An era of confusion ends

Of the first 15 years of his coaching career with the Knights, 13 featured uniforms that, at best, caused some film-study headaches. At worst, it infuriated opposing coaching staffs, public address announcers and fans in the stands.

Whether it was the same uniform home and away, one with funky fonts for numbers, or lightly contrasting uniform numbers, it could be hard to identify which Knight was doing what on the field.

“We didn’t do anything illegal,” Parodi said. “It was a form of gamesmanship. I admit it. I had seen some other coaches do it. It was horrible trying to scout or watch film. So I decided to do it.”

That mental edge, however slight, has been eliminated. Several years ago, the National Federation of State High School Associations, the national governing body for high school football, announced football uniform numbers must “be a single solid color that clearly contrasts with the body color of the jersey.”

The deadline to make the switch was this year, so Parodi actually got new, conforming uniforms prior to the 2023 season.

“I think the big complaint was the referees not being to … identify players and things of that nature,” Parodi said.

Uniform shenanigans have been Parodi’s calling card for most of his career at Hillsdale. A San Mateo native and Serra graduate, Parodi got his first head coaching gig across town at San Mateo in 2004, before taking over at Hillsdale for the 2009 season. Since then, he’s turned the Knights from a doormat into a perennial playoff team.

How difficult was it for opposing teams to prepare to play Hillsdale?

“Ha!” exclaimed Steve Sell, former Aragon football coach who faced Hillsdale and Parodi every year from 2009 until Sell stepped down as coach after last season.

“It was frustrating,” Sell continued. “It drove my defensive coaches crazy.

“It was funny.”

There have been different “uniform eras” since Parodi came aboard. From 2009 to 2011, the Knights used the same uniforms for both home and away games, ones he called the “Columbia blues,” which is the official blue color of Hillsdale. While many people assumed that a team wore dark at home and white on the road, Parodi dug into the rulebook and found that wasn’t quite right.

He said the book said teams had to wear dark jerseys at home games and “light” on the road. He argued that the blue uniforms were light enough to wear at road games.

On one of those road trips, the opposing coach confronted Parodi about his team’s blue uniforms. After Parodi explained the rule, he tried to reassure the skeptical coach.

“I told him, ‘Don’t worry. They’re pretty light (colored),’” Parodi said. “He asked me, ‘What do you wear at home?’ And I told him, ‘These same jerseys. They look darker in San Mateo.’”

A new uniform rule stating road uniforms had to be white was instituted shortly thereafter.

After a two-year span of what can be described as normal, regulation uniforms, Parodi dipped back into the bag of uniform tricks. This time he tweaked the uniform numbers font itself, making it difficult to differentiate between numbers. Was that a No. 15 or No. 16? Is that No. 23 or No. 33? 56 or 58?

“Again, a little bit of gamesmanship,” Parodi said.

From 2018 to 2022, the Knights used a jersey that featured a low-contrasting number against the rest of the uniform, again making it difficult to identify players.

While Parodi does all this with a wink and smile, there were other reasons for his style choices: mainly, he and others thought they looked good and Parodi is a believer in the “look good, play good” mentality.

“I thought they looked clean,” Parodi said. “We had our whites that we used to call our ‘Stormtrooper Unit.’”

And there was another year in which the Knights had a predominantly gray uniform that was soon shelved by a rule change, as well.

“I thought those looked sharp,” Sell said. “I thought they were brilliant. (The rule) change was unfortunate.”

While some may think it silly to play these kind of games with uniform colors and styles, there is definitely something to it. If it affected even one coach or player on an opposing team, it was mission accomplished, as far as Parodi is concerned.

“It was always funny when in pregame when an opposing coach would come over and say how much he hated (our uniforms). … The more displeasure others got out of it, made it even more fun for me,” Parodi said.

Added Sell: “[Parodi is] right to laugh at anyone who truly got angry. If that makes your list about things to get angry about, then we have very different lists.

“But I’ll say this, when he retires … someone who roasts him will talk about it.”