Ridleylash

It's stars that form a crown, it doesn't need a goddamn backstory lmao

Plus the pine forests that are also extremely plentiful in the state. Kind of hard to miss those, isn't it? Not every WC logo has to incorporate local landmarks just to get across the locale, really; Dallas' WC logo didn't, and neither did Boston's the year before then, and both were perfectly serviceable.

I friggin' love it. It looks like what a Minnesota NHL team would've had in the 20's or 30's, which is what the Winter Classic is all about. Even the excessive striping is just like what that era had, which is great.

The Heartlanders have revealed their home and road jerseys;

Opinions on tastefulness aside, the Hawks use red, green, gold, white, yellow, black, orange, blue and white all on the same logo. The Kachina logo uses red, purple, brown, tan and green; it's certainly more colors then typical, but it's hardly "too many". Plus, simplifying the design would bring it further away from the design inspiration to begin with; the logo is supposed to resemble a kachina figure, after all, and those aren't exactly known for being low on colors. And, being around fans myself, there's genuine excitement over going back to this exact look; it's unique and odd, and that fits a team in a oddball market like Arizona.

I mean, Tempe seems pretty keen on it; the RfP they've put out is explicitly looking for a pro sports venue, and the only team really in need of a new location in the city is the 'Yotes; the D-Backs, Suns, Cards and Rising are all pretty well-off where they all currently sit, so I doubt any of them are looking for new buildings. Besides, I feel like the NHL won't want to relocate to a market that's basically the same size when they could just expand to Houston and have more large media markets then they already do. They're not always the keenest, but even the NHL isn't that dumb; they only left Atlanta when there was literally nowhere for them to play and no time to find a new building. The Coyotes could always hole up at the Vet while a new building is made, like what the Isles did with Nassau during UBS' construction; it's not ideal and not up to modern NHL standards, but it's still somewhere for the team to play on a temporary basis, with the benefit of being closer to the rich folk in Phoenix then Glendale is.

They could, but they seem not to want that; otherwise, why do a Texans homage in the WC instead of a North Stars jersey? Why not pull out a black '91 North Stars jersey with a Dallas logo to sell for the RR program instead of making a whiteout '99 jersey? Seems at this point they're purposefully distancing themselves from the North Stars and just letting the Wild handle that kinda stuff, which makes sense since Minnesota's where North Stars stuff would sell the best and the team's been in Dallas longer than it was in Minnesota now regardless.

Nashville had a pretty similar-looking navy alternate at the time, as well; So it clearly wasn't that unique.

Honestly, I'd be stunned if the Wild weren't pulling out a North Stars fauxback design of some form; it's the obvious choice to go with to cash in on the North Stars love some more like they did with the RR. Nashville and Dallas had a lack of real vintage-y jerseys to choose from given their history, so them going fauxback was logical. Minnesota just has to do a North Stars jersey in either classic colors or modern colors with the current Wild logo and they'll be golden.

Again, the reason Euro leagues look the way they do is to cover travel expenses, not because of greedy owners; the NHL has a much higher revenue pull than even the KHL does, so I doubt covering travel's going to be much of an issue. Looking at the NBA, which has the same basic economic structure as the NHL, is a much better comparison; and jersey ads there are still extremely limited in quantity, even though the NBA is probably the league of the Big 4 with the least care for aesthetics. That leads me to think that they're not so profitable at the NBA/NHL level that it's worth adding a bunch, but also not so unprofitable as to not merit their inclusion from an economical perspective. We've had jersey ads in the AHL and on practice jerseys for ages without much complaining, and we know the NHL has used the AHL to float ideas around before promoting them to the NHL in the past. I almost have to wonder if this wasn't considered for a while and circumstances only now fell into place to justify it.

I mean, I can't see the NHL falling too far into the rabbit hole besides a mere patch, anyways. It's pretty damn obvious that jersey ads aren't that much of a boon at the NBA/NHL level, otherwise they'd have been far more prominent in the NBA then they are with how goddamn little care the NBA has for their jersey aesthetics. It's unideal, obviously, but so is everything about the last two years. And at the end of the day, sports owners will always do what makes them more money, even if it's a small amount. Accepting that's made it easier to deal with stuff like this. Besides, I have to wonder if the jersey ads in the AHL were always them floating the idea around. They do that a lot in the AHL, and the fact nobody complained then likely influenced their decision.

TV cameras in the early 2000's weren't really as good as they are now, though.

My crazy pet idea is that the Kings might be doing a 2000's jersey as a third. So far, it's been the only era they have yet to have a throwback to; they've done multiple purple+gold jerseys and just did a Gretzky-era jersey, so that era's about the only time they have left to throw back to. And if they're not keeping the grey and neither the RR or 90's throwback design are being made alternates, then that pretty severely limits the options outside of that unless they're actually going to do an 80's throwback in purple and gold on top of the Team Classics release.

Looks like the Canes are doing a home version of their '06 Cup banner for their new Central Division title banner, to stay consistent with the rest of the banners they have.

Jets officially retiring the Aviator Blue alternate in favor of the dark Heritage jersey as their new third jersey.

I mean, so did NBC when it came to promoting the sport; as cringy as ESPN takes can be, it's the kind of exposure the NHL NEVER got on NBC. Social media loves that kind of hot take stuff, and if the NHL wants to keep up in the sports sphere, it kinda has to be on a network that encourages that kind of thing from its talking heads. Stephen A. drives attention to ESPN, even if it's people saying "lol look at this idiot", and that's his job. And honestly, I'd rather a Stephen A. than a Mike Milbury when it comes to cringe-inducing figures in hockey media; because for as loud and annoying as the former is, he's still not as grating as Milbury was.

The NHL already has their nice meaty new media deal in hand, and it's with ESPN and TBS; they don't need Barstool when they have those two much bigger fish. Plus, MLB is out of touch enough that they'd think Barstool is a perfect platform for them to be "hip" and "with it", so I could absolutely see it being them.

And the worst part is that it replaced their best look in the black era, too; Calgary's aesthetics took an absolute nosedive in the Edge transition and they never fixed it for some godforsaken reason, even when so many other teams did get rid of their Edge-template jerseys for more traditionally-designed jerseys. If they'd come out of the Adidas transition by bringing these jerseys back, I honestly don't know if the demand for the retros becoming the primary reaches the fever pitch it did.

I'd imagine blue names didn't show up as well on camera testing and that's why they've gone with burgundy; same reason the Wild scrapped that planned third they had.

MMMMH, that's a nice look.

The most I could see is a Kachina-fied Howler (ala the unused concepts for the 2003 rebrand) sticking around the brand for continuity as an alternate logo, but I can't see any of the designs sticking around. None of those designs had the same staying power the Kachina has, and if anything I think any new alternate might play more with that aesthetic rather than depart from it...though honestly, a Reverse Retro using the Howler on an old Runners jersey could be pretty nice.

MullenLowe LA is an advertising and marketing group, so it's a guarantee that this "new look" stuff is in reference to that side of things; the advertising and marketing of the Coyotes franchise, not the franchise itself. I would expect the team's design (logos, colors, jerseys, etc.) to be handled like any other NHL redesign is; between the team and Adidas directly. And given the draft hat is a flat throwback, my expectation is they're going full throwback.

My guess is the RR gets upgraded and the Howler is put to pasture. As much as a group of people like it, the consensus among the fanbase does seem to lean towards the Kachina look, and the Coyotes' RR was extremely popular. I wouldn't mind if they stuck the Howler logo on the RR, though.

The only date we have for the new jersey reveal is "this summer", and the offseason only just started not that long ago. Jersey reveals also don't always have to coincide with major events like the draft or expansion. My guess is that we'll see them later on, maybe sometime in August. Plenty of other teams have new alternates rumored, anyways, so I'd expect reveals to come throughout the offseason as per usual, instead of being centered around the draft.