Uniform Issues
 

1) Team A is wearing uniforms with the letters "A M D G" about 1" tall right underneath the neckline on the back of the jersey (the letters are some acronym for the latin motto of the school or something). Legal?

2) Team B is wearing brown jerseys with a yellow shoulder area (from the base of the neckline in the front, around to the corresponding area in the back. The numbers on the back of the jersey are centered vertically within the brown "torso" of the jersey, but as a result, are lower-than-centered when considering the entire back of the uniform. Does the requirement for centered numbers refer to the entire back of the jersey, or just the torso? (iow, are these jerseys legal?)

1...I think the rule here is ambiguous. It seems to imply that the lettering is only for team names/abbreviations or player names. AMGD appears to be something else and likely not legal with respect to that part of the rule. But then, ART 1 indicates that there are NO design restrictions in the neckline area. Does "design" include lettering or just patterning/coloring? But are letters just patterns? It seems to be illegal to me.

2...the rule says the number must be centered with respect to the part of the jersey intended to be visible (ignoring the part that is expected to be tucked in). I don't think there is any way you could interpret that to mean that the upper area is excluded. So, by rule, the jersey you describe is not legal....the numbers are not centered on the visible part of the back.

Would I ever notice such a jersey? Probably not if you hadn't mentioned it.

AMDG is the abbreviation for the Latin of the Jesuit motto--For the Greater Glory of God." I've seen some iteration on several Jesuit school teams uniforms or warm-ups. Some prior years my son's school had it down the side of the uniform shorts. And now I wonder if they don't any more because of the uniform rules.

The NFHS pre-season PowerPoint makes it pretty clear that the lettering is only for team names or player names. There's a slide that shows a player with his/her initials in the shoulder panel and states that it's illegal. Why? I have no idea. It's perfectly fine to have a memorial patch there with initials. But I'm pretty confident that the lettering in Rich's question is illegal.

(How do I insert the Powerpoint slide into this message???)