Tuesday, August 31, 2010
1995-96 Mighty Ducks of Anaheim Paul Kariya jersey
Monday, August 30, 2010
2003-04 Dallas Stars Alternate Mike Modano Jersey
"The new logo depicts a constellation of individual stars aligning to form an unstoppable force of nature, a charging bull. Get it? A constellation of stars aligning to form an unstoppable force? "
Only that's not how the critics saw it.
Oh no.
The bull's head immediately reminded many of a diagram of a woman's uterus, and was derisively nicknamed "The Mooterus" - a combination of a cow's "moo" and a woman's "uterus", elevating it instantaneously to the lofty status of the "named jersey", a sure sign of infamy.
The jersey, which was not very well received, was worn for two seasons, 2003-04 and 2005-06, taking a year off in the middle for the season lost to the lockout. Teams are required by the NHL to market their new alternate sweaters for a minimum of 15 games for their first season of use. The Stars reduced that number to just eight games for the 2005-06 season and refused to commit to the same amount for 2006-07, which would have been the final season for The Mooterus anyway, due to the league-wide redesign coming with the introduction of the Reebok Edge jerseys that limited teams to just home and away jerseys for 2007-08.
Dallas Stars owner Tom Hicks was quoted as saying on the occasion of The Mooterus' final game on April 3, 2006, "Good riddance. The funny thing is that you can't find anyone around here who will take credit for designing it. Nobody's left."
Jill Moore, the Stars Senior Director of Merchandising, said one of the problems with the bull's head logo was that it was designed undercover by an outside service during the days of the Southwest Sports Group's ownership of the Stars. The conglomerate had a plan - trying to mix the thought of a constellation, stars, with a Texas icon, the bull head.
The team did make $400,000 from sales of the jersey and went 13-7-3 while wearing it, but the mixture of too many ideas combined with a lack of testing led to the backlash against it.
There were no additional patches worn on the jersey in either season of it's use.
We classify this jersey as clearly "Ugly" due to the unexplained inclusion of red, which was not only never a Dallas Stars color, but the way the red looked combined with the predominately black jersey and the dark shades of green and gold used by the Stars. Overall it was a dark and depressing jersey even before the logo was applied to it.
As for the logo itself, as stated above, there was just too many ideas combined for it to ever work. Perhaps a simplified bull's head logo with a single star (which worked up the road in Houston quite nicely) rather than the constellation overlay might have been more effective, in the way that the Calgary Flames horse head logo paid homage to the Calgary Stampede rodeo and the city's western heritage, with just enough flames to tie it to the team's name.
As it was, the logo just didn't look enough like a bull's head and was overshadowed by the busyness of not only the stars placed on it, but the lines connecting them as well. The unnecessary shooting star on the logo only added to the visual confusion since there were already stars pictured inside the bull's head. The streak of red behind it only served to grab the viewer's eye away from the more muted tones of the black and green bull's head.
Then there was the logo's unfortunate resemblance to the female reproductive system, which reduced the entire thing to a laughingstock. In hindsight, they should have at least curved the bull's horns upwards to diminish the comparison to the medical diagram since the logo was not faithful to the actual constellation of Taurus in the first place.
Also odd was the decision to not use any red in the customization specifications. The colors used for the names and numbers, taken straight from the green home jerseys look out of place on the alternate since the gold color trim on the numbers does not match the gold color of the stripes on the jerseys. Perhaps changing the black trim of the names and numbers to red might have made them look like they were meant to be on the jersey from the beginning. This would have helped tie the entire package together and helped to justify the appearance of the red on the jersey in the first place. As it was done, the jersey and the customizing don't look like they were meant to be together on the same sweater.
Since these jerseys were only worn for a total of 23 games, let's see what kind of luck we can have looking for video of them in action, although you probably can predict by now that if we do find any game footage, it will most likely be fisticuffs...
Sure enough...
Here's some actual skating and passing featuring Stu Barnes.
Friday, August 27, 2010
1995-96 Los Angeles Kings Wayne Gretzky Jersey
Thursday, August 26, 2010
1974-75 California Golden Seals Marv Edwards Jersey
Politically, Swig and the Gunds were relying on Swig's political connections with San Francisco Mayor Joseph L. Alioto to get a new hockey arena built downtown. "Alioto was very helpful, " Gund remembered. "He had hoped to put the team where the Moscone Center is now. It was very close to public transportation."Regrettably for the Seals, Swig's timing was off. Alioto was leaving office and Swig supported the wrong man in the 1975 election. When George Moscone took office, the new arena died. "The new mayor put the building on hold." Len Shapiro said. "He ran an investigation into the report and then said the survey had to be resurveyed , so basically, it went nowhere. Then there were plans to remodel the Cow Palace but that never happened either." Once those two plans fell through, the Seals were finished in the Bay Area."After the new arena in San Francisco fell through, the league gave us the go-ahead to move the team." Gund remembered. "We looked at a lot of other places. We looked at Denver and Seattle-Tacoma. We ended up picking Cleveland because hockey was very popular there."Rumors that the Seals would leave the Bay Area were almost as old as the team itself. The owners were quietly but aggressively looking over other locations. The NHL had planned expansion franchises for both Seattle and Denver, which were supposed to begin play in 1976-77. The new entires, though, were experiencing problems so moving the Seals to those cities was still a possibility.Shapiro recalled when he first got an inkling the team might be leaving. "On February 1, 1976, I realized something might be up. I was in the office with Loretta Marcus [the team's secretary] and nobody else was there. I had no idea where anybody was. I looked at Munson Campbell's schedule and it said he was booked at the Cleveland Hilton. Then I knew something must be up."George and Gordon Gund owned the Richfield Coliseum in Richfield, Ohio, where the NBA's Cleveland Cavaliers played. It was halfway between Akron and Cleveland, a location that would cause the franchise more problems in the future. In typical Seals fashion, even it's exit was not smooth. The club participated in the July 1976 entry draft as the Seals and even started selling tickets for the upcoming season in Oakland.At the 1976 entry draft, the Seals made history by becoming the first NHL team to use its frist-round draft pick on a European player by drafting Swedish defenseman Bjorn Johansson. The team didn't make it's intention to move officially known until August 26, 1976. It was announced that the team would move to Cleveland and take the name of the AHL franchise that played there for so many years, the Barons. Because of the late move, the Barons had a mere six weeks to sell tickets in their new home. Once again, the franchise started its new life behind the proverbial eight ball.
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
1980-81 Vancouver Canucks Richard Brodeur Jersey
Q: "Why are the Vancouver Canucks jersey's always ugly?Seriously, there [sic] always horrible. Do the designers for Vancouver really think they look good? I always get a headache watching them play.Vancouver fans, please answer! Please explain why you have idiots as designers?"A: "I thought it was a league rule. Vancouver must always have the ugliest sweaters."
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
2002-03 Nashville Predators Tomas Vokoun Jersey
First unveiled for the 2001-02 season, this Nashville Predators alternate jersey generated swift, outspoken reaction to just about every feature of the jersey, from the unusual squared neckline, the "untucked dress shirt" rear tail, both the borderline cartoonish new main crest and the secondary fossilized skull logo, neither of which appeared on the home and away jerseys at the time, and the unique double layered fabric of the body of the jersey.
The jersey was used through the 2006-07 season and did influence the home and away jerseys, to some degree, as it's secondary fossilized skull logos were transferred to the shoulders of primary jerseys for the 2005-06 season, replacing the original design used since the team's inception.