find its way in the NFL.
“The Browns were dominant. The Browns were championship caliber,’’ Warfield said. “What stood out for me, watching them as I grew up (in Northeast Ohio), was how they compared to the New York Yankees. The Yankees might have had tough years for a while. They might have been tempted to make a change in their uniforms, make them modern. But they were the pinstripes, and they kept being the pinstripes, and they’re never going to change from the pinstripes.
“The Cleveland Browns don’t have to change, either.’’
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Warfield is right, of course, as for decades the Browns, along with teams like Oakland, Green Bay and Indianapolis, have had one of the most iconic uniforms, especially when they wore the brown jerseys. Paired with the orange helmet and white pants, the brown jersey was instantly recognizable, even to the casual fan. Now? Not so much.
The Cleveland wordmark on the chest comes across as superfluous, and the Browns running down the side of the pant leg looks amateurish.
Sporting News agrees, as the site placed the Browns 12th in the AFC in their recent uniform rankings, writing that:
"It’s a definite downgrade from their previous uniforms, which were easily Top 5 in the AFC, but not as bad as feared. The large “CLEVELAND” as the new uniform wordmark is fine … the “BROWNS” down the leg is not. We’ll slot the Browns at 12 until we see the uniforms on the field."
While Mark Twain once correctly pointed out that “clothes make the man,” the truth is that it is the players in the uniforms, rather than the uniforms themselves, that matter.
Do you agree with Paul Warfield about the Browns new uniforms?