One team in red and the other in green — that did not work.
If you follow the NFL, you might remember the Bills-Jets game last year that was a complete disaster for people who are colorblind.
The problem in that November 2015 game was the league’s new Color Rush uniforms, which had the Jets in all-green and the Bills in all-red. The issue being that, according to the National Eye Institute, nearly 10 million Americans have red-green colorblindness.
One journalist even said watching the game was “torture” for those who have the condition (see tweet below).
Fortunately, the NFL is this year taking steps to make sure everyone has a good view of the action on the field.
Whenever the color schemes have the potential to cause problems for people with colorblindness, one team will wear white, according to ESPN. One team will also wear white whenever their color uniforms are too similar to each other.
Traditionally, NFL games are played with one team in its color uniforms and the other team in white. Color Rush puts both teams in colors for Thursday Night Football, though not all teams are participating in the program.
CBS Sports reports that for tonight’s matchup between the Cardinals and the 49ers, the Cardinals will wear their traditional white uniforms. Otherwise the two teams’ black uniforms would be too hard for anyone to distinguish.
To solve the issues for colorblind people, Nike “brought in doctors from Mt. Sinai Hospital in New York to review which Color Rush matchups would be problematic for people with colorblindness,” according to ESPN.
Last year, the American Optometric Association published comments from optometrist Karl Citek explaining how difficult the Jets-Bills game was to see for people with colorblindness.
“To top it all off, the green of the jerseys of one team was even similar in appearance to the color of the field,” said Citek, a professor at the Pacific University College of Optometry. “For someone with normal color vision, imagine seeing the game in black-and-white; all the jerseys and the field would be similar shades of gray.”
Read more at ESPN
Read more at CBS Sports
Read more at American Optometric Association
The NFL’s Color Rush program with Nike puts both teams in colors for Thursday Night Football.