That is correct. Mostly. I think you mean red would clash more than the gray. Chicago may want to wear the gray to promote sales of their new shirt. The gray has enough contrast with yellow so it is allowed. Teams often have other motivations than just creating the most clash.
Assuming I remember all of this correctly and nothing has changed, here's how it goes... The default is the Primary home kit at home for every team. With the Primary for the visiting also being the most preferred option unless there is a clash. All of this happens 3-4 weeks before a game with finalization the week before and a Ref doing the eyeball check on them a couple of hours before the game. Teams do have a a chance to wear their Away kit at home (this is usually the FO people asking for it so they sell some) and if both teams, both Eqt Managers and Ref are ok with it, they can do this. Eqt Mangers pick the GK outfits and tell the league what their preferred option is based off of the kits selected for that game. Refs are told what to wear by the league, but can also have a say back to the teams and league in the week leading up to the game. There is a bit of gamesmanship that can go on here though. Eqt managers will pick certain colors to make sure the other teams GK can't wear their favorite or if a coach/team feels like a certain kit is lucky - it gets into the rotation more. Timbers third on their championship run 2 seasons ago is a good example of this. they wanted to wear it in the Cup game, but league said no.
I'm sure they just wanted to show off their NEW secondary jerseys. In the future if they can wear their primary (Red) jerseys on the road they will.
Much as I like the new Fire secondary kit (obligatory would've looked better with navy shorts here), I was disappointed to see them wearing it today. Columbus/Chicago games should always be yellow/red to me, except maybe for an Open Cup game or something.
We are undefeated in the new grays so I am not going to say anything bad about them until we start losing.
I'm starting to wonder if there is some British/American English difference going on here with the word "clash." "So it's CHI's choice not to wear their primary red, even though it clashes less than the grey" "With the Primary for the visiting also being the most preferred option unless there is a clash." Two different posters have used the word clash in way that makes me think they mean the uniforms are too similar. I notice that one of them spells gray as "grey" so that makes me think British or possibly Canadian. This is what "clash" means to me in this context: Looking at the Oxford dictionary gives similar definitions. So I think that you would want the uniforms to be in conflict or disagree to clash. They wouldn't necessarily be offensive in combination but they certainly wouldn't be similar. So what's the deal?
The league does at the beginning with the planning 3-4 weeks before the game and then the game referee has a final say the day of the game, but if there was possible confusion due to color (is the better than saying clash??) it should have been sorted in the weeks leading up to the game. With the league going to color Primary kits and white away, this will sort itself out as the white away (or very light colors) kits would become the standard away uniform. Just like NFL and college football. and I forgot- order of importance is Jerseys, socks and then shorts. Many teams have additional change shorts (NYCFC and their away Orange shorts) that may never see the light of day for whatever reason. But they are there.
Minnesota United @ Portland Timbers 3/3/2017 Home: Portland Timbers (primary, monochrome) Green Green Green Away: Minnesota United (secondary, white, monochrome) White White White
Chicago Fire @ Columbus Crew 3/4/2017 Home: Columbus Crew (primary, monochrome) Yellow Yellow Yellow Away: Chicago Fire (secondary, monochrome) Gray Gray Gray
FC Dallas @ LA Galaxy 3/4/2017 Home: LA Galaxy (primary, white(p), monochrome) White White White Away: FC Dallas (primary) Red White Red
Toronto FC @ Real Salt Lake 3/4/2017 Home: Real Salt Lake (primary, monochrome) Red Red Red Away: Toronto FC (secondary, white) White Blue White
New England Revolution @ Colorado Rapids 3/4/2017 Home: Colorado Rapids (primary) Red White Red/Blue Away: New England Revolution (secondary, white) White Red White
Sporting Kansas City @ DC United 3/4/2017 Home: DC United (primary, monochrome) Black Black Black Away: Sporting Kansas City (primary) Light Blue White Light Blue
Seattle Sounders @ Houston Dynamo 3/4/2017 Home: Houston Dynamo (primary) Orange White Orange Away: Seattle Sounders (primary) Green Green Blue
Montreal Impact @ San Jose Earthquakes 3/4/2017 Home: San Jose Earthquakes (primary, monochrome) Black Black Black Away: Montreal Impact (secondary, white, monochrome) White White White
New York City @ Orlando City 3/5/2017 Home: Orlando City (primary, monochrome) Purple Purple Purple Away: New York City (primary) Light Blue White Light Blue
New York Red Bulls @ Atlanta United 3/5/2017 Home: Atlanta United (primary) Red Black Black Away: New York Red Bulls (primary, white(p)) White Red White
Philadelphia Union @ Vancouver Whitecaps 3/5/2017 Home: Vancouver Whitecaps (primary, white (p), monochrome) White White White Away: Philadelphia Union (primary, monochrome) Blue Blue Blue
WeekGames2nd/3rd ShirtsNon-Primary, HomeWhite ShirtsNon-Primary, White ShirtsMonochrome Kits 11123%0%27%14%55% Cumulative1123%0%27%14%55% The numbers are fairly consistent from last year on Non-Primary Shirts, White Shirts overall, and Monochrome. I have added the new categories for Non-Primary @ Home and Non-Primary White Shirts. We'll see how those go. HOU/SEA gets the Ofer award in this first week. ATL/NYR only had the Red Bulls white primary shirt holding them back. DCU/SKC and ORL/NYC were close
Was there not more all-white than usual? Seemed like a lot based on my sheet (posting shortly)...but maybe that's normal and I just forgot.
Minnesota, LAG, Montreal, and Vancouver wore all white. Are you counting Chicago because that gray was dark enough for me to count it as non-white? Toronto, New England, and Red Bulls also wore white shirts but not all white. So that was 7 white shirts or 32%. White shirts were worn 27% of the time last season. Whoops. I just realized I only had 6 white shirts on my spreadsheet. I'll fix that number.
EDITED WeekGames2nd/3rd ShirtsNon-Primary, HomeWhite ShirtsNon-Primary, White ShirtsMonochrome Kits 11123%0%32%18%55% Cumulative1123%0%32%18%55% The numbers are fairly consistent from last year on Non-Primary Shirts, White Shirts overall, and Monochrome. I have added the new categories for Non-Primary @ Home and Non-Primary White Shirts. We'll see how those go. CORRECTION: White shirts should have been 32% so that was more than the 27% average from last year. And one more non-primary white so that number went up to 18%. HOU/SEA gets the Ofer award in this first week. ATL/NYR only had the Red Bulls white primary shirt holding them back. DCU/SKC and ORL/NYC were close
Chicago is certainly non-white. So...just above average whiteness. We'll see what the early season shows as far as trends...