tBBP

So what are they gonna call this...the "Black Hole" look??

As one who's used Qualtrics more than I care to post about in the past nine months for several service projects, the last place I expected to see that word turn up was in a dang freakin' sports logos forum. Thanks for ruining my escape route for me. Let me clarify my prior post. I wasn't talking about the logo concept; I was talking about the idea of "Yaks" as a nickname. I mean, of all the bison-family animals out there (wait--is it family, genus, then species?), that's about the last one anyone thinks of...period, let alone sports branding. (Unless you're Ace Ventura when nature calls.)

They didn’t bother to adjust the slant angle of the NHL banner to match the angles of that hexagon? Yeesh! Okay...I'm feeling that idea, and loving that nickname suggestion. Also, I was 30-seconds-ago years old (as of the time of this posting) when I learned what the word "bovine" meant...good call on that one.

Which underscores how good an idea it is to think beyond the box sometimes regarding hyper-localized identities. I mean shoot, Vegas just did it. There's nothing about Vegas that infers anything about knights (unless some sarcastic peazy somewhere wants to bring up the Excalibur), and that doesn't even address the irony of the Golden Knights playing in the Silver State. Yes, we all know how why the team has the Knights nickname, but the point is that sometimes fun branding is fun whether [hyper-]localized or not. All I'm saying is if people have to go to the extreme ends of the galaxy to find some hyper-local source material for a team brand, perhaps maybe it's time to reevaluate the approach altogether. A little bit of whimsy never hurt anyone. (See Exhibit A: Kraken, Seattle for a significant example.) So, if Smitty n' em want to look beyond the state for a mascot that "works"...or find some nickname that may be, oh I don't know, "out of this world", so be it. I personally am coming around on the idea of "Yeti" just for the phonetic alliteration alone. (Wait--is "Yeti" plural in the same vein as "moose" or "deer"??? Somehow, "Yetis" doesn’t really flow right to me.) But whatevs...we'll see how this goes.

Well, if anyone wants mini-reprieve from the ongoing Denver Colorados fiasco, how about a couple heaping tablespoons of steer-seasoned salt?? Wouldn't surprise me one bit to find out she was/is the reason for the "H-Town Blue" even being a thing in the first place...

I'll do a full critique on all this later, but these are my two quick response thoughts: 1.) City Edition/CityConnect design ideology is becoming/has become like a parasite to this new era of branding... 2.) ...This uniform set looks less like Denver Broncos and more like Denver Colorados.

YES. All they did was "take the best, and made it better." And I honestly wish more teams would follow suit. Link here.

Time out—did they just turn that panther head logo 90 degrees, crop it, and create a pants "stripe" out of its neck?? That's what they did, didn't they???

Yeeahhh this one got sidestepped/swept to the side, didn't it?? Pulled the ol' Pete Carroll on 'em...

Good call--that's exactly what they're gonna call it (or allude to it being). That's candy-coated to you, pal. (See above.) If that's real--and I believe it is--what are they even really doing right now? Like, what exactly does that stripe of triangles have to do with, well, anything? Stylistically it doesn't even fit with the art direction...unless that pattern shows up in the numbers. (Shoot..that's exactly what's gonna happen, isn't it???)

This reminds me of my first trip into Denver way back when. (This also underlies the value of feet-on-the-ground experience about places rather than going off what somebody somewhere said about a place, especially when/if they ain't been there themselves.) All my young life I heard about Denver, the Rocky Mountains, and thought the whole state of Colorado was gonna be mountainous. NOPE. Roughly the entire eastern third of Colorado is flat open prairie...and that flat landscape includes Denver. The thing that threw me off was the fact that flat, open prairies exist IN THE MOUNTAINS THEMSELVES. I was completely not expecting that. Then I got over into Salt Lake City and saw that though the core part of the city is built down in the flatter parts of the valley, much of the east and especially northeast part of town is built right up into (and in parts way up into) the side of that Wasatch front. (I'm sure that's where all the $$$$$$ lives, as well.) That said, that scenery out there in Utah...man oh man. If you ain't been, you gotta go see if for yourself. (Just don't go in wintertime...)

If ever there was a more meme-able photo... ...I know we can't blame Nike (entirely) for uniform design—but I CAN blame Nike for all this recent epidemic of "uniform nicknames". That's all them right there. (And even MLS picked up on the vibe.) It started in the NBA with the City Edition stuff, then continued with renaming the home/away/alt uniforms, then it carried over into the W with the "Heritage/Elite/Rebel" nicknames (H.E.R.—haha, how clever), and now it done crossed into the NFL. It'll be hitting the MLB diamonds soon enough. The common denominator [MLS notwithstanding]? The swoosh. Anyway, the new Lions home and away are very nice. They'd be even nicer if they wore silver pants with white jerseys more often than not (which is to say, at all). I'm not at all moved by the alternates.

Oh it'll 100% look like that H...maybe not with all the beveling, but definitely blackletter-esque.

Hold up here—I know I've been out the fray for a minute, but just what is going on with these baseball pants here? (Especially the Blue Jay player up there) What is this, the NFL meets the diamond or something??

Trust me on this: NO ONE wants the '97 jerseys... (And those were the versions that made it out after the preseason...)