Studs Up

I did this comic the morning before Spurs-Milan. During the match, Bale ended up coming on in the 66th minute.

Coincidence? Am I Jesus? Did Pengy have a word?

Some things better left alone…

I promised a few Arsenal fans on Twitter that I’d draw Busacca getting pooped on, and so I shall. I’ll post it to the blog in a bit when its done.

Every now and then I’ll hear from a Studs Up fan who’s taken it upon themselves to bring something from the SU universe to life in their own way. It’s probably one of the things that puts the biggest smile on my face, it’s crazy enough to think that you guys are out there enjoying the comics but even crazier to have inspired you to take matter into your own hands.

The latest game from Ben who works over at game development house Splash Damage who wrote me asking if they could use Lil Tevez’s image on a cake for an office party they were having to celebrate Manchester City’s 35th year without a trophy. I’m guessing they’re United fans.

It couldn’t have been an easier decision to say yes, especially as a big gamer myself, as long as I got some good pics. Here they are and, I never thought I’d say this, Tevez looks absolutely delicious.

As those of you following me on know, I was at the Umbro launch event for the Spring/Summer NY Cosmos line in NYC last night. It turned out to be quite the party, here’re the green-tinted quick hits.

Normally people try to be fashionably late but since an open bar and free food was promised, I decided to be the first person waiting for the doors to open. The people inside are Umbro and event employees.

I’m still outside at this point, peering creepily inside through the display windows.

“Really? I thought I was in the United States.” LOLOLOLOLZ

What’s a football event without a bunch of tiny balls? And yes, I did grab a couple. (I know what I said).

An open bar with no one at it. That is a wonderful site. That DJ was going mental for the three of us, too.

A view from the upper level showing just how early I was.

About 15 minutes later, the place packed out.

A lot of people are searching for the “Next Ronaldo” or the “Next Zidane”. But I found the “Next De Jong”.

Watch from 4:10 to 4:20 for a good sampling.

4:50 is what I imagine De Jong’s training regime is.

Or watch the whole thing if you’re a psycho (I watched the whole thing).

I reviewed some new gear from Pelé Sports last week and, as promised, the lads at PS have provided a few to giveaway to you guys as well.

There are three prizes and three ways to win and you can enter as many as you like. Winners will be announced this Friday Feb 25, 2011 so get in there quick.

Giveaway #1: Pelé Sports Hooded Sweatshirt
How to win: Simply “Like” Studs Up and/or Pelé Sports on Facebook and we’ll pick a winner at random from the fans. Obviously, liking both doubles your chances.

Giveaway #2: Pelé Sports Grandmaster Logo Tee
How to win: Simply follow me on Twitter and I’ll pick a winner at random from my followers.

Giveaway #3: Pelé Sports Side-Vent Sweatshirt
How to win: Answer a simple question using the form below:

Question: What ‘very brazilian’ move is Pelé most proud and especially connected with?

Hint: Answer can be easily found in this article: Pelé Biography

Fill in the form below with your answer:

So I’ve been working on getting back to regular M/W/F and its been easier at some times than others, I thought it best to explain why it can be troublesome and my latest, and I think best, solution.

A big part of the problem is that I’ve always worked on the comic the morning of the day its due to be posted. This was to stay as up-to-the-minute with the latest news possible just in case something crazy happens and keep things topical. The only problem is that if I can’t think of quite the right idea, or something comes up that day that blows my schedule away, then I end up missing the deadline. It can take me the entire day sometimes to get a comic concept into something good on (digital) paper, and by that time I just post it the next day and everything gets out of wack.

So I think from now on I’m going to work on the comics the day/night before to ensure timely posting every morning Mon/Wed/Fri. It may mean a slight delay on topicality if I write a comic the night before and then the following morning a football gets caught having sex with a transsexual horse, but it’ll just be addressed two days later rather than day-of. I think that’s a fair compromise.

It’s more important to be regular, for me and for you guys, and this should do the trick. Now time to eat some Pickle Onion Monster Munch.

Chris

Update: Giveaway is on Monday now instead!
Note: On Wednesday I’ll be partnering with Pelé Sports to give away each of the items from this review (new ones, not the ones I’ve had my grubby fingers all over) so make sure to fan SU on Facebook or follow me on Twitter for the announcement.

I first came across Pelé Sports a few months ago, I don’t remember exactly how but I do remember not thinking too much about it. After all, Pelé comes up pretty often these days and it wasn’t too long ago that he popped up back with the NY Cosmos so seeing the Pele name appearing on new projects or businesses isn’t particularly shocking. I assumed he had licensed out his name to pop on a couple t-shirts and be done with it.

But a few weeks ago the lads at Pelé Sports got in touch to try and explain more about what they were trying to do, and the plan was much more ambitious than my sweeping initial assumptions had led me to believe. The brand had been fleshed out both wide and deep, with three core lines Performance, Pelada (for urban football) and Pelé Story (fashion). There were t-shirts, but also sweaters, hoodies, base layers, shorts, boots, zip ups and more. More importantly, each seemed to have a fair amount of detail.

Pelé Sports is a new company, launching just before the last World Cup but clearly a lot had been invested in product development and trying to build a backstory to the brand. The former was immediately clear, the latter not quite as much. I’ll get into that more as I dig into the products themselves. After all, for all the talk of the Pele name and ambitious branding if the products weren’t any good then Pele Sports runs the risk of being resigned to the pile of licensed novelty items.

They offered some items for review, and I went with the Hooded Sweatshirt (Pelada), the Side Vent Sweatshirt, and a simple Grandmaster Logo Tee.

At a glance…

The front design was a mixture of screen printing and what appeared to be felt (the Pele logo and “Mind Over Matter” typography.

This is holding up the hood in front o a window, the material is quite thin and lightweight. Nothing wrong with that, just something to keep that in mind.

The Grandmaster Tee features a sort of gold foil finish to the design and typography.

Right out the packaging, it was obvious that time and money wasn’t just spent on broadening the product line but on the individual quality of each piece. From small details to the quality of the material, these were clearly items of a high workmanship. The material of the hoodie and sweatshirt was lightweight and thin, which is good/bad depending on where and how you plan to use them, but the material was soft and felt of a good quality.

As I mentioned, the detailing was kinda nuts. There were tags and logos everywhere which means your fondness for Pele isn’t the only part in your decision but a stylistic one as well. That’s a good thing for a new brand as they’ve set their stall out and given their products their own personality and character.

Here are some of the imagery and small detailing that cover the Pelé Sports items (and in the case of the tags, are double-sided with even more logos). Personally I’d rather have less logos from a purely aesthetic standpoint but I understand and appreciate the attempt to bring elements of Pelé to each item beyond his name. My only issue was you don’t really have any idea what they mean (other than the football which… I get.) In talking to Pelé Sports they said that each represents something from Pelé’s history but it’s not explained on the PS website or in any documentation or tags that arrived with the product. So if any of you guys are massive Pele lore buffs and can fill me in, that’d be great.

The “Side Vent Sweatshirt” was one I was particularly interested in, as I wasn’t really sure what it was about. Turns out, it’s exactly what it sounds like. Zips run up the sideseams of the sweatshirt that allow unzip to open up the top like a bib, presumably for ventilation and ease of removal.

An interesting touch you don’t see too often. Doubt I’ll wear it out, but  I’ll definitely give this a whirl as a training top for my next Sunday League match.

Overall, it’s a good start for Pele Sports. The level of quality and design was surprising as far as a licensed product and I’ll be especially curious to try out the boots when they’re available as there’s apparently a significant tech play being made. The brand story appears to dig deep into Pele lore but they probably need to do a better job of communicating that beyond seemingly abstract logos. I’m a sucker for a good product or brand story but right now if I wore my Pele gear out and someone asked me what the plethora of icons meant, I’d love to tell them but I simply don’t know.

But that can be worked on. The product is the foundation and the quality, workmanship and attention to detail can’t be argued with. I’m excited to see what else is to come as the brand gets its legs.

The Twitter chatter with you guys seems to get better and better every week, so if you guys want to get involved make sure you follow me @christoy and I’d love to hear from you!

That was a hell of weekend, I don’t remember doing anything other than consuming sport. First watching hours of an epic Premier League weekend, catching some of Messi and Ronaldo competing in the Amazing Goal Race over in La Liga and then powering through about 12 hours of Superbowl pre and post game shenanigans. Being on Twitter the entire time showcased it less as a vehicle to communicate with others than a collective hive-mind of sarcastic comments. From Arsenal’s epic capitulation to the Black Eyed Peas “epic, um, performance(?) at the SB halftime, it was jokes jokes and more jokes and you guys were cracking me up.

The best part of it all may be that the international break has been limited to midweek, with full slate of games resuming on the weekend and maintaining the momentum. That feels a hell of a more logical, although I suppose only if the game is relatively close to England.

It is heartening to see Liverpool getting back to form. Rafa provided endless entertainment, Roy provided a sympathetic loser, but having Kenny Dalglish at the helm and now doing well seems appropriate. LFC is a club that, like many, believes its history makes it special but, unlike many, they’re actually right. There does feel like a disconnect has been righted in how the club was spoke of and how it was run, not to mention the fact that the fans, on whom Liverpool’s aura is built, were the ones calling for him all along.

If Dalglish can somehow turn Liverpool back into title contenders before Ferguson retires, it’ll really feel like a throwback with two British managers leading the two most storied English clubs to glory. Foreign players and managers have only been good for the Premier League but an old school battle of old school managers at old school clubs would be a welcome alternative to Chelsea and City owners competing to see who can care less about how much they spend from their personal fortunes.

Also, wtf is up with Torres? He’s looked this disinterested for the better part of a year now and that includes playing for Spain at the World Cup. I mean if you’re a striker and don’t fancy the quality of your teammates providing service to you at your club, fine, but if you’re playing in front of Xavi and Iniesta then I gotta say you literally have no excuse for scoring at least a hattrick every other game.

Oh and I know comic timing has been spotty again lately, just a lot going on behind the scenes that I can’t wait to share with you guys when its ready! But as always, will be endeavouring to do better and get back to M/W/F on schedule. It’s important to me to be regular so you guys don’t come to the site and be disappointed, so I’m on it.