Because we can't.
Jaguars Nation, know that none of the following comes from a place of disrespect. At least not intentionally.
I understand your beloved team has a rich tradition of eight playoff wins in three decades. No one could argue with those two whole times you backed your way into AFC South titles, famously the NFL’s most “challenging” division. Mark Brunell? A quarterback icon, someone who looks exactly like the generic protagonist from a movie that also stars Al Pacino or Gene Hackman. And who couldn’t love John Henderson, the guy who asked to receive multiple vicious slaps to the face on camera?
The Jaguars’ unforgettable place in NFL history is forever sewn into the league’s stitching.
READ MORE: Ranking the NFL’s new uniforms in 2024, including the Vikings’ Winter Warriors
With all of that in mind: Why on Earth did Jacksonville unveil (supposedly new?) 2024 “Prowler” throwback uniforms that sure don’t look any negligibly different from their current threads? Don’t the Jaguars want to properly celebrate the legendary David Garrard? Harumph!
When the Jaguars first teased these throwbacks, I got so excited. I thought we’d be harkening back to the halcyon days of the mid-1990s in glorious fashion. One of my colleagues here at For The Win echoed these sentiments, claiming he used to wear their hats all the time as a wee lad. In spirit, I felt the same, my friends. The mighty Jaguar roars inside all of our hearts. We should cherish that. I also half expected them to make some kind of reference to the Sega Genesis and the hit show Friends in the announcement — two things everyone knows are synonymous with the Jacksonville Jaguars.
Yet, when I look at the final throwback product, I’m … not entirely certain what’s different about these throwbacks compared to the Jaguars’ regular uniforms.
Maybe I’m not the target audience for this — an outsider could never understand Duval county’s passionate, ravenous obsession with its franchise — but it sure seems like what’s different about Jacksonville’s old-school uniforms should’ve been made much more obvious to casual observers.
In my attempt to extend an olive branch, here is a short list of things I think are different about the Jaguars’ new throwbacks compared to their current ones. Note that I did not read any formal press releases before doing this because that would defeat the purpose of the exercise, and everyone loathes that one guy who looks things up on his phone.
Before you read the below, I urge you to first play a little game of: “Can you spot the difference” yourself, and let’s see where our answers match up. How fun!
