2020-2021 NHL Changes

[Sport]

THEY KEPT THE BLACK NUMBERS ARE YOU :censored:ING KIDDING ME?!?!?!

 

 

[spartacat_12]

7 hours ago, M4One said:

I'm starting to wonder if Colorado missed a deadline to change the numbers to blue, similarly to how LeBron couldn't switch to 6 last year so AD could have 23 because it was too late and Nike had already too much gear with LeBron 23.

 

Maybe eventually I'll get use to the blue pants with the white jersey (eh, not my team, anyways), but right now, I don't really like it.  The black was a better match for the burgundy.

 

I feel like number changes don't have the same sort of deadlines as jersey design changes. I remember when Tampa rebranded with single-colour numbers originally. People complained about the lack of black in the design, so they quickly scrambled and switched to double-outlined numbers with black trim.

[Sport]

First, allow me to say that even with an inherent flaw in their uniform design that I'm about to get into, I have always loved the Avalanche mountain uniforms and brand and I miss the yeti foot logo. The Avs were my preferred hockey team as a hockey-obsessed kid in the 90's before we got the Blue Jackets and I still maintain an affection for them. I've typed something similar to this on this website a dozen times over the years, but I'll do it again since they're in the news.

 

The Avs uniforms main problem has always been that they have one too many colors. With the Avalanche Uniforms 1.0 this wasn't that big of a problem because they used black on the jersey's striping (also true of the EDGE uniforms, to be fair). The issue was with the white jerseys where the only black to be found was the numbers on their backs, which was presumably a decision made so the black pants didn't stick out too much. With the burgundy jerseys they were a burgundy-blue-black-gray team, but on the road they were a burgundy-black team. This got worse when they revisited the mountain striping a few years ago when they thankfully took their EDGE uniforms behind the shed and shot them, but that revised jersey, though clean and in my opinion a better look than the 1.0 jerseys, it still had the 'One Too Many Colors' problem and with no black in the burgundy jersey it made the black gear stick out even more. 

 

 

This looks like Mackinnon plays for the LA Kings and pulled an Avalanche sweater over the top of his Kings jersey.  

 

This blue pants/helmets thing looks like they're trying a solution to the 'One Too Many Colors' problem. Issue there (IN MY OPINION, OF COURSE) is that the values of the burgundy and blue are too similar and there's not enough contrast across the uniform. They look like a bunch of skating bruises. It's even worse with the white jerseys because there's very little blue on the white jerseys so the pants almost look more out of place than the black pants did. I assume the black numbers thing was a deadline they didn't hit and at some point they'll be blue? IDK. I anticipated this light blue pants and helmets idea looking goofy years ago when I suggested instead that they consolidate the blue on the uniforms and the black on the uniforms and replace it all with navy blue. Another solution could've been burgundy pants and helmets (I think you'd have to redesign the white jerseys so it's not so burgundy heavy and change the striping to blue and grey with burgundy numbers.)

 

To sum up my thoughts - I think they solved a problem by choosing the worst solution, which created a bigger problem and I think they look less cool now than they used to. 

[chcarlson23]

I think the Avs kind of solved some issues with their new blue equipment at home. While there is some problems with matching the blues to each other on some helmets, it works fairly well. Their burgundy should be somewhere in the equipment, like a burgundy stripe on the bottom of the breezers like the Jackets have a navy stripe, or a mix of burgundy, white, and blue on the gloves. I do like the blue helmet, but it definitely needs to match shades. 
 

So the Avs have become a burgundy, blue, and silver team at home, which looks nice. But the road jersey needs to change big time. I think from the hips down, they look great, with the sock pattern and the blue breezers. Even the burgundy touching the blue now on the breezers is fine. But the issues is that there is now no blue on the sweater, besides the sleeve number trim and the collar. But obviously there needs to be a lot more. They made a great change matching the striping of the home sweater to the socks at home, with the single silver stripe, but they should have matched the road pattern too. That's partly why the original white jersey worked, was because there was matching colors all over the jersey. The dark needed the work, but was fixed when they adapted the mountain pattern to the Adizero template.

 

If the Avs used blue numbers and had silver and blue trim on the road, then there wouldn't be a problem. They should have done this from the get-go with Adidas. Because they ended up with a burgundy and silver and black team on the road, with a little blue trim mixed in. Now they look like they've got the wrong gear. None of the elements look or feel like they were designed for each other.

[Sport]

I think a pretty easy solve for the white jerseys is blue numbers, obviously and of course, and then add a blue stripe to the sleeves and hem like they used to have 

 

[AFirestormToPurify]

12 hours ago, Morgan33 said:

 

It's a uniform representing a fire-themed team, not a literal depiction of fire...  Black is a perfectly acceptable colour for them to use.  It's also about as far from Black for Blacks Sake as it gets since it adds some much needed contrast and definition to a scheme that is overly bright and borderline gaudy.  The new uniforms might be an improvement over what they've used for the past 13 seasons but IMO they're still a massive downgrade from what they had from 2004 to 2007.
 

 

 

They don't actually need contrast. Bright red and gold looks bright and warm, it works just fine. I prefer a White Hot C to Burned to a Crisp C, but that's just me I guess

 

12 hours ago, Ridleylash said:

This is a sports brand, not a photorealistic illustration, it doesn't need to be literal. This is like saying "the Leafs should ditch blue and be a green team because maple leaves are green and not blue"; like yeah, it's not literally true, but it's not supposed to be a literal thing.

Besides, I see nothing objectively wrong about this look, and certainly nothing that says "BFBS" (a term which has become so overused it's beginning to lose meaning beyond "uniform set that I don't like what has black in it");

UniWatch's definition of BFBS is "Stands for “black for blackCs sake,” a reference to teams that gratuitously add black to their uniform design even though black was never one of their team colors.", and explicitly uses the black Mets jersey as an example. Personally, I think this is far more egregious a case of BFBS than any black-inclusive Flames jersey has ever been;

Like, who looks at the A's uniforms and thinks "You know what this team needs? A black alternate which uses basically no green at all!"? That's what I qualify as BFBS; black being added for no other reason but to have black. The Flames changed their entire uniform design when they added black to the scheme, so I'd count it as more of a normal uniform overhaul as opposed to true-blue BFBS, since black was designed around rather than lazily slapped in to try and make it look cooler.

Even in hockey, I'd say the Isles are exponentially more guilty of BFBS than the Flames;

 

 

The Leafs comparison doesn't work. The Flames look better without the black because in the context of a fire, black represents things that are no longer on fire and just burned and dead, you don't want that imo. BFBS is ”a reference to teams that gratuitously add black to their uniform design even though black was never one of their team colors.", so the Flames? I like how you contradict yourself on that one while giving other examples of teams that did the very same thing. None of them needed black, but it's definitely worse for a team called the Flames. Nice mental gymnastics there to convince yourself that the Flames adding black to their scheme in the 90s at the height of the BFBS movement somehow isn't BFBS because you think it looks good. Why are you even talking about the Islanders? Whataboutism at this point lol. With that being said, I think the black Blasty jersey looks great. Probably because it looks like a completely different and also partly because of nostalgia probably. But only as a third/fourth jersey

[AFirestormToPurify]

2 hours ago, spartacat_12 said:

 

I feel like number changes don't have the same sort of deadlines as jersey design changes. I remember when Tampa rebranded with single-colour numbers originally. People complained about the lack of black in the design, so they quickly scrambled and switched to double-outlined numbers with black trim.

They also added the lightning bolt back on the pants. So adding burgundy to the gloves and pants is definitely doable

[CreamSoda]

Maybe one of our Adidas insiders can chime in here.  Any plans for Colorado to change the numbers to blue?

[monkeypower]

5 hours ago, Sport said:

 

That alternate captain A is brutal. Going with the silver outline on the white is bad enough for the numbers, but looks terrible on the captain's letters.

 

It also looks terrible with the silver outline on the aways.

 

Look at the sleeve numbers on the away jersey too with the "correct" colouring. If the numbers are like that on the burgundy sleeves, why can't they be like that for the burgundy jersey?

 

There's just so many minor flaws with the Avalanche jerseys that add up to really bring down what should be a good set. 

[Sport]

2 minutes ago, monkeypower said:

 

That alternate captain A is brutal. Going with the silver outline on the white is bad enough for the numbers, but looks terrible on the captain's letters.

 

It also looks terrible with the silver outline on the aways.

 

Look at the sleeve numbers on the away jersey too with the "correct" colouring. If the numbers are like that on the burgundy sleeves, why can't they be like that for the burgundy jersey?

 

There's just so many minor flaws with the Avalanche jerseys that add up to really bring down what should be a good set. 

 

Yeah agreed. When they went back to the mountain striping they really botched the numbers. They chose to outline the numbers in gray, which by my calculations is the absolute worst choice they could've made. It just makes the numbers look fat. White numbers no outline, better. White numbers, black outline, better. White numbers, blue outline, better! 

 

Why couldn't they have just done this?

[habsfan1]

16 hours ago, nash61 said:

Numbers are still black.

 

 

[spartacat_12]

6 hours ago, Sport said:

The Avs uniforms main problem has always been that they have one too many colors. With the Avalanche Uniforms 1.0 this wasn't that big of a problem because they used black on the jersey's striping (also true of the EDGE uniforms, to be fair). The issue was with the white jerseys where the only black to be found was the numbers on their backs, which was presumably a decision made so the black pants didn't stick out too much. With the burgundy jerseys they were a burgundy-blue-black-gray team, but on the road they were a burgundy-black team. This got worse when they revisited the mountain striping a few years ago when they thankfully took their EDGE uniforms behind the shed and shot them, but that revised jersey, though clean and in my opinion a better look than the 1.0 jerseys, it still had the 'One Too Many Colors' problem and with no black in the burgundy jersey it made the black gear stick out even more. 

 

Definitely agree on the too many colours issue. I think the better choice might have been to get rid of silver instead of black. The shade of blue that they use is light enough that the silver isn't necessary. I know not everyone is a fan of the diagonal wordmark, but this set is the only time the black gear hasn't looked out of place:

 

 

I don't mind the blue equipment, but they need to completely eliminate black for it to work. Changing the away numbers to blue would make a huge difference.

[Sport]

I actually liked those jerseys. It was the later blue alternates with the diagonal lettering that I couldn’t get behind. Though, if one team uses diagonal lettering on a jersey it would make sense for the team named after something falling down a slope! 

[AFirestormToPurify]

8 minutes ago, spartacat_12 said:

 

Definitely agree on the too many colours issue. I think the better choice might have been to get rid of silver instead of black. The shade of blue that they use is light enough that the silver isn't necessary. I know not everyone is a fan of the diagonal wordmark, but this set is the only time the black gear hasn't looked out of place:

 

 

I don't mind the blue equipment, but they need to completely eliminate black for it to work. Changing the away numbers to blue would make a huge difference.

I really liked the blue version of the diagonal wordmark third jersey from the 2010s, even more than the current navy alternates. Those were just boring and unnecessary. Unpopular opinion?

[CreamSoda]

I think the huge divide on the Avs is if you like them in blue or burgundy.  I prefer blue.  A lot of folks don’t.  
 

I liked the blue script sweater and this new blue gear setup.  Never liked the burgundy script. 

[Ark]

Unsurprisingly the blue pants on the Avs away uniform look terrible. They should go burgundy pants on the road and add more blue as an accent color. Blue pants are never going to look good with that huge burgundy mountain stripe right above.

 

Not changing the numbers on the away jersey is just embarrassing, though.

 

[The_Admiral]

For a long time now I haven't been able to shake the feeling that the Denver branch of the Kroenkempire is about 90% concerned with the Nuggets and 10% with the Avs. It's sort of the same breakdown as MSG with the Knicks and the Rangers, except that Dolan is so toxic that neglecting the Rangers works to their benefit. I just feel like all these little oversights with the Avs wouldn't slip by if more people in the organization cared.

[RyanMcD29]

On Colorado: The blue helmets and breezers are turning out to be one of those deals where it's better in concept than execution. Normally something that's a team color and not black would be preferable, but it just doesn't look right between the various shades of blue on the helmets depending on the manufacturer and then the pants with the away jerseys having all the burgundy on the bottom. It might get better as i get more used to it but at the very least they probably should've gone with burgundy breezers on the road

 

On Calgary: Saw the debate in the morning, still in the camp of keep the current throwbacks for home and away, bring back the Iginla 2004 jerseys as a permanent third jersey, never change the look again

[monkeypower]

I don't really have a problem with the look of the blue pants and gloves (I could do without the white cuff band thing, maybe try burgundy there?) with the burgundy heavy jersey. Maybe it's because I grew up seeing these jerseys all the time.

 

 

The silver jersey striping should be blue though...

[DEAD!]

3 hours ago, Sport said:

I actually liked those jerseys. It was the later blue alternates with the diagonal lettering that I couldn’t get behind. Though, if one team uses diagonal lettering on a jersey it would make sense for the team named after something falling down a slope! 

Wait..... I just realised all this time, they could have done something like this?