Tale of two t-shirts

by Nestor on Jun 13, 2006 10:11 AM PDT in Basketball Comment 8 comments

The Daily Bruin today has a great article on the turnaround experienced by the UCLA basketball program. And the story captures what has transpired with the UCLA basketball program by telling the story of two shirts. The first one was started by couple of UCLA students back in 2002 when Steve Lavin was putting the finishing touches on his total destruction of the UCLA basketball program:

From afar, they are merely a couple of T-shirts. The powder blue with the gold trim, worn by UCLA students who ache for the nostalgic basketball history they weren't even alive to experience.

On closer inspection, one of the T-shirts symbolizes the darkest days of the UCLA men's basketball program. The other one seems to carry all the unabashed optimism that has returned to the program in three short years.

In the spring of 2002, Mehran Ebadolahi was a first-year political science student who had an idea. Ebadolahi, who graduated fall quarter 2005, was a lifelong Bruins fan who grew up in Irvine, and his high standards for the UCLA basketball team were not being met.

Along with five of his friends, Ebadolahi created the "Lose Lavin" T-shirt. The shirt was a walking advertisement for the Web site loselavin.com, where people could gripe about why they were upset with Lavin's coaching.

"The shirt was made to give Bruin fans from all eras a chance to say, 'Hey, this is our program too, and we have expectations,'" Ebadolahi said.

By the fall of 2002, the shirts became more and more popular. Upward of 2,000 had been sold. While Lavin was stumbling through his last season in Westwood, Ebadolahi was receiving e-mails from alumni swearing they wouldn't donate to the program until Lavin was ousted. Ebadolahi even claims that basketball players on that year's team would congratulate him on making the shirts.

I remember those t-shirts quiet well.

And I also remember how hostile some so-called UCLA fans were to those kids when they were coming onto Bruin message boards to publicize their campaign around those t-shirts. Well, they were more than vindicated, and these days they are getting swept up in the rejuvenation of the basketball program by gobbling up these.

Unfortunately for the kids who started the Moute Kicks Boute t-shirt campaign, they were told to stop distribution of those t-shirts by university administrators who are not too keen on having the students swept up by school spirit on campus. Anyways, that is for another post.

Meanwhile, congrats to Mehran Ebadolahi and his friends on their graduation at UCLA and congrats to them for finally experiencing the real taste of basketball tradition of Westwood. As alums we have to feel proud of these kids for standing up and making their voices heard loud and clear. They understood what UCLA basketball meant to us - the alums, students, season ticket holders, and they got the message out in their creative way around the campus and around the country. Despite attempts to shut them down both by the administration and Lavin cronies, they did not back down. Good for them. Now perhaps before they leave the Westwood area they can tell a current student to get started with LoseDorrell.com t-shirts in case the below average coach fails to beat SC and win 9 games this upcoming season.

GO BRUINS.

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Infringes on their license?

I have one of those (Moute) shirts. I don't see the name UCLA on it anywhere, or are they going to tell me that they have exclusive rights to a pair of colors? What a bunch of morons.

by scittles on Jun 13, 2006 11:19 AM PDT reply actions 0 recs

yea

I was wondering the same thing. Exactly what part of that shirt is covered by UCLA's trademarks?

by ranelar on Jun 13, 2006 12:30 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

No, UCLA's Arguement Is Probably . . .

that they have TM and other intellectual property rights to Luc's last name. :) I can't wait until they start trying to "own" letters and numbers.

by charnaw on Jun 13, 2006 11:28 AM PDT reply actions 0 recs

Actually the way it works is...

The Store (ASUCLA) has exclusive rights to sell T-shirts and other merchandise on campus. They pay the athletic department 15% of their gross sales at games for that right. The Moute shirts can be sold anywhere else, but not on campus. In fact the store and the school are not allowed to carry the shirt at all. It would be an NCAA violation for profiting directly off of a player or player's name. That is why there are no "official" UCLA jerseys with current player's names on them. It's not because the store or the Associated Students want to discourage team pride in the student body.

by isodore on Jun 13, 2006 1:02 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

except

werent these guys selling it online? and now they dont sell it at all. if it was just a matter of selling on campus, I'm sure they would still be selling them online.

by ranelar on Jun 13, 2006 4:16 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

I got mine online

I don't know how they justify shutting down that operation since I didn't see anyone selling them on campus. Well, it's sad, but now my shirt has some novelty.

Speaking of great shirts, I need to find someone dispensing the "pUSC" design. I haven't seen them until recently and I would like to purchase one of those as well.

by scittles on Jun 13, 2006 5:04 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Sadly

They justify it by sending some college kids a strongly lawyer worded letter threatening litigation, and the kids have little choice but to capitulate. I do a fair amount of intellectual property enforcement in the real world, and that's just the way it goes sometimes.

by Menelaus on Jun 13, 2006 8:29 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

As you can probably figure...

I have a connection in the store and have a little knowledge about the situation. They were selling on campus before games as well as online. Online sales were delivered on campus many times, since a large part of their business came from students. I just thought they were run out by security whenever they were found on campus selling. Apparently they were sent a threatening letter by trademarks and licensing to stop. I'll have to take their word for it. This may have been, due to their continued sales on campus after being told several times not to, that T&M wanted to protect the store's interests and halt sales entirely. This does NOT mean that the shirts are violating any trademark laws. As a couple people have said you can't trademark blue and gold or the #23, besides I think Michael Jordan already has that one :) So these shirts probably can still be created and purchased on the DL, as long as it is entirely off campus. I think they are a great new piece of campus lore and that they bring many Bruin fans together and should continue. Besides the store cannot replicate the shirt in anyway since it does violate some tricky NCAA rules on official merchandise. So for once this isn't the Morgan center, or Murphy, but the student store protecting the turf it pays significant money to occupy.

by isodore on Jun 14, 2006 12:17 AM PDT reply actions 0 recs