Tampa Bay Buccaneers Getting New Logo, Helmet & Uniforms

[ColeJ]

this helmet is freaking great. i really hope they pull out an orange and pewter alternate uniform. with this new shade of pewter, that's going to look fantastic.

[j'villejags]

Thought I'd try to re-create the helmet with Davidson's template.

[Xist2inspire]

Logo - Slight downgrade. While I like some aspects of the streamlining, like the swords, overall it just comes off as too clean for its own good. The Bucs' old logo had a nice ruggedness that gave it a certain flavor. Now it's skirting into wannabe-Raiders territory.

Ship Logo - It's a wash. While it's the better logo in areas, again, it's way too clean-cut for its own good. Also, it looks like it'll be harder to place on the jersey and have it stand out.

Wordmark - Upgrade. This I love. Unlike all of the other upgraded wordmarks recently, this one manages to achieve some simplicity while retaining a bit of its character. As an added bonus, they could probably use this font for their numbers if they wished, something that they simply could not do with their previous wordmark (I'm a fan of unique, odd fonts, but even I thought those practice numbers were minor-league at best).

Helmet - Downgrade. Everything that's interesting about it will be outdated in 2-3 years. It may be serviceable now, but unless the jerseys really pull this together into a solid package (which I kinda doubt), it'll wear off quickly.

[Billy B]

I think the primary logo is an upgrade. It looks a little cleaner, but I don't think they really needed to change it.

Also think the secondary is an upgrade on its own. Assuming this is going on the sleeve and the jersey is still red, it's probably going to be harder to see than the current secondary.

I'm giving the wordmark an upgrade as well. The other one was a little too cartoony for my taste. This one isn't great, but I think it's better than the old one.

The helmet is a downgrade, mainly because of the huge logo. I'm not entirely against giant logos on the helmet, but I don't think the NFL is the place to do it. It would've looked much better with a normal sized decal. I like the new shade of pewter better. Not a big fan of the chrome facemask either.

[jaha32]

The logo was released a few hours ago, so I'm probably about 20 pages too late on this thread, but I've read enough of this thread to get the gist of people's mindset here.

Naturally, when an NFL team changes their look it will draw a much more passionate response than an arena team or low level minor league team, and that is exactly what is happening here. People always want to jump in and hate on it. I think the Dolphins actually had a good modern logo change last season, but that got lots of hate here, probably because it replaced such an iconic logo.

With this, I really don't know what the Bucs were thinking. "Let's change our logo, yet keep the elements and imagery relatively the same??" What is the point of such a lateral attempt? And I do think they failed on that attempt and end up with a downgrade.

Mainly less detail is better and more detail and colors looks messy. My main problem is that they took out detail within the flag, where detail is needed to show a flag that is tattered and moving in the wind (before you could see the hint of the sword behind the flag but now that shadow is gone), and added detail and colors where it wasn't needed, in the skull and football. So what you have is a flat flag and a skull and ball with unneeded detail. If black is already a dark color, outlining the skull, just use black as the color to show shadows within the skull's teeth and bone structure. The best way to see that a designer is new to logo design is to see that they add colors in the shading (like gray) when they could just use an existing team color to make that shadow. In the ball in the new logo, why add the extra color that is seen no where else in the logo to make that shadow? Just use the black that the Bucs already use. I think those colors are the reason a few compared it to clipart (which I know is the most cliche insult on these boards) but I truly see it here, although in an exaggerated sense.

For the wordmark, I think it's pretty good. It's much more tame than the old, but the A which falls out of line, still gives it the weathered-piratey feel, in a modern way. I do think they could have just kept the old and just gotten rid of some unnecessary detail, but that's just because it was a unique NFL wordmark.

[BadSeed84]

I figure the new logo would be a cleaned up version of their logo, which is lame imo, it looked better being more rugged.

The wordmark , eh its less generic than I figured it was going to be, the A sticks out like they wanted to hold onto something from the old wordmark. But thats the trend with some of these new wordmark, to be plain looking but have something small in it thats unqiue (Panthers, Patriots)

Also I liked the old darker red, they somehow went from having a red darker than the 49ers to one that now looks brighter than the 49ers.

[Lee Noire]

Before I go into my opinions about this change I have to say I'm impressed with how quickly Tampa is looking to get this stuff out to the masses. New logos and helmet yesterday with new unis in 2 weeks. None of this waiting game stuff. I was honestly expecting to see the unis in early summer but color me surprised.

Primary Logo:

I actually love this new logo. It's cleaner and brings the Bucs into modern times without really changing too much. I thought the old logo, as good as it was, looked more like a colored sketch than a final logo. Especially in comparison to the new one. The one criticism I have is that I miss the line detail on the flag above the sword. It helped sell the flag was wrapped around the sword, whereas now it just looks attached artificially. To me, I still get a piratey feel so I don't miss the other detail lines and I still get a sense of motion without them as well. The colors are nicer as well. I always liked the brighter red and orange from the creamsicle days. Upgrade.

Secondary Logo:

Great update to the pirate ship as well. The old one always looked like a weird abstract take on a pirate ship. This one look very much like a big, strong, galleon that would make Captain Marvelous jealous. It is more red than the old one so it might not look as good on a jersey, but maybe the outline will be thick enough to help it stand out. Upgrade.

Full Wordmark:

This is probably the most necessary change the team made. The other logos didn't really need to change but I could see why they may have wanted to. That wordmark though...it needed to go. Was it unique? Yes. Did it fit the team name? Sure. Was it getting more and more dated as time went on? You betcha. Some products of the 90's have held up rather well but that wordmark wasn't one of them. This new one continues the NFL trend of modern wordmarks but unlike the others it still maintains some character. Plus it still ties in pretty well with the pirate theme. The dropshadow is a bit unnecessary but it doesn't really drag the mark down as a whole. Upgrade.

Secondary Wordmark:

I'll just say it isn't really needed. It isn't bad but it doesn't have the same flare as the full mark. Especially without the "A" that makes the full mark look piratey(I know I've said it twice, its going to stick.). Like the Jags before them, its cool to have a shorthand nickname for your team, but that is just something nice for the fans and it doesn't need its own logo. Downgrade, due to lack of necessity.

Helmet:

Everything about this helmet is what is wrong with most of modern football aesthetics and it shouldn't work, but surprisingly it does. The oversized logo is too big but it works for that logo. I do think it could be a bit smaller and still qualify as oversized though. Kudos to the Bucs for keeping the logo on both sides of the helmet and not going for that number trend. I'm actually impressed the thing fit on both sides without touching. The color of the shell is beautiful and is a true Pewter. The old helmet just looked too brown to be Pewter. Also if there really is some time type of paint effect on the shell then it is subtle, which is the way it should be. Jags did that right once then tried it again and screwed the pooch.

Finally, the chrome facemask. Again, it surprisingly works here. I compare it to the Vikings black one that fits the paint job of their new shell. That's the key here, it fits in relation to the paint job. If the Vikings helmet was candy instead of satin that mask would look terribly out of place. Same goes for the Bucs helmet with its shiny Pewter paint. The chrome almost blends in with the shell. Upgrade.

Uniforms:

Coming real soon. I hope the Bucs haven't completely changed everything and merely enhanced, or updated the unis like the logos. I'm not as worried about it as much as I was other teams though. The front office seems to have a sense of pride when it comes to their look and brand. Toilet collars aside.

[CS85]

In order to avoid total hypocrisy here's what I like and don't like about the logo/helmet:

GOOD

• I love how huge it is. This logo, IMHO, works with such a huge decal. It's kind of helmeted-dolphin syndrome where the level of detail was almost useless because even with HD there was the sun, then the dolphin, then the helmet, then the M, all designated to a relatively minuscule area on the helmet. The original Bladed Banner (for lack of a clever moniker) had a similar area of space allotted for what others have said is a fairly detailed logo. The old flag had more swooshes and tatters; the sword a distinguished chip in it's blade and defined grip, plus the skull had thicker outlines.
• The new Skull and Cross-swords is featured prominently and serves as a virtual primary logo with a simplified flag/sword billowing enormously behind it. This is vastly superior compared to the logo within a logo within a tiny space on the previous helmet. Take a look:

• Some may argue the previous logo "was plenty big," or damn the design altogether (bucco bruce lovers). This design worked but the new look turns the volume up in a positive way, I feel, yet it's obviously a polarizing design choice.
• There is something to be argued for with the sword getting chopped up depending on the holes in the helmet and various straps, but as my only complaint it's not much of a gripe.

• The hue of the helmet is now a much more defined shade of "steel" that looks to me more like a cutlass and less like a cannonball. I did love the pewter but this is a great example of compromising between extreme elements (full Jag gradient) and uber-conservativism (flat or even matte). The hand-painted shadows, which aren't clearly defined just yet, I feel are a neat element that's relatively subtle considering the enormous goddamn logo.
• Reducing black, at least in the facemask, was a great call. I hope they do this with the uniforms as well.
• I love that the flag works almost like the Eagles wings or Vikings horn in giving the helmet a more iconic look instead of simply smacking a logo onto the side. The Bucs jerseys will certainly finish the look for better or worse, but with a helmet this loud I'm guessing the uniforms will be a color-updated, slightly more streamlined version of their previous look with the new numeral font installed.
• In the sunshine of Tampa Bay, these helmets should look fantastic. Let's hope their pants are a matching color to the helmets, as seeing the Bucs wearing so much white over the years has hurt my soul.

[bowld]

Love the new red and orange.. Colors seem to really pop when compared to the old ones. Looking forward to March 5th

[TBGKon]

Love the new red and orange.. Colors seem to really pop when compared to the old ones. Looking forward to March 5th

March 5th? Did I miss something about unis?

[LAWeaver]

Love the new red and orange.. Colors seem to really pop when compared to the old ones. Looking forward to March 5th

March 5th? Did I miss something about unis?

Yeah, before the logo was leaked, someone posted that they heard that the uniforms would be released then. They have ties to the League

[pcgd]

What a poorly rendered train-wreck. This is screams of amateur. I don't know who the heck is responsible for the recent run of logos, but clearly this is not Verlaner. Verlander had a nice run there between the Texans, Cardinals, Bengals and even the Falcons. Nice clean logos and nice clean yet distinctive wordmarks. This is bad. The wordmark (much like the Pats new wordmark) is just a slightly (poorly) customized version of some free fonts. These are supposed to be professional organizations but methinks someone went cheap on their graphic designer.

It's not poorly rendered. Its highly detailed and a nice illustration. Isolate the skull and you can see the skill involved in creating this illustration.

Please note I said Illustration and not logo. The reason its so big on the helmet parcially could have to do with the inability to see all the details at a normal decal size.

[CS85]

Love the new red and orange.. Colors seem to really pop when compared to the old ones. Looking forward to March 5th

March 5th? Did I miss something about unis?

Yeah, before the logo was leaked, someone posted that they heard that the uniforms would be released then. They have ties to the League

It's not just rumor. It's official.

The reveal on Thursday of the enhanced logo and helmet are a preview of a full uniform re-design that will be revealed on March 5 and put into action during the 2014 season.

[BlueSky]

Love the new red and orange.. Colors seem to really pop when compared to the old ones. Looking forward to March 5th

March 5th? Did I miss something about unis?

Apparently so. That's the date TB will reveal their new ones.

Can't say anything about the helmet that hasn't been said. It's a "meh" overall for me though proponents make some good points. It certainly fits into the loud, brash design tone that seems to be popular with many players.

One specific dislike is the rear bumper. The wordmark should just be "Buccaneers." It's always struck me as small-time or bush league when teams use their city name in a wordmark on the uniform. Stationery, banners, whatever, fine, but not on the uni. Ironically, that was my complaint for a long time about the helmet of another TB team:

Obviously it's less egregious on the bumper but it still bugs me. Use the city (Seattle's are terrific) or the nickname...not both.

In the "everything old is new again" category...the NFL of the '60s had a giant logo trend too.

Of course there was a point in the '60s, to make the logo more visible to the fans in the stands (there was much less TV coverage). The Bucs seemed determined to make their logo visible from this:

[CS85]

Say what you will, the Bucs helmet decal is still smaller in ratio than the Houston Texans collar was.

[BlueSky]

Or the Pats' shoulder Elvises:

The new Bucs skull does fix something I found funny about the old skull: it had no bottom teeth or they were weirdly short and wide (can't tell which). Either way, the result was something of an old geezer look.

Now that we have an official uni watch on (ha!) with confirmation of the 3/5 release date, this thread should get really interesting. I'm hoping for the best but fear something garish is coming our way. Maybe chrome pants?

[queso fundido]

I was expecting the worst but that is a huge upgrade. (pun intended)

[TruColor]

3. I liked the darker pewter. This pewter almost looks like straight silver.

As I've pointed out a couple of times now, the new one is actually a bit darker.

[waltere]

I'm expecting a big change in the uniforms after Gerald McCoys tweet.

"@geraldini93: This is just the BEGINNING of 2014!! New Uni's coming at you as well!! I've already worn it and it's FIREEE!! Just wait. Tune in live March 5th for unveiling on Buccaneers.com!!"

Uh-oh.

As a general rule players have terrible uniform taste

[CubsFanBudMan]

I'm going to have to finish up for the night and continue this tomorrow, but here's a teaser: old helmet graphic vs. new helmet graphic:

...and the Primary Mark:

...and the Primary Mark against a Pewter background:

More to come tomorrow...

This got lost in some NFL-thread weirdness. Appreciate seeing both at the same time. Still prefer the old, but at least the new one is not a radical departure. There have been better modernizations of helmet logos.