2023-24 NHL Jersey Changes

[Morgan33]

2007/08 was far and away the NHL's ugliest season.

[DTConcepts]

14 hours ago, the admiral said:

Now that NHLuniforms.com works again, I can really "appreciate" how 2002-03 was one of the ugliest seasons any league ever had. 

 

Strong disagree. Aside from a couple of awkward alternates, (NYI, VAN) Ottawa's toga jerseys, and Buffalo/LA's weird waist wordmarks I think 2002-23 was a fine season jersey-wise. The Edgification of the league a few years later was so much worse.

Edited December 10, 2023 by DTConcepts
Clarified teams

[Morgan33]

Also going to strongly disagree with that statement.  Off the top of my head, I can think of 7 teams that looked better in 2002/03 than they do right now...   

 

The Anaheim Ducks, Carolina Hurricanes, Colorado Avalanche, Florida Panthers, Nashville Predators, New Jersey Devils and Tampa Bay Lightning.

 

[mjarvie]

Watching the Kings- Rangers game and the Rangers new jerseys/socks are very underwhelming.

[Ridleylash]

Oof, these are pretty bland. It just seems like a needless attempt to "modernize" the classic blue jersey that just ends up coming off more like a Walmart knockoff trying to ape the Liberty jersey's style than anything. The overwhelming amount of blue makes the pants stick out like a sore thumb, too.

 

And the captain's patch is...less than ideally placed;

[ruttep]

2 minutes ago, Ridleylash said:

Oof, these are pretty bland. It just seems like a needless attempt to "modernize" the classic blue jersey that just ends up coming off more like a Walmart knockoff than anything.

 

And the captain's patch is...less than ideally placed;

 

So jarring. We haven't had a real alternate jersey since 2017. I'll critique it at a later date, since it just looks plain weird to me right now.

 

One note on tonight's matchup tho: The Kings' chrome helmets can  right off.

[Chewbacca]

4 hours ago, Ridleylash said:

I would have rather seen a white version of this worn for the Stadium Series and nothing more. I’m not a fan of this look. Also, with Fanatics replacing Adidas next season, why are teams bringing out new alternate uniforms this season?

[ruttep]

1 minute ago, Chewbacca said:

I would have rather seen a white version of this worn for the Stadium Series and nothing more. I’m not a fan of this look. Also, with Fanatics replacing Adidas next season, why are teams bringing out new alternate uniforms this season?

 

It's very possible that Fanatics isn't going to change anything about the on-ice uniforms next year. They already announced they're going to be producing the uniforms in the same factory that Adidas is currently using, so maybe the NHL is permitting teams to keep their alternates for the transition. 

 

Teams were allowed to keep their uniforms after the lockout when the NHL went from CCM/Koho to Reebok (in the couple of seasons they had the contract before the Edge template)

[ruttep]

On 12/9/2023 at 8:33 PM, Kevin W. said:

It's funny that you'd mention that since 2003-04 is (IMO) one of the best-looking seasons the league has ever had.

 

My personal favorite season is 1990-91. 

- Last year before the North Stars went to a black uniform

- First year of the final original Jets uniforms

- Rangers introduce arched nameplates

- Skate uniforms were toned down so that there's no yellow home jersey

- None of the darker 90s rebrands have kicked in yet (the Kings are in silver/black, but that happened in 1988)

[Around the Horn]

4 hours ago, Ridleylash said:

Oof, these are pretty bland. It just seems like a needless attempt to "modernize" the classic blue jersey that just ends up coming off more like a Walmart knockoff trying to ape the Liberty jersey's style than anything. The overwhelming amount of blue makes the pants stick out like a sore thumb, too.

 

And the captain's patch is...less than ideally placed;

The more I watched the game tonight, the more I was thinking a navy alt would look fine if it was the old NEW YORK font on the front instead of the shield

 

 

Also the lack of a drop shadow looks awful on TV because it makes the numbers thinner and harder to read...

[Morgan33]

It's  so frustrating that the Liberty design still isn't a part of their main set.  Navy base/royal base... either would be an marked improvement over what was released.  That logo just isn't meant to be used as a front crest.

 

[DTConcepts]

1 hour ago, Morgan33 said:

It's  so frustrating that the Liberty design still isn't a part of their main set.  Navy base/royal base... either would be an marked improvement over what was released.  That logo just isn't meant to be used as a front crest.

 

Agreed. This is all they had to do to make these jerseys a home run, or at least passable, imo

[VancouverFan69]

15 hours ago, ruttep said:

 

My personal favorite season is 1990-91. 

 

- Skate uniforms were toned down so that there's no yellow home jersey

 

It was actually the second season of the Canucks' home white Skate uniform.

 

There was nothing wrong with yellow-gold as the home uniform. Added variety to light-coloured uniforms and created colour vs colour. The problems were the V yokes, the thick striping, how the Skate logo itself was screwed up by having a yellow background behind the yellow CANUCKS wordmark and by missing one of the white streaking lines and most of all, the constant losing.

 

The updated Skate with the vibrant yellow and red and with more black and no white would look gorgeous on the new shade of yellow.

[ruttep]

25 minutes ago, VancouverFan69 said:

There was nothing wrong with yellow-gold as the home uniform. Added variety to light-coloured uniforms and created colour vs colour. The problems were the V yokes, the thick striping, how the Skate logo itself was screwed up by having a yellow background behind the yellow CANUCKS wordmark and by missing one of the white streaking lines and most of all, the constant losing.

 

Yellow is such a weird uniform color to me. I don't really like it as a light or a dark uniform color. I think that Nashville's current home yellow doesn't contrast well enough against any road team in white jerseys, and I've never been a fan of color vs color in any sport. But no argument from me that the design of that yellow Canucks uniform's design was lacking.

[VancouverFan69]

1 hour ago, ruttep said:

 

Yellow is such a weird uniform color to me. I don't really like it as a light or a dark uniform color. I think that Nashville's current home yellow doesn't contrast well enough against any road team in white jerseys, and I've never been a fan of color vs color in any sport. But no argument from me that the design of that yellow Canucks uniform's design was lacking.

 

I love the Predators home yellow-gold uniforms. Much unlike that nauseating Dijon mustard they wore in the mid 2000's.  

 

Yellow and yellow-gold(Athletic gold) should be used as a light base like white. I agree, I was ever was a fan of yellow vs white in any sport...hockey, basketball, soccer. However, with the right colour scheme including a complementary dark colour like black, navy blue, forest green, burgundy and purple, yellow as a light primary can look amazing. Loved the Canucks-Flames uniform matchups at the Pacific Coliseum during the 80's. Like the Bulls-Lakers matchups in LA. Even black vs yellow looks awesome.

[Morgan33]

6 hours ago, DTConcepts said:

 

Agreed. This is all they had to do to make these jerseys a home run, or at least passable, imo

 

That's a improvement for sure... I like the addition of Royal Blue to the crest.  Unfortunately, there's no saving that striping configuration.

[ruttep]

16 minutes ago, VancouverFan69 said:

 

I love the Predators home yellow-gold uniforms. Much unlike that nauseating Dijon mustard they wore in the mid 2000's.  

 

Yellow and yellow-gold(Athletic gold) should be used as a light base like white. I agree, I was ever was a fan of yellow vs white in any sport...hockey, basketball, soccer. However, with the right colour scheme including a complementary dark colour like black, navy blue, forest green, burgundy and purple, yellow as a light primary can look amazing. Loved the Canucks-Flames uniform matchups at the Pacific Coliseum during the 80's. Like the Bulls-Lakers matchups in LA. Even black vs yellow looks awesome.

 

Yeah, this is more about my dislike for color vs color than anything. I do wonder if the Preds home jersey would still be yellow if the NHL went light-colors-at-home and they'd introduce a corresponding navy jersey.

[Morgan33]

The Predators issue isn't the use of gold at home, that was a brilliant move that has really helped their brand stand out.  It's ridiculously bland jerseys, with nondescript, minimalist striping.  Time has shown that maybe getting rid of silver entirely wasn't the best idea either.  Still, they are very close to a great design and in my opinion, the solution lies between these two designs...  Surely there's the potential for the perfect Predators jersey there.

 

[Around the Horn]

18 minutes ago, Morgan33 said:

The Predators issue isn't the use of gold at home, that was a brilliant move that has really helped their brand stand out.  It's ridiculously bland jerseys, with nondescript, minimalist striping.  Time has shown that maybe getting rid of silver entirely wasn't the best idea either.  Still, they are very close to a great design and in my opinion, the solution lies between these two designs...  Surely there's the potential for the perfect Predators jersey there.

 

I would be interested to see if they could pull off a keyboard sleeve stripe like what's inside the collar separating the gold from the navy but the dark keys taper like fangs

 

Might be *too* busy though

[ruttep]

1 hour ago, Morgan33 said:

The Predators issue isn't the use of gold at home, that was a brilliant move that has really helped their brand stand out.  It's ridiculously bland jerseys, with nondescript, minimalist striping.  Time has shown that maybe getting rid of silver entirely wasn't the best idea either.  Still, they are very close to a great design and in my opinion, the solution lies between these two designs...  Surely there's the potential for the perfect Predators jersey there.

 

 

I agree that the Preds' minimalist design is the main issue here, but I'll reiterate that I don't like yellow as a jersey color because it doesn't work as a light jersey or a dark jersey. Wear it against white, the game looks too light. Wear it against a color jersey, the game looks too dark.