Packers 2018 NFL Draft Hat: Love it or Shove it?

The NFL Draft places hundreds of college football players into one of thirty-two NFL cities. For a select few who will attend the draft in person, the hat they place on their head while walking out on stage is the hat they’re wearing in their first photo as a member of a team.

Sometimes, these hats are well-liked. This year’s hats are polarizing, featuring a catchphrase stitched into each team’s hat. Jon and Gary discuss their thoughts on the hat below.

Gary: I heard this week’s episode of Blue 58, and one thing was very clear. You don’t like this year’s NFL Draft hat for the Packers.

Jon: I do not. It is bad. Hats with words on them are bad. They’re like the not-too-distant cousin of those sarcastic and never funny t-shirts with words on them.

Gary: I hear you. I’m more on board with this year’s hat than I am of years past. Just look at some of these atrocities:

Gary: Compared to some of the other NFL teams, the Packers’ “Go Pack Go” is a good entry. It’s not as bad as the Patriots’ “Do your job” hat. I like the contrast against the gray top, but I don’t think they’re as hackneyed as you think they are.

Jon: I think my issues with this particular hat are as much systemic as they are a reaction to a bad design.

You’re right, the gray and green does look sharp together, and in the right context, words on a hat might not be too bad. I knew a Michigan fan once who had a maize and blue hat that just said “The Big House” on it. It was pretty cool. The problem with these, though, is something common to all draft hats: they’re defining themselves too much as being part of the draft.

Trying hard to be a part of something is almost always a recipe for a disaster. They should have just tried to make a cool hat instead of doing something special for the draft. The sideline hats are cool almost every year! Do something like that.

Gary: You bring up a good point about trying to be a part of something. Because the hats are usually created by a centralized graphic design team at Nike or New Era, what I know of the process is that there isn’t a whole lot of influence from those who understand the community. I’m willing to give New Era a pass on this one.

Jon: They get a partial pass on that from me, but they also need to have a little bit of awareness about the community. Remember a couple years ago when they put the Leo Frigo bridge on the Packers’ draft hat? Nobody in Wisconsin even knows that’s the name of that bridge, and it’s certainly not something anyone thinks about off the top of their head when they think of Green Bay.

Gary: The only thing I know about that bridge is that it makes my car rattle and I have to turn my music up when I drive over it.

What I am not willing to give them a pass on, however, is the punctuation on the hat, though. That’s where my gripe with the hat begins and ends. If you look closely at the hat, you’ll see that the text is technically “Go! Pack Go!” If you wear this hat, are you telling people to go pack up their belongings?

Jon: You can have them pack whatever they want. I’d just prefer they not pack this hat.