After last year’s embarrassing Jets-Bills Color Rush game that made it impossible for the color blind to enjoy the action, the NFL promised to factor the reality that some people can’t distinguish certain colors before ditching the standard one-team-wears-solid-one-team-wears-white approach to most sports.
“We did test the jerseys this summer on field and on television,” the NFL said last year after the first Jets-Bills Color Rush contest. “The standard television test did not account for color blindness for fans at home that became apparent last night. We will enhance our testing to include a color blindness analysis to better address this issue in the future.”
This year, the Jets and Bills will play in the first Color Rush game. And even though the official, once-per-year Color Rush uniforms are, once again, all red for the Bills and all green for the Jets, Color Blind Bowl II won’t be happening. The Jets will be wearing white.
“We have taken steps this season to ensure that all uniform combinations will be clearly distinguishable for all fans,” NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy told PFT by email. “We engaged color-blindness experts at Mt. Sinai Hospital and panel-tested possible match-ups.”
It’s a smart move from the NFL, but it’s still a confusing situation. Why not make the Jets’ Color Rush uniform all white in the first place? Chances are it has something to do with giving the fans something to devote their greenbacks to, other than the team’s standard white road jerseys.