The death of knickers (I hope)
 

Uni Watch Another Nail in the Knickers’ Coffin?

This should eliminate the argument that black pants are inappropriate for warmer nights. Hopefully this trickles down to the HS level (here in WI) in a couple of years and I can throw out the knickers for good. We only wore them for 4 of our varsity games last year -- we wore shorts or black pants for all of our subvarsity games.

The white hat on my crew hates the black pants with a passion and wouldn't let us wear them at all last year. :(

I was going to buy another pair of knickers this season but I think I'll wait now. I'm hoping this change is adopted sooner rather than later here in this state.

I look forward to the day when I can tell the rookie officials "When I started, we wore knickers and striped socks." :D

Really? I'm the WH on my crew and could never imagine acting as that much of a dictator in areas such as this. Matter of fact, the crew votes on what we wear every Friday night and I am merely the tiebreaker.

Our WH is not our crew chief and does not have that power either. We wear these pants all the time when we can. I hate white knickers as they are hard to keep clean and look silly in my opinion.

Peace

In reality, most WHs are the crew chiefs, I would guess. I know the occasional crew up here where another member is the listed crew chief, but I'm guessing it's less than 1-in-10.

I could try to be a dictator in this area, but what's the point? I try to assert what limited authority I have over areas that really matter.

Besides, my crew all loves the black pants, so we never really argue over this one thing anyway.

Of course most are. That goes without saying. Funny I have never been on an actual crew where the WH is crew chief at the high school level. And even my current crew chief does not act like he is in charge. He only makes decisions when we cannot seriously agree and someone has to decide. But he gets out voted by many all the time (we joke about it) with uniform changes or when we wear them. Other than that this is a partnership and we all look at it that way. He just takes care of most of our administrative issues and we try to work together on everything else.

Peace

Of course. If a CC acts like a dictator in our areas (where the crew self-forms) people would just join another crew. My crew has had the same five guys now for 6 straight years.

Week 1 this year will be the first time I will miss a game (I'm working a baseball tournament in Maine). Someone else will wear the white hat and life will go on.

Hochuli looks like he's tapered his pant cuffs a bit. He's allegedly always had his shirts tailored for the "gun show" but he might be tailoring the pants also.

Actually tapered cuffs make a lot of sense. Elastic bottoms (sweat pants) would also help putting one's heel through the bottom of the pants that ride down from all the running.

Why? All you need to do is properly hem the pants and it is no different than basketball pants. Not much to be concerned with if you ask me.

Peace

Our assn assigns crews for the season. Yet we are small enough that everyone knows the quirks of each of the WHs. We have one that refuses to wear jackets (long sleeves are ok). We have one that refuses to wear shorts. And we have some as others describe (whatever the guys want--and everyone owns--we are good). But in all case, the WH has the ultimate say.

In reality, what people wear comes down to what the assn mandates. And the assn only mandates nickers, short sleeves, and long sleeves (along with socks, shoes, hats etc). Heck, we don't even have blue bean bags, despite all the snow, since the board (state and local) can't agree on that. (And we all know that blue bean bags are only a problem in Boise, so I don't know why there is such opposition.)

We do need a lighter weight version of the pants. I'm not one to buy into the myth that dark colors are automatically hotter than lighter ones (dark colors absorb more LIGHT, not necessarily more HEAT; the material makes 99% of the difference), however the thick material Honigs black pants that I have would be pretty hot in August -- at least hotter than similar pants with a lighter weight material. Lighter weight white knickers usually meant the black stripes of the shirt showed, but with black pants, that's no longer a problem.

I HATE knickers. I don't think they look bad per se, but I hate wearing them. I also think this would steer most of us in the south toward shorts in early season subvarsity games.

Honigs already has the 2" shirts on their site, and you can have the shirt made with a letter already on the back -- no placard, its part of the shirt. How long before 2" comes to HS?

Word on the street is that the Gerry Davis and Cliff Keen black pants are a lighter material than the Honigs. I wouldn't be surprised if Honigs is also developing a lighter weight version.

Aggie, how long before you think TASO will adopt the 2" stripes and black pants?

I'm a benevolent dictator. I give them a vote and then overrule them accordingly!

Seriously, I do get input, but my guys expect me to lead, and I do just that. I have the reputation of going short sleeve on any game not played at the North Pole or in weather warmer than 0 deg. F! Sort of a long running joke, though not entirely undeserved.

Funny because I sent my chapter's VP this question just tonight. My guess is that next year, we'll be able to wear the pants whenever we want. Officially, we can wear them with long sleeves, but I think that will change. It won't be a mandate, but an option. As far as the 2", maybe 2 years. They look MUCH better with the black pants.

The other thing is that the pants will make the shorts a little more acceptable for subvarsity wear. The real problem with the shorts isn't because shorts look bad, but because too many guys wear the overfitted basketball shorts. If we can get them semi-uniform, you might even see them on Friday nights in early season.

The Davis pants are considerably lighter. I could wear those in any weather -- they are truly like baseball or basketball pants.

Personally, I prefer them in cold weather, too. I'd rather put cold gear on under the pants then have the pants themselves be hot.

You guys in Texas might since you use NCAA rules but I've heard one of the things in the movement is to differentiate each level- the NFL has their thing (Can't wait to see what Nike designs them in 2012), college will migrate to the 2" stripe (Honig's has to get rid of all that backstock somehow) and us peons down at the HS level will keep what we have- 1".

I imagine college will also have a pant stripe somewhere between what the NFL has (4") and HS.

Can't remember where I heard or read all this but it was sometime last fall or late summer.

The Honigs pants are not any more heavy than the pants you wear during the baseball season and we certainly umpire is hotter weather at times than we ever will in most football games in this part of the country. Maybe the first week on an afternoon, but I do not work many football games in near 100 degree weather. That being said this is a college issue right now. I am not sure the high school associations are just going to drop knickers right now.

Peace

I've long been impressed by the fashion industry and their ability to generate continual revenue by simply declaring that something "different" was better than what everyone already had. Not selling enough skirts, raise (or lower) the hem line several inches and tell everyone who has a closet full of the old hem line, that anything NOT with the new hem line is "out of style".

It's always worked with women, and has been successful with young males, who spend more on cologne, bath wash, hair gel in a month than their fathers did in a decade. I can remember when a pair of canvass Keds enabled people to play basketball, jog, walk, climb, play and be comfortable all in the same pair of sneakers.

Soon we'll be able to replace all our white knickers with black pants with white stripes. Of course changing the width of the stripes will enable the fashion gurus to dictate changing everyone's inventory periodically. For a while we'll have different fabrics for different weather conditions, until eventually the idea of winter undergarments comes full circle. Strange that these new miracle fibers (stain resistant, water proof, wind resistance, etc.) only presently come in black?

Maybe some day they figure out how to make them in white, and maybe even different shapes, like knickers (to more clearly differentiate officials from the other people on the playing field). These fashion people may be a lot of things, but they absolutely aren't dumb. I guess the marketplace has changed, used to be officials didn't spend a lot of time worrying about how fashionable they might have looked. I wonder if anybody, other than other officials, pays any attention to the width of the stripes or the color of the pants (or knickers). No matter, other officials are the only ones the fashion industry has to convince.

I agree, but this will travel downhill in the next few years. We're already barely wearing the knickers now. We've gone to shorts for subvarsity games in warm weather and I'm contemplating wearing them for varsity games as it's allowed here.

Oh please, lets not go back to black shorts. I do like the black pants and my R and I agreed that we were going to wear them all year next year irregardless of any decisions. But please no shorts.

My crewmates refused to wear white shorts, but they've embraced black ones. Go figure.

I thought white shorts were lacrosse. Isn't football all black shorts -- where they are worn?

Ohio switched to black shorts optional just last season. 2011 will have black shorts only, and (still) only for subvarsity.

It's regional. When I lived in the south, it was black. Here, it was white. Last year the rule interpreters said black was OK and then the state office came around a month later with a bulletin that said THEY'D never said that. When I emailed the interpreter about this, he never returned my email. Since we spent money on the black shorts on the word of a rep of the state, we continued wearing them, as did everyone else I know.

We switched to black this past season. I had always advocated black, until I saw a color game photo of myself. I failed to realize just how ghostly pale I was/am. :eek:

I wear shorts when working outside and had been to the beach with my child a couple of weeks prior to the season starting so its not like I wasn't getting any sun.

We've gone with black shorts, black ankle socks, and of course, black shoes. Maybe white socks would have helped in the transition :confused:

While we're on shorts, shorts are passe' in softball so the age old coaches shorts we all know are dead. The only brands I can find online now are Honig's and another brand carried by some official suppliers called Teamwork. Both are cut pretty tight across the seat and seem rather cheap.

Any ideas?

In South Dakota, they have mandated the black pants for inclimate weather only. We had some crews who were wearing them for all games, and the SDHSAA came out and said that if this continued that we would no longer be able to wear the black pants at all. I'm hoping this changes as our crew loves the black pants. As far as the shorts go, they would come in handy to clean up any beer spills on the trip home from the game. Other than that, they'd be pretty much useless.

As far as the white hat being the crew chief, I'll say this. Anyone who attempts to sit in the front seat other than me when riding to or from the game is in BIG trouble !!! :D :D :D

As Rich said, it is regional. In my old association in California, we wore white shorts. Here we wear black.

Agreed. layering is best. The Smitty slacks we purchased are no heavier than the Honigs basketball slacks I were.

No. In NC, we have the option of black or white shorts in subvarsity. In fact, black shorts were only allowed as an option two years ago.

I bought a new pair of knickers this past season and never even took them out of the plastic. Guess I will need to wear them for the 2011 season, otherwise they could end up being a waste.

They'll have to tear my knickers from my cold dead body.......A thought that puts a smile on alot of local head coaches!

I rather weark knickers than wearing white shorts.

Wait...wait...I have the answer...black knickers!!! :)

You mean these? :eek:

http://www.theofficialschoice.com/im...etail/OF19.jpg