Adidas has signed a three-year deal with China's Ministry of Education. (Photo : Reuters)
In the country side, there are only relatively a few teams who are more attached with the Adidas brand than Mississippi State baseball team. However, after warm-ups had the phrase “F—K the School Up North” printed on it, Bulldogs coach John Cohen is now having second thoughts about the deal.
Mississippi State does not just use Adidas for apparel, but for their bats and gloves, as well. Majority of today’s baseball teams that are sponsored by Nike and Under Armor are not required to not have gloves or bats from Adidas. Plus, even other schools with Adidas brands use a different brand for their gloves – unlike Cohen’s all-Adidas team.
“Somebody ran up to me,” Cohen said, according to The Clarion-Ledger. “It is unfortunate, but I really do not have anything to say. I have not had any contact. I do not have a lot of information there.”
Sadly, the team will never wear the warm-ups again. The fact that they were only meant for warm-ups and were not ideally created for an actual game did not reduce how the team and Cohen felt.
Some pictures of the shirts were taken and were posted to the Internet. Once the photos became viral and was even featured on Sports Illustrated, the Mississippi State athletic director apologized to the public.
Adidas was quick to apologize to Mississippi State and the team’s fans through a statement that they gave on Thursday. Still, whilst apologizing, the brand just could not help but to defend their intentions for the “F—K the School Up North” printing. According to them, that was merely “old art work that was never presented to the university.”
“This graphic does not reflect our brand values nor those of Mississippi State,” the brand said in their apology, according to Dead Spin. “We take full responsibility for this error and wish Mississippi State the best of luck during Super Bulldog Weekend.”
