Jersey? Sure.

I initially thought the photos in this post were of the new kits. It turns out they're the training tops and the jerseys will be revealed later. This post has been updated to correct that.

The ancient Greeks didn't always compete naked. (Wait, come back, It's a soccer blog, I promise.) I mean, eventually they did and if your understanding of the ancient Greeks is they were the birthplace of the Olympics and democracy and that's about it, then you probably remember learning the competed naked in the Olympics to honor Zeus. 

The Olympic games didn't start out this way. In fact, during the first 50 years, the athletes wore tunics or loincloths or something to cover themselves. They would wear the colors or symbols of their city-state as they represented their locales in the competition. Essentially, these were the first athletes to wear team jerseys to signify to others who the represented as they wrestled or ran or threw the discus of whatever else they did.

It took a while for jerseys to come back after they disappeared. That's not to say competitors always competed in the nude. But eventually games would be played by people wearing their everyday clothes. Not exactly conducive to peak athletic performance. 

It wouldn't be until 1849 when the New York Knickerbockers baseball team all graced the field wearing "long blue woolen shirt with white trousers and a straw hat" that an athletic team would wear uniforms again. Even then, it didn't catch on for another 20ish years until the formation of the National League in 1876 that it became standardized. 

Let's skip ahead 175 years from the Knickerbockers to the next most important jersey news in the history of sports uniforms. Tormenta announced they've partnered with Puma after having been with Adidas for years and unveiled new training tops as seen modeled by Pedro Fonseca above. 

The new uniforms will be unveiled at a later date. 

I should pause here to say that I'm not a kit guy. The fact I opened a blog about Tormenta's new jerseys by talking about the ancient Greeks was probably your first clue. I know there are people who obsess over details of uniforms. There's an entire website dedicated to the smallest changes in uniforms. It's a big thing to a lot of people and if that's what you're excited about, then I want to hear it. I like talking to people about what they are passionate about. 

For me, I have one big request for jerseys. I just want to be able to read the numbers. Part of that is a professional need. When I'm covering games, I want to be able to tell who did what and the easiest way to do that is to read the numbers. There's a nearby high school who has white jerseys with light yellow numbers. I hate having to cover their games. I can't read the numbers from the press box. And it's not just because I'm getting old. No one up there can do it. 

But I digress. Back to Tormenta. They've got new uniforms and a new partnership with Puma. The images they've posted, look great. We're still waiting on the official match jerseys, but again, all I want is readable numbers. If the players and fans like whatever they look like, all the better. 

One time during a Twitter Q&A I was doing to kill time during a weather delay, someone asked me what my favorite Tormenta jersey was. At the time I said any one with a star on it would be my favorite, which was a polite way to get out of actually answering the question. But I stand by my non-answer. 

Will they better than the last year's jerseys? Maybe. I don't know. I'm not really the person to ask. They'll different and I'll grow to appreciate them like I do every year. If Tormenta goes with no jerseys and just paints numbers on the players next year, please know it wasn't my fault.