At a glance: 2017 NFL Logos and Uniforms

Pro football is officially back, as the NFL has kicked off yet another season. If you’re reading this right now, then you’re definitely interested in seeing what the big uniform changes are for this season. If you didn’t notice them during the preseason or during this past Sunday’s action, don’t worry! We’ve got you covered and we’ll let you know what to watch for when it comes to logos and uniforms for this upcoming season.

For starters, the vast majority of teams have updated their uniforms to adapt to Nike’s Vapor Untouchable template. For those of you who aren’t fans of Nike’s Flywire collar design, this is very good news because the new template came with a new collar. That means that if a team switched to the Vapor Untouchable template, they got a new collar. We’ll go through which teams updated and which teams kept the old template as we go from team to team. As usual, if a team wasn’t mentioned, then they either didn’t make a change that was major enough. So let’s get started, then!

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Arizona Cardinals

They switched to the new template. Other than that, nothing major has changed for the Cardinals this season.

Atlanta Falcons

The Falcons were one of the few holdovers from the Reebok era, but apparently they must’ve liked what they saw with the new Nike template because they’ve finally dropped the old Reebok material in favor of the new stuff. Meanwhile, the Falcons didn’t get a chance to wear their Color Rush uniforms last year because of a Thursday Night Football color clash with Tampa Bay, but that won’t be the case this season. I’m going to assume that they’ll break them out for their December 7 TNF game against the Saints, and that may actually be a solid-looking Color Rush matchup when you take into account New Orleans and their beautiful Color Rush fauxback uniforms. So we’ll have that to look forward to in the later stages of the season.

Buffalo Bills

The Bills switched to the new template, and this might be a rare case of this turning out to be a downgrade. The template affected their collar design, and I’d say that the new truncated collar is a downgrade from the previous look. That doesn’t change the fact that the Bills have one of the best uniforms in the entire league, but it’s a small detriment to what’s an amazing uniform.

Carolina Panthers

The Panthers have made no major changes to their uniforms or logos for this season, but they did give us their uniform schedule for the year. It’s also interesting to note that the Panthers have not only refused to update to the new template, they’re still wearing the same material that they had back when Reebok was the supplier. Talk about holding on to the past!

Chicago Bears

The Bears updated to the new template, so no Flywire here. Also, we’re talking about the Bears here which means that we won’t be seeing any major changes. They did give us a uniform schedule via Twitter, and they also threw us a wrinkle in Week 1 when they went monochrome from head-to-toe. Not quite a Color Rush, but it’s close enough.

Cincinnati Bengals

The Bengals went to the new template and this resulted in a slight upgrade for their uniforms. For starters, the collar fix means that they’ve gotten rid of the “toilet seat” collars that a lot of teams inexplicably stuck with for longer than one season. The new template also had a big effect on the shoulder yoke of the away uniform. This is still a bad uniform, but there’s no denying that it’ll look slightly better with the new template. Also, they’ll be wearing a patch to commemorate their 50th season.

You can find their uniform schedule here.

Cleveland Browns

The Browns just got their new uniforms and they’re already considering a do-over as soon as they get the first chance to do so. Yikes.

Also, there’s a chance that we could go another year without seeing the Browns wear their Color Rush uniforms. Cleveland doesn’t have a Thursday Night Game on their schedule, and while the Chargers have announced that they’ll be wearing their Color Rush unis for their December 3 game against the Browns, I’d imagine that the all-brown uniforms may be enough of a clash with the all-blue Chargers uniforms to where the Browns may be forced to just wear all-white again. We’ll see what happens, but it’s looking like the Browns will continue to keep their Color Rush uniforms shuttered away.

Dallas Cowboys

The Cowboys will be wearing the new template this season, but this comes with an interesting wrinkle. Paul Lukas of Uni Watch pointed out that while the Cowboys were wearing the new templates for their white uniforms during preseason, this was not the case when they broke out the navy blue uniform. I’d imagine that they’ll have the blue uniforms in the new template once it’s time to wear them in the regular season, but we’re talking about a franchise that refuses to match the different shades of blue and silver on their white uniform, so they very well could just let this inconsistency slide.

Denver Broncos

Denver’s wearing the new template, and this means that their design has once again adapted to yet another template. This time, the stripes that come up the sides of the uniforms are a little bit thicker than they were on the previous template. Other than that, the Broncos will largely look the same.

Detroit Lions

Here’s our first major change of the 2017 season. The Lions eliminated black from their color scheme and also went to a new, brighter shade of blue. This resulted in a (somewhat) new logo and brand new uniforms as well. The uniforms themselves are pretty simple, except for the fact that they decided to throw in a wrinkle by putting “LIONS” and the William Clay Ford patch on the right and left sleeves, respectively. Other than that, I’d say that these new uniforms are an upgrade over what they had previously. Plus, moving away from black in their color scheme was definitely the right move, in my opinion.

Green Bay Packers

The Packers will wear their Color Rush uniforms again for their game on September 28 against the Bears and they’ll wear their throwbacks on November 19 against the Ravens. Other than that, there’s nothing new on the horizon for the Packers. They’re also one of the teams who continue to stick with the old template that they wore during the Reebok days. They’re not trying to mess with a good thing up there at Lambeau Field.

Houston Texans

The Texans will honor their city and surrounding community by wearing “Houston Strong” decals on their helmets for the entire season. Also, the Texans switched to the new template and this is actually good news because their super-thick collar got thinned out a little bit. Their uniform schedule (for the home games, at least) can be found here, as well.

Jacksonville Jaguars

The Jags have switched to the new template, and just like the Texans, the only major change came in the form of a tweak to their collar striping. The stripes are much thinner on this new template, and it’s a slight upgrade from what they previously had. Then again, a slight upgrade on these uniforms is akin to putting a cherry on top of a sludge sundae.

Kansas City Chiefs

They’re wearing the new template, and that’s as far as the changes go here.

Los Angeles Chargers

The old horse-shield logo that was the team’s primary mark for their only previous season in LA back in 1960 and for the first decade or so in San Diego has been revived! This was a very quiet move on the Chargers’ part — a lot quieter than how they botched the unveiling of the interlocking LA logo.

Meanwhile, here’s their home uniform schedule for this season, which includes the interesting note that they’ll be wearing their powder blue alternates when they visit the Cowboys on Thanksgiving.

Los Angeles Rams

The Rams are dead-set on eliminating gold from their visual identity and they’ve almost pulled it off. Their logo is now just completely blue-and-white, the ram horn on their helmets is now white, and their pants are either blue with a thick white stripe running down the side, or white with a thick blue stripe running down the side. The only bit of gold remaining is on the sleeves and on the outlines of the numbers. Other than that, the Rams are slowly-but-surely phasing gold out of their scheme and I’d imagine that it’ll be completely gone once they get a chance to actually touch the jerseys in a way that’s more than just moving to the new template (which they did).

Meanwhile, the Rams let their fans decide when they’ll wear their beautiful throwback uniforms, and the fans chose October 8 and December 31 as the throwback days.

Miami Dolphins

The Dolphins apparently weren’t fans of their orange Color Rush uniforms, because the team has made it known that they’re planning on wearing all-white when it’s their turn to participate in the Color Rush this season. I know I’m in the minority here, but I didn’t think that the orange Color Rush unis were all that bad.

On the other hand, I think we’re all in agreement that their throwback uniforms are gorgeous, and they’ll be wearing them for their final two home games of the year.

Minnesota Vikings

No changes other than updating their look to the new template. No need to mess with perfection!

New England Patriots

The Patriots switched to the new template, and their collar striping design underwent a change similar to what we saw with the Bills’ collars. Also, Paul Lukas of Uni Watch pointed out that the striping is inconsistent from cut-to-cut. Some jerseys have thin shoulder stripes, and others have thick shoulder stripes. It’ll be interesting to see if they tweak this as the season goes on or if they’ll wait to fix it later on.

New Orleans Saints

We were on top of their switch to the new template in the early stages of the offseason. That’s mainly because we’re all excited to see that the Saints have fixed their “toilet seat” collars and now have one of the best uniforms in the league as a result. Good job, Saints!

New York Giants

The G-Men will be sporting the new template this season. Additionally, they’ll be wearing their popular white fauxback Color Rush uniforms for a home game this season, so Giants fans will have that to look forward to. You can check out the rest of their uniform schedule here.

New York Jets

They’re going to wear the new template. Other than that, nothing major on the green side of New York.

Oakland Raiders

Another team that simply switched to the new template and left it at that.

Philadelphia Eagles

Other than switching to the new template, there’s nothing major changing in Philadelphia. However, the Eagles are still trying their best to bring back their old Kelly Green uniforms as an alternate look. The team’s owner confirmed that their tabled rule change proposal to bring back alternate helmets was part of an effort to bring back the Kelly Green look, and Jeffrey Lurie also confirmed that the Eagles will be one of multiple teams who will push to bring back alternate helmets. So, if your favorite team can wear more than one helmet in the future, you’ll have the Eagles and their love of Kelly Green to thank for that.

Pittsburgh Steelers

In honor of their late owner Dan Rooney, the team has decided to honor him by wearing a special patch for the entire 2017 season. The Steelers also appear to be one of the teams that switched to the new template.

San Francisco 49ers

When the Niners went to their current look, they had this weird situation where there were three stripes on the sleeves but one of them was truncated. Now, the 49ers have decided that there’s no need for the third stripe and will just go with two stripes on their sleeves as they move to the new template. Hooray for consistency!

Seattle Seahawks

They switched over to the new template, but the biggest change for the Seahawks is actually an addition to their logo set. The Seahawks actually pulled a fast one on a lot of us by coming out of nowhere and unveiling a new secondary logo. The timing of the unveiling was definitely interesting, but it’s here so we may as well get used to looking the bird right in its eyes.

Tampa Bay Buccaneers

The Bucs didn’t go to the new template, but they did add a new set of pants to their set. These pants are basically a white version of their pewter pants, but it’s a very good look for the Bucs and their fans seem to think so as well. It doesn’t salvage the rest of their awful uniform, but it’s a start!

Tennessee Titans

The Titans switched to the new template, and they’ll have an even bigger switch once next season rolls around as the team’s owner has confirmed that they’ll have new uniforms for the 2018 season.

Washington

The team in the nation’s capital will be wearing the new template this season. Meanwhile, Washington couldn’t wear their Color Rush uniforms last season because they weren’t on the Thursday Night Football schedule (outside of Thanksgiving), but this year is different. They’re scheduled to face the Cowboys on the November 30 edition of TNF, which means that they’ll have a chance to wear them. However, the NFL may decide that yellow-vs-white is a color clash, which could keep Washington from wearing their Color Rush uniforms for a second straight year. With that being said, it doesn’t seem like they’ll be too sad about this development.