Saints wear Color Rush uniforms against the Rams without black helmets

Color rushing for Thursday Night Football 🏈 @EAMaddenNFL ➡️ https://t.co/4YyqGGQf5p pic.twitter.com/l2BlKV9ICC

— New Orleans Saints (@Saints) December 20, 2023

Now this is interesting. The New Orleans Saints (7-7) are hitting the road for a huge game with the Los Angeles Rams (7-7) on Thursday night, and they’ve announced that they’ll be wearing the fan-favorite “Color Rush” alternate uniforms for this prime-time game — with a twist.

It looks like the Saints are ditching the controversial black helmets they’ve paired with these all-white uniforms since last year’s game with the Minnesota Vikings in London. Their announcement on social media uses older photos of players wearing the usual gold helmets, not these new black ones, which drew a mixed reaction from fans for clashing with the jerseys and pants.

Hopefully that’s the case. Black helmets could work for the Saints if paired with the right uniforms (like their classic throwbacks) and if given a little more polish. We’ll find out for sure at kickoff. If you’re curious, the Saints were 9-5 in their “Color Rush” variants with gold helmets, and winless in three games with black helmets.

And if you’re superstitious, here’s how that compares to the other kits used since 2006 (not including the controversial gold jerseys used in a loss back in 2003):

“Black and Gold” throwbacks

Derick E. Hingle-USA TODAY Sports

Record: .800 (4-1)

White jerseys, white pants

Harry Aaron/Getty Images

Record: .706 (12-5)

White jerseys, black pants

Aaron Doster-USA TODAY Sports

Record: .597 (43-29)

White jerseys, gold pants

Jeff Hanisch-USA TODAY Sports

Record: .597 (37-25)

Black jerseys, gold pants

Chuck Cook-USA TODAY Sports

Record: .585 (24-17)

Black jerseys, black pants

Bob Donnan-USA TODAY Sports

Record: .589 (53-37)

“Color Rush” alternates

Catherine Ivill/Getty Images

Record: .529 (9-8)

Black jerseys, white pants

Stephen Lew-USA TODAY Sports

Record: .000 (0-1)