[perfy]

You all know the drama that went down so now I bring to you my abbreviated comparison review.


Waist

Sprawls have a reputation for fitting a tad small whereas Nogi has the exact opposite. My waist size is a 31 or to be more exact this is the measurement where I sually wear my shorts: which happens to be right above the hips. Given each companies' sizing reputations I ordered a 32 in the Sprawl FlexFighter and a 30 in the Nogi OEs. Laying both shorts flat as in the pics below the Sprawls measure 15 inches translating to a 30" waist and the Nogis 15.5" equaling a 31" waist. Stretching the waist out the Sprawls measure in at 17.75"(35.5" waist) Nogi 16.5"(33"). The Sprawl shorts have an elastic waistband that seems to be directly taken from boxing shorts. They provide a lot of stretch as evident by the measurements above but this may come with a downside. During training I've found that opponents can usually get their gloved hand into your waistband and try to control your movement accordingly. The Nogis have a taper that lets them ride higher in the hips so I believe this distorts the actual sizing. The Sprawls fit like a glove, but because of the taper or perhaps just because of the measurement, the OE shorts are a tad loose.







Length

The Nogis are considerably longer than the Sprawls 21.5" vs 19". I'm around 5'9"-5'10" and the Sprawls hang right above the knee whereas the Nogis cover it a bit. Shorter individuals may need to hem the Nogi shorts. I personally prefer the longer shorts and they don't interefere with kicking or movement.

[scorcho]

Wow, this thread is a real letdown. Why not just wait until you actually had your review prepared to post?

[perfy]

Width

Both shorts have the same width, which happens to be plenty. Even while wearing a cup there is no restriction or binding in the hips or seat of the pants.


Flex Panel vs Stretch material

The flex panel stretches from 4.5" to 7.5" while the Nogis expand 2.5" but the latter stretches in all directions. Both increase comfort especially while working from your guard. Both shorts move with you rather than against you so while the approaches may differ the end results are the same.


Stitching

The Nogi shorts use double stitching throughout the shorts with the exception of the crotch area. It appears to be a simple double stich on the outside but looking on the inside it uses a triple stitching. The Sprawls use a double stitch in the waistband and fly areas. The flex panel uses a triple stitch and the hem of the shorts use a weird triple loop stitch as illustrated in the pic below. I've never experienced any of the stitching coming loose in either brands' previous products and shouldn't be a concern here.




Crotch design

Neither short uses a gussetted crotch design that normally prevents shorts from tearing in this area. The Sprawl shorts have the flex panel and triple stitching. As a result there isn't any one seam bearing a lot of stress. The Nogi shorts on the other hand feature the typical board short design where four seams intersect. This places a lot of stress at this seam and often results in tearing or the seam coming undone. Perhaps the stretch material alleviates some of this stress as I never had any problems with the 05 line. I recall a few Inspirit shorts sufferring from this design flaw and subsequently tearing. Either way I believe the Nogi shorts could benefit from a gussetted crotch as it won't decrease the flexibility but will increase the durability.

[perfy]

Pockets

Sprawl features an internal hidden pocket(dimenasions 4.25"l x 3.25"w) attached to the waistband on right front. It's big enough to hold your keys or mouthpiece or a couple folded up bills but not much. The Nogi pocket is external and located several inches below the waist and on the side of the left leg. Internal dimensions are 5"l x 4.5"w and features a small bungie cord though I have no idea for what purpose. You can fit your Ipod in there as advertised but it bounces around to much when running. It's big enough to fit your mouthpiece and it's case or even a wallet or cellphone making them a bit more practical as casual shorts. It also has a rivet at the bottom of the pocket either to let dirt and debris out or in.


Logos

Both shorts featured stitched logos but the Sprawl shorts have a hard semi inflexible plastic logo on the front of the waistband. It features sharp hard corners that could possibly cut someone or cause abrasions to an opponent not that I really care. I dislike the rigidity of the logo though because it makes the waistband a bit unyielding. A silkscreened or stitched logo would be vastly better and let the shorts have more give, hopefully future versions may incorporate this. I have considered removing the logo but I'm not sure if I could do so without maiming the shorts.


Summary

Each company produces quality products that are only surpassed by their outstanding customer service and in the end you can't go wrong with either. While both shorts have room for improvement they are also the best versions yet to date. The FlexFighter shorts feature the greatest revisions and improvements over the previous year's version and as a result probably warrant purchase for that reason alone if you already own prior versions of either shorts. The Nogi shorts have subtle revisions like having a bit more stretch that improve upon it's predecessor. In the end, let your personal preferences be it color, design, length, price, etc dictate what shorts you go with as both are top-notch.


Sorry for the poor pics but the camera is partially broken and won't zoom in or out And using MS Paint to resize and change the file type doesn't help matters.

[perfy]

Misc Pics
Front




Back



Left Side

[perfy]

Right Side


Will try to get more and better pics later. Sorry for the way it's posted but forums only allow 6 images per post hence the delay.

[fat_wilhelm]

Great review... thanks. By the way, your pics look fine to me.

[Dynasty1]

good review, keep it up..this topic of sprawl and nogi is a been long ongoing debate that after this review proves there pretty much up to preference, i would still go with the nogis though, sprawls just dont fit me right, and the boardshort look is cooler anyway

[Dynasty1]

Originally Posted by scorcho

Wow, this thread is a real letdown. Why not just wait until you actually had your review prepared to post?

why not wait till he posted the whole review before scrutinizing it

[SSF]

The Nogis look great.

www.SSFgear.com