The day of reckoning we have all been waiting for since last September is now less than two months away.
Of course, I’m talking about July 1, 2026 – the day when all Penn State athletic team’s uniforms will showcase an Adidas logo. Penn State jerseys, hats, shorts, pants, shirts and equipment will henceforth be adorned with a three-stripe triangle logo rather than a swoosh.
And this change affects us fans as well. For more than three decades, I, like millions of Penn State fans everywhere, have been buying Penn State clothing emblazoned with the Nike swoosh. Sure, I’ve saved money by purchasing Penn State licensed clothing made by other manufacturers, but I enjoyed wearing Nike quality as well.
Heck, you might have even felt that you were wearing the exact same clothing the student-athletes or coaches were wearing. Even though all the Happy Valley locals know the best way to get your hands on that “gear” is to stop in Plato’s Closet regularly – especially when the transfer portal window opens up or a coaching change occurs.
As the parent of a student-athlete who played on a Nike-sponsored football team, I’ve been the recipient of many “official” hand-me-down shirts, shorts, sweatshirts and other swoosh-labeled clothing.
And, I’ll be a bit of a prima donna here and say that in my opinion the clothing that Nike sells to the general public isn’t quite the same. Of course, maybe it’s just my imagination – or conceit! – but that’s how they feel to me. Although, I do have two store-bought Nike brand “On Field” polo shirts that I’ve grown to like even more than the official gear I’ve inherited.
But one critical equipment component for the Penn State football team will not change. The manufacturer who makes Nike footballs – Big Game Sports in Dallas, TX – is the same manufacturer who makes Adidas footballs.
Now, according to my son, who as a punter had a very vested interest in how the balls performed, Big Game makes two footballs for each company. For Nike they make the “Vapor Elite” and “Vapor One”. For Adidas they make the “Dime” and the “Rifle.” According to him, the Dime and Vapor Elite were the same football, and the Rifle and Vapor One were also the same.
The Dime and Vapor Elite were his favorites because they had a more elongated shape with a bigger sweet spot so they were a lot easier to hit for great punts, whereas the Rifle and Vapor One were not very good because they were fatter and had a small sweet spot. Most punters he knew felt the same. However, it seemed to him most quarterbacks preferred the Rifle and Vapor One because they were easier to grip since they were a small fraction wider.
In any case, the switch to adidas footballs should be seamless for the Penn State football players because whichever Nike ball they liked, there is apparently an exact Adidas replacement.
Now, on a personal level, the switch to Adidas is a step back in time for me as far as the footwear is concerned. As a kid and a young adult I mostly wore Adidas sneakers. The first real dedicated running shoe I ever saw was the blue Adidas SL 72 – an odd combination, for that time, of colors that had a very distinctive look. Most sneakers back then were white.
I played tennis in Adidas shoes as well. Although dragging my right toe when I served meant I spent a few dollars on “shoe goo” to keep the front of my right sneaker from wearing out prematurely.
And playing basketball in a pair of Adidas Superstars was the height of quality – no more canvas Chuck Taylors! The Superstar, with its stylized rubber over the toebox, was such a great style that my wife and I started outfitting our daughter in them as soon as she was able to walk. Always white ones with red stripes to match her red hair.
In any case, in less than two months this massive brand revolution will be the new world order for Penn State athletics and all us Penn State fans.
So, with that in mind, and in light of this seismic change, I have one request of Penn State athletics that is extremely small in comparison. A change so slight I doubt that anyone will even notice.
For all the bottled water, soda, sports drink, etc. that Penn State sells at sporting events, only get plastic bottles from Pepsi that have tethered caps. Why? Because, at football games at least, the concession stand workers are required to remove and keep the caps when they sell you a bottle.
The first time this happened to me the concession stand worker apologized for having to do it because I was buying three water bottles and a chicken basket. Normally I would have stuck two bottles in my coat pockets, but now was forced to carry all three and the food. Sure enough, I dropped a bottle on the way back to my seat and by the time I was able to pick it up, half of the water was gone.
Not to mention, I, like most fans in the stadium put my water bottle under my seat when not holding it. Who knows what kind of gunk gets on the lip of the bottle, or in the bottle, while it sits under my seat. And, the bottles occasionally tip over and spill even there.
Apparently the reason for removing the caps is because some folks like to throw the caps. But if the caps are tethered to the bottles, the caps are almost impossible to rip off and subsequently throw. Just ask anyone in Europe.
All over Europe plastic bottles have caps tethered to them. And as the Europeans have found out, the tethers are darn difficult to break!
Now, the Europeans mandated that all plastic drink bottles up to three litres must have tethered caps as an environmental issue, not a projectile issue. It’s part of a directive to reduce single-use plastic waste. But either way, it solves an issue we have here in the Happy Valley.
And since the athletic department is making this major switch of its sponsorship allegiance from a company headquartered in Oregon to a company headquartered in Germany, maybe this is a great time to adopt another bit of European sensibility, and have tethered caps at all Penn State sporting events. I know it will keep me from wasting water!
