DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Pure Football Forum Browns want players to earn their helmet stripes

Yet I don't believe that will work. The NFL has strict uniform guidelines. As I mentioned earlier in this thread, NFL players have gotten fined for even wearing different socks. Now this may work to achieve certain goals in training camp, but when NFL players take the field, the uniforms must be the same.

That would include pre-season. So every player would have to wear stripes on their helmets during pre-season which is long before the roster is cut down to 53 players.

Ehhh... when you put it like that, how can one not agree? Point made and accepted

That is why I think it a rinky dink move.

Except a employee of the month singles out one person. Nobody gets their stripes until they make the final roster.


I don't see it as a motivational tool at all. Not getting fired is the motivation for the players.

Lol, I'd hate to be your employee! :-P Just jokin' around.

Positive reinforcement has it's place in management.

Why yell at 52 players, when you can just give 1 a compliment?

While I agree, once 20 or so guys get their stripes it probably won't matter, but the first bunch? If it were me it would mean a lot.

Like, you expect all the stars of the team to get them, like Garrett, Gordan, etc.

Now I'm Howard Wilson, I put together a great day at camp, and I'm the 15th guy to get my stripe. I feel really good walking out on the field at practice that day.

I highly doubt it makes the difference between someone making the team or not, BUT WHY NOT make them feel good when they do something?

They are NFL players, but they are also 20-27 year old humans.

Meh. I was a jocks jock til I couldn't anymore. Martial arts, Football, Basketball, and Track.

For me it was only, and only about being better than the other guy/team.

Beating the guys that where the best before me, made me want to beat them even more.

Even when I was fighting for money (rough house boxing). I would have done it for free.

So "pride" being key here I think. I would have killed myself trying to earn that stripe.

Then wore as a badge of honor...at least for me that how I attacked sports.

We don't disagree on all of that stuff. I am just saying this is rinky dink.

Nobody is actually earning anything here. It's not like some guys have no stripes, some have only a white stripe while others have one or two brown stripes.

That could be motivational if you had a guy running around missing one of the Brown stripes.

If I am not mistaken, I do believe that the earning of stripes to be on the practice helmets.

although would be darn funny if this happened

announcer "Well there is Duke and Hyde in the backfield. Duke has both stripes and Hyde said before the game that he is doing everything he can to earn that second stripe."

I would die laughing

Eo, nobody earns their stripes until they make the team, so no, Ward hasn't earned his stripes.


That is the point. It's pretty meaningless.

I think this could gain some degree of meaning IF the guys who everyone knows will make the team, practice with the stripes on their helmets. Call it like it is...might be refreshing and separates from college.

OR if you want it to be like college, apply small parts of the stripe for attaboys in TC...which I would hate.

It's a time-filler and this year's mantra of sorts...for me, it's essentially nothing.

I agree.

It's not a bad thing. It won't have a negative impact. I just think it foolish to tell a guy like Bitonio or Garrett they have to earn their stripes.

I think they already know that.

The way I understand it, Joe Thomas or Jim Brown wouldn't have their stripes until they made the team.

At this point it is just a bunch of pumpkin heads running around.

I don't really think the helmet stripe is going to motivate anybody but I don't really think it's harmful either. Maybe they will give players something to work towards together and help build the team little bit. It does on paper at least show that everybody starting out equally.

It won't hurt anything.

We will probably get tired of hearing people talk about earning their stripes by the end of Hard Knocks.

A large part of our team was in college a year or 2 ago. They are probably still used to this kind of thing. Taylor, Hyde, Fells ... these guys have been around for a while. They are probably amused by it, but I bet it is, at least, a little bit of motivation to the younger guys who had to earn buckeyes, bones, paw prints, and so forth.

And it's kind of odd that we hadn't heard of any such gimmicks until Hard Knocks came to town. I'm not a fan of it.

yeah, how many times will the phrase "earned his stripes" be muttered on Hard Knocks? Over/Under 10

Maybe it'll end up being a drinking game like:

The Austin 'Throw the Hammer Down/Deep in the Q" Carr Drinking Game

or

"Have a Drink on Me/ AC/DC" drinking game.

or

"Drink Anytime That Kid From Dazed and Confused Touches His nose" drinking game

Taking Hard Knocks to a whole new level this summer!

last year we drank every time Kizer turned it over ... and you had to take 2 shots every time he did so in the Red Zone

hammered by half

I could get drunk off the cheapest beer following those rules hahaha..