Texans uniforms made it hard for Mike Tirico to ID players

For Week 10’s Sunday Night Football game against the Detroit Lions, the Houston Texans went with all red uniforms, while the names and numbers were dark blue.

That particular combo made things a little tough for Mike Tirico, calling the game on NBC.

Late in the first half, upon realizing that he had credited a catch made by Houston’s John Metchie III, Tirico explained the issue.

“So that’s Metchie on back-to-back catches. From where we are in the press box, with these uniforms, we’ve had a terrible time this first half here,” Tirico said, with his explanation drawing a chuckle from Cris Collinsworth.

Tirico then explained other methods of identifying players that he, Collinsworth, and their spotters tried.

“We’ve been trying to guess at some of the numbers and look at body types here. Apologies to Metchie for cheating him on the first catch.”

This isn’t a comment on how good the uniforms look. Tastes are subjective, after all.

What’s not subjective is that when the team wearing dark colors has names and numbers that are anything other than white (or maybe a light gray), it can be awfully hard to track who’s who. Anyone who’s ever had that experience while trying to call, chart, or spot a high school football game — where there are few (if any) cameras and replays — can certainly relate to Tirico here.