I’m a huge Celtics fan, so I realize that some of this opinion might be tinged with bias, but I think the Philadelphia 76ers uniforms couldn’t be stupider.
They have three variations of the uniform, but all are dumb.
Their away uniform features the word “Phila” on the front because “Philadelphia” could presumably not fit.
But Phila? No one refers to that city as Phila. It’s not even a reasonable abbreviation of the word.
The Atlanta Falcons have “ATL” on their football jerseys, which I also find silly, but at least “ATL” is a possible abbreviation of the city’s name. It’s just three capital letters across the chest — small, clear, and bold.
Phila is just 41% of the actual word. It almost looks as if the word might wrap aound the back.
Just saying the word “Phila” out loud makes me feel dumb.
The home uniform is even more ridiculous. The team’s name is the 76ers, which is a dumb name. It was chosen by fan vote in 1963 and was meant to honor the 1776 birth of our nation, which took place in Philadelphia, but naming your team after 50% of a year — or any year — is also dumb.
Even worse, their home uniform identifies them as the Sixers, which is just 46% of their name, but it’s also how many people refer to the team since “76ers” — their actual name — sounds dumb.
But the team could easily fit their proper name — 76ers — on the jersey, but they know that their team name actually looks ridiculous, so they instead switch from numbers to letters and only include the back half of the name.
In summary:
The front half of the word “Philadelphia” when the team is away.
The back half of the word “Seventy-Sixers” when the team is playing at home.
This is a dumb name that causes dumb problems, which are being solved in a dumb way.
Then again, I’m a Celtics fan, so maybe I’m seeing all of this through green-tinted glasses.
But I don’t think well.
