NHL reveals "bold jersey designs" for 2015 All-Stars
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Last Friday, the NHL finally made it official. These are the new jerseys we'll see later this month for the 2015 NHL All-Star Game in Columbus.
And that's not your screen. They really are that color.
If anything, hopefully the many months of speculation that these jerseys would feature some amount of neon green — dating back to July and all but confirmed last month — helped ease what would've otherwise been a pretty significant shock to the system.
Still. Wow. Seeing it there is just... inexplicable.
So I have to address that fact off the top. For the first time in league history, the NHL's All-Stars will wear neon green. Why? Allow me to argue with the press release.
The "elite green" color, while new to fans as a primary color, actually is in the necklines of all authentic NHL jerseys.
Oh lord, I'm sorry — "elite green." That's not pretentious at all.
"This was a fresher spin and a color that is unique," lead NHL Reebok designer Dominic Fillion said. "No other team owns this color so that was unique and it complemented very well the black and white while bringing a great accent with high visibility. We wanted something energetic and bright enough that it would stand out and grab your attention.
But... it's irrelevant to the NHL. You can grab someone's attention by stabbing them in the face but that doesn't mean you should do it. Guys, come on...
"We wanted something that fans hadn't seen on an NHL uniform before."
All right. Well, it makes it hard to take these people seriously when their strategy swings so wildly from one All-Star uniform set to the next.
Let me remind you that in 2011 — at the unveiling of the previous design in Raleigh — we were told that the six colors seen in the two jerseys were chosen because they represent the majority of teams in the NHL.
Now, they've chosen elite green — I'm sorry I just can't — neon green... because it represents no team? Really? And why is that a good thing? I'm at a loss.
At this point, the "chill out bro" comments are likely to start piling up, so let me say this for the record — I don't really care that the jerseys look silly. As a marketing professional, I'm a little bewildered at the league's lack of consistency and sense of taste here.
Stop pandering to dumb 12-year-olds! There are plenty of people with working eyes who would buy a nice-looking hockey jersey just because it looks nice.
Anyway, so there's more.
Another addition to the jersey is the authentic team logo and event mark on the shoulders, which is new with regard to the All-Star Game. Typical All-Star jerseys had the team logo for a particular player on the shoulder and in its actual team color.
"With this jersey we wanted to be consistent from head to toe, so we brought the team mark on the shoulder down to a more darker tone so it would complement the uniform look yet give it a modern visual," Fillion said. "We feel it complements the colors of the jersey well."
That's right, so just like the two-tone black and grey All-Star Game patch on the right shoulder, the player's team logo will be on the other should in the same colorless, two-tone style.
The good news, if you can paint it, is that Justin Faulk is already covered with the shoulder patch from his Hurricanes third jersey.
If you're curious about what the other 29 team logos will look like in black and grey, standby. I hope to add a complete graphic to this post soon.
So that about does it. It should be clear by this point that I am not a fan of these jerseys. Normally, I like when the league steps outside the box for a new specialty jersey design, but this one just went three steps too far.
The All-Star Game has been a joke for quite long time now, but that doesn't mean the jerseys have to be as well. I know this one is likely to be recycled in 2016, but let's see something classy for the league's 100th birthday in 2017, right?
By the way, for those wondering about my extended absence recently, a quick explanation may be in order. I went to Florida to see my family for the holidays (first time since moving to Seattle) and followed that up with another trip for my wedding anniversary this past weekend — which ended with me getting extremely sick. Food poisoning, I imagine. I'm over it now, but it was touch and go for a while.
All that conspired to keep me away from the site these last three weeks. But I'm back now and I'll be covering all the bits of news I missed in that span. And there were some good nuggets. So stay tuned to the blog for more throughout the weekend.
As promised, here's a projected look at the 30 NHL team logos as they will appear on the shoulder of each player's 2015 All-Star jersey.
