NHL’s New Seattle Kraken Announce Name & Logos

[gsn93]

This probably fits better in the unpopular opinions thread, but I actually like the name Minnesota Wild. Might be the only one here. It's not perfect, but it's better than most of the proposals.

[Digby]

5 hours ago, CaliforniaGlowin said:

I'd love Seattle's AHL team to be the Jellyfish to stick with the nautical theme.  Wouldn't work for Palm Springs though.

in fairness nothing about ice hockey should work in Palm Springs, so what the hell?

[spartacat_12]

7 hours ago, SFGiants58 said:

Northmen, Norsemen, Voyageurs, and Geminis all work for me.

 

Northmen/Norsemen feels too similar to the Vikings, and Geminis is derivative of the Twins. Voyageurs sounds ok, but it would seem strange for an American team to be using a French-Canadian name.

 

Considering we're having this discussion now, I guess that means in 20 years people will still be arguing for Seattle to be the Sockeyes/Metros/Emeralds/etc.

[andrewharrington]

On 8/5/2020 at 6:38 PM, BringBackTheVet said:

Remind me - what's the story behind why the Kraken have a logo that's a boat anchor?  I love the logo so much that I never stopped to question why a part of a boat would be a logo for a team named for sea monsters.

I think the anchor is a symbol that communicates very well, being essentially *the* symbol of the sea, and it’s surprisingly underused in pro sports, so there’s a good opportunity for them to own a really strong icon there. I almost see it as a more conservative, mature alternative to the primary, because not only does it act as the slouchy dad cap to the primary’s flat bill snapback, it also holds up as a crest, which is a huge asset in a secondary logo.

 

The action of sinking or pulling something under is a nice metaphor for the creature, but from a more realistic/less fantasy point of view, which is a great thing to have, giving tepid fans a “dip your toe in” option if they’re still on the fence. If I think of the primary as embodying the creature itself, I think the secondary embodies the people who tell its stories. This is what they fly on their sails. I also think of “dropping anchor” as the seafaring version of “planting your flag,” so it fits well within that direction.

 

Beyond that, it’s just a solid, universal symbol of strength (the anchor of the defense), and it’s a genuine symbol of pride in seaworthy cultures (sailors traditionally got anchor tattoos to show that they’d been across the ocean). Throw in the perfect fit of Seattle’s most famous landmark, and I don’t think it could have been anything else.

[nash61]

5 hours ago, gsn93 said:

This probably fits better in the unpopular opinions thread, but I actually like the name Minnesota Wild. Might be the only one here. It's not perfect, but it's better than most of the proposals.

For what it's worth, the NAHL has the Minnesota Wilderness

 

[Chromatic]

Is Minnesota known for being particularly rugged wilderness? All I know about it are the Twin Cities, lots of lakes, and that its directly south of Manitoba, so I picture prairie rather than dense woods.

[Cujo]

15 hours ago, gosioux76 said:

 Wild was among six finalist names submitted by fans: Freeze, Northern Lights, Blue Ox, White Bears, Voyageurs and Wild

 

Wild was selected over Voyageurs?

 

[chcarlson23]

6 minutes ago, Chromatic said:

Is Minnesota known for being particularly rugged wilderness? All I know about it are the Twin Cities, lots of lakes, and that its directly south of Manitoba, so I picture prairie rather than dense woods.

What we call up North in the Twin Cities, which is the North Shore area, and honestly as far west as about Detroit Lakes is pretty heavily wooded areas. There’s the Boundary Waters which has extensive wilderness, as does most of the Northeastern part of the state. Basically from the Twin Cities, north, and as far west as Detroit Lakes up to the Canadian border is all heavy woods, with some farm land, and LOTS of lakes. The rest of the state is open prairie and farm land with a few lakes. 
 

I would have to say it’s known for its wilderness...

 

2 hours ago, spartacat_12 said:

 

Northmen/Norsemen feels too similar to the Vikings, and Geminis is derivative of the Twins. Voyageurs sounds ok, but it would seem strange for an American team to be using a French-Canadian name.

The French-Canadians were pretty busy in Northern Minnesota. I mean Voyagers National Park is locates in Northern Minnesota, right along the Canadian border. 

[GhostOfNormMacdonald]

2 hours ago, spartacat_12 said:

Voyageurs sounds ok, but it would seem strange for an American team to be using a French-Canadian name.

The states motto is an homage to French-Canadians who founded many settlements in Minnesota. In fact, the county Minneapolis is in is named after a French-Canadian

[Chromatic]

Not to mention 'Voyageurs' invokes the spirit of the uncharted wilderness theme without being as awful as 'Wild'

[-Akronite-]

5 hours ago, chcarlson23 said:

What we call up North in the Twin Cities, which is the North Shore area, and honestly as far west as about Detroit Lakes is pretty heavily wooded areas. There’s the Boundary Waters which has extensive wilderness, as does most of the Northeastern part of the state. Basically from the Twin Cities, north, and as far west as Detroit Lakes up to the Canadian border is all heavy woods, with some farm land, and LOTS of lakes. The rest of the state is open prairie and farm land with a few lakes. 
 

I would have to say it’s known for its wilderness...

 

The French-Canadians were pretty busy in Northern Minnesota. I mean Voyagers National Park is locates in Northern Minnesota, right along the Canadian border. 

 

As a kid in my Boy Scout troop we took a trip to the Boundary Waters to canoe, portage, and camp for a week. We took a train to St. Paul and drove through endless woods to get to pristine lakes that looked like glass in the mornings. At night a dense cloud of mosquitos would cover your camp, more than I've ever seen, so you'd need to be closed up in your tent by a certain time. Minnesota has kickass wilderness IMO.

[charger77]

14 hours ago, BringBackTheVet said:

 

 

It's a f-ing schooner.

 

A schooner is a sailboat stupid!

[Digby]

I haven't really thought about it before, but what is the Wild's animal head? Is it a bear? Kinda looks like a fisher to me too, almost, which would be cool. But I don't know if Minnesota has fishers.

[Ridleylash]

Just now, Digby said:

I haven't really thought about it before, but what is the Wild's animal head? Is it a bear? Kinda looks like a fisher to me too, almost, which would be cool. But I don't know if Minnesota has fishers.

From what I recall, it's just a "wild animal" officially with no set identity.

[WSU151]

8 hours ago, Chromatic said:

Is Minnesota known for being particularly rugged wilderness? All I know about it are the Twin Cities, lots of lakes, and that its directly south of Manitoba, so I picture prairie rather than dense woods.

 

The northeast part of the state is all forest. maps.google.com it. 

[Brian in Boston]

12 hours ago, andrewharrington said:

Beyond that, it’s just a solid, universal symbol of strength (the anchor of the defense), and it’s a genuine symbol of pride in seaworthy cultures (sailors traditionally got anchor tattoos to show that they’d been across the ocean).

It's also a symbol of hope. That strikes me as particularly fitting for an expansion team, as hope is often all that fans of an expansion franchise have to hang their hats on for several seasons.

[CaliforniaGlowin]

19 hours ago, Digby said:

in fairness nothing about ice hockey should work in Palm Springs, so what the hell?

Seattle was planning on having their AHL team in Palm Springs until the world went down.  Now that's in danger.

[Digby]

4 hours ago, CaliforniaGlowin said:

Seattle was planning on having their AHL team in Palm Springs until the world went down.  Now that's in danger.

I’m aware, I just always thought that was a funny place for a hockey team.

[king_mahalo]

I've had a couple weeks to process it.

 

I'm coming around on the name. Never loved the name "Kraken". I agree it's gimmicky. But I'll get used to it. We all will. It'll sound natural within a year. However, I'm curious what the team will promote as far as nicknames, I'm sure they don't want "Krakheads" and "The Krakhouse" to gain too much traction. 

I cringe a little whenever I hear someone say "RELEASE THE KRAKEN!" I really hope they don't run with that.

 

I was disappointed by the simplicity of the logos at first, but I think they did a great job making the logos iconic and memorable. The tentacle is a nice (and necessary) touch. The logo serves as the yang (clean, timeless, and iconic) to the name's yin (strange, unique, conceptual). The alt logo is only tangentially related to Kraken, but as a logo it's beautiful. Looks great on a hat. Would love to see a lighthouse alt logo in the future, similar to NYI. 

 

Love the colors, but DAMN, why couldn't they have went with that salmon red instead of boring old red? They're trying for unique colors, promoted salmon this whole time on their website, then ditched it. Disappointed there. 

 

Uniforms are beautiful. Kind of strange to have 4 shades of blue in your palette, but it looks nice on the jerseys. Was hoping for something more wild with a name like Kraken, with tentacles down the arms or something, but they make a good decision to keep it clean and simple. Can't wait to buy a jersey.

 

I really hope the team promotes the "ice blue" color in their promo materials and designs a third jersey in that color. Would look great with an anchor crest. Was really hoping for a seafoam green and it's pretty close to that. Conversely, I hope they keep red to a minimum. 

 

I've already purchased a few pieces of merchandise. The logos look great on navy, ice blue, and white. Looks terrible on black. Fanatics sucks for merchandise.

 

Overall I'm a fan, and I'm pumped for 2021.

 

[ebod39]

On 8/6/2020 at 7:14 PM, Digby said:

in fairness nothing about ice hockey should work in Palm Springs, so what the hell?

 

The same said was about Las Vegas, so....