Thursday Night Football is about to get more colorful.

Literally.

The Thursday night schedule has grown over the years. It has now reached a point where every NFL team appears on Thursday Night Football once each season.

Then, Thursday nights introduced another wrinkle into the NFL and Nike marketing machine: the “color rush” jersey. Last season, the NFL featured 4 “color rush” games, where 8 teams began wearing monochromatic uniforms. The first such contest featured the Buffalo Bills and New York Jets wearing all red and all green jerseys, to the dismay of many red-green colorblind viewers.

NFL’s “Color Rush” uniforms for Bills-Jets was a disaster for colorblind people https://t.co/T1Qf9qRI6U pic.twitter.com/QoLdY23AhI

— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) November 13, 2015

The trend continued with the other 6 teams wearing similar full color uniforms. Since it started with only 8 teams, and the Steelers have traditionally shunned altering their jerseys over the years (they opted out of the Nike “fly wire” collar, and also do not sport the “C” captain’s badges) I had wondered if Pittsburgh would join the color rush frenzy in the near future.

Well, that future appears to be now, with the Pittsburgh Steelers traveling to Indianapolis for a Thursday night showdown with the Colts, once again playing to a national Thanksgiving night audience.

As soon as the news broke, the speculation began on what the Steelers might wear that evening. Would the team break tradition and wear a modern era alternate jersey? After all, the Steelers only added a third jersey option around 9 years ago, during their 75th anniversary.

https://twitter.com/steelcityundrgr/status/733298746956623873

The 75th anniversary uniforms were a hybrid representing the look of the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s, with the Steelers sporting gold helmets with black throwback tops featuring gold numbers, and white pants with gold stripes. The look was well received by fans and media, unlike their replacements, the 80th anniversary “bumblebee” jerseys:

https://twitter.com/steelcityundrgr/status/733313353628684288

The “prison stripe” look dates back to the Steelers 1934 season, their second year as a professional football team. Unlike the 75th anniversary iteration, the 80th anniversary uniform remained faithful to the originals, including the “puke” khaki color pants and striped socks.

Fans either love or hate the look.

Which beckons the question: what could happen when the masterminds at Nike come up with the color rush concept for the Steelers?

Steelers President Art Rooney II commented on the possibility:

“I haven’t heard anything official, but I assume that’s a color rush game. “It’ll be Indianapolis’ call in terms of what uniform they wear, and so I haven’t heard yet from them what their color rush uniform is. We’ll have to wait and see on that one what color we’ll be wearing.”

According to the color rush protocol, each team was able to choose their color. The default option for each team is white.

Since the Colts are the home team, they will get to choose what they will wear, which will force the Steelers hand a bit. Traditionally, the Colts wear white pants with either blue or white tops. The all-white option wouldn’t be very groundbreaking, especially for a larger holiday television audience, which makes me believe the Colts might opt for an all-blue kit. In that scenario, it is assumed the Steelers would wear an all-white uniform.

However, a tweet surfaced shortly after the NFL schedule release, which claimed to be an authentic representation of what each team would wear on Thursdays. The legitimacy of the photo has been questioned, and is believed to be fake, but offers another alternative for the Steelers: gold jerseys.

All Gold Everything? Here's the Color Rush leak we're talking about with @DrewOlsonMKE. pic.twitter.com/pqErGks2No

— ESPN Milwaukee (@ESPNMilwaukee) April 18, 2016

With the Colts in blue uniforms, a gold or white uniform might make sense from a perspective of one team wearing dark uniforms and the other wearing a lighter color. However, as was the case with the color rush games last season, the uniforms didn’t always contrast by hue. The Bills and Jets both wore darker shades, while the Jaguars/Titans game had gold and powder blue, and the Panthers/Cowboys went with powder blue and white respectively.

That leaves the door open for an all-black Steelers uniform, regardless if the Colts wear white, or blue:

“We had our options,” said Rooney. “We had some presentations from Nike in terms of what the options were, and we decided our color-option was going to be black, and the default option is going to be white. When you’re the road team, the home team gets to decide what it’s wearing. If for some reason the Colts would decide to wear white, we would wear black. We just felt black was more of our predominant color (than gold).”

Rooney’s comment further undermines the Twitter leak, and all but confirms the Steelers may go with a uniform that features black tops and bottoms. I believe that uniform will closely resemble the 75th anniversary jersey, but with the modern era numbering and lettering.

Reebook had produced a vanity jersey, called the “shadow jersey,” several years ago. It was devoid of any color, completely black and white.

https://twitter.com/steelcityundrgr/status/733298925390704640

Such a pattern would fit the color rush theme to a tee. However, I’m of the opinion the whites would be replaced with the traditional gold, for a unique look that’s not far from the standard Steelers option. That mockup is below, with the traditional Steelers helmet and solid black pants.

Also below, is the “default” white kit, which is mentioned by Mr. Rooney. It’s not as exciting as the all-black concept, but it’s still a cool idea nonetheless.