The buzz around the University of Miami’s new football uniforms has reached a crescendo, with both top commits tweeting about them and the first purported images of the duds leaking on to the internet. Now one major recruit is calling the Hurricanes’ football program, “the new Oregon.” The reference is a clear nod to the school’s forthcoming uniforms, with as many as six fully-formed uniforms leaking out on to the internet on Wednesday. And that’s six variations before the team mixes and matches from the different sets.
Here’s the Oregon-referencing tweet, from rising junior Tyler Dunning, already a linebacker commit for the Class of 2017:
A couple of quick observations about Dunning’s claim:
1) In a sartorial sense, he’s probably right. Miami’s uniform variety may have been as close to Oregon’s as any other program in the country when the Hurricanes were still with Nike. Now adidas is simply upping that ante, perhaps inspired partly by their college portfolio’s recent loss of Notre Dame (2014) and Tennessee (2015).
2) Focusing on the similarities between Oregon and Miami’s uniforms misses the much larger point: Oregon’s uniform variety is notable because the Ducks us it as a clever recruiting ploy. The message is simple: Come to Oregon and you’ll enjoy the best facilities and the brightest unis. If that’s not your style, Oregon’s not your school, and it should be your type of school because it’s a school that wins on its own terms.
Miami is different because it can’t currently boast the same legacy of winning that Oregon can. Yes, it has flashy uniforms, but its facilities are far from Oregon’s caliber and its product on the field pales in comparison, too. That’s not to say Miami won’t get there, and soon, but as currently constituted, the Hurricanes are about as close to the Ducks as the Cleveland Browns are to the Super Bowl; it could happen, but it would be a heck of an upset.
So, is Miami, “the new Oregon”? Perhaps, though no one should mistake the program’s swag as a primary reason for Miami’s future success.