Wednesday: Predator or Prey?

It's Wednesday, ladies and gents.

Big ticket items this week include two COTW votes (both the regular COTW and the COTM vote for the month of October). Don't forget about the weekly Jersey Nerds Podcast and the Nashville Predators ReDesign competition! (Entries are now open and will close on Black Friday).

With that in mind, let's see what we've got so far...

Mac W.

Avi S.

Danny R.

Looking good, gentlemen! Think you've got something better? Send it in to hjccontest@gmail.com and we'll see which reigns supreme.

REMINDERS:

COTW October vote (ends Friday at 12pm ET)

COTW November 2-8 vote (ends Friday at 12pm ET)

Jersey Nerds Podcast (new episode every Tuesday)

Nashville Predators ReDesign (entries due by November 23rd)

On to the concepts!

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Burkus Circus.- Boston Bruins (Digital Six)

The Digital Six series release by EA Sports and Adidas exclusively for NHL19 was... certainly something. You've got to give them credit for going out of the box, but beyond that there wasn't too much to get jazzed up about. Honestly, the Bruins look was probably the worst of the bunch. With all the forced patriotism that comes with being America's first team, the look had 13 alternating black and yellow stripes that ran directly into the logo and frankly left it looking more like a cycling uniform than a hockey jersey. Burkus does what he can here to salvage the look and, to give him credit, he improves it mightily. Swapping black for grey as the primary freshens up the look. Matching the white fill of the arms on the hem ties it together, and cleaning up the striping makes this actually recognizable as a hockey look. Unfortunately, the oddly patriotic primary returns in all its star-spangled glory and Burkus also makes a critical mistake on the arms. If you look closely, there's now only 12 alternating black and yellow stripes there. Might as well throw an extra one on their and rep the whole of the original colonies. 

Overall Rating: 8.5/10

Definitely a step in the right direction. But a few more steps need to be taken for this to be a look I'd be happy too see, even in a video game.

Jordan R.- Adirondack Thunder

If you ask me, one thing Nashville did right in their rebrand is a yellow primary. There's only so many ways to maintain a unique brand in a 31 (soon to be 32) team league, so owning a unique color is definitely a great way to establish a foothold. Here, we see Jordan do the same with the Adirondack Thunder. The Thunder currently wear an uninspired red and black look, so its nice to see Jordan breathe some life into the logo set with a new pallete. There's little to complain about in the jerseys as Jordan presents something that its honestly shocked me has not been adopted in some form by the Tampa Bay Lightning as at least an alternate. The Lightning yoke works well on all 3 jerseys, but I think the third points out a flaw in the other two. On a two color jersey, the bolt really stands out and is able to be the star of the look. On the primaries, the grey underarms really muddy up the look. Swap those for the primary jersey color and you've got a darn near perfect look across the board.

Overall Rating: 9.0/10

Grey skies mean thunder's on the way, but remove that grey and I'd be even happier to see them coming.

Lucas D.- Texas Rangers (MLB)

Lucas brings us to my hometown baseball team with a trip to Arlington. Having grown up on Rangers baseball, its fun to see the identity taken from the grass to the ice, but if I'm entirely honest, this look is far from perfect. First, though I entirely understand and approve of the removal of the baseball stitching from the logo, the removal of its one unique element leaves it looking quite bare. And while I'm usually all for logo-inspired striping patterns, I'm afraid this one doesn't transition to a hockey jersey particularly well. While I think it works fine on the side panels, adopting the same look on the arms is just a bit too garish for me and puts the look dangerously close to the minor league category. I'd also recommend swapping the red and blue on the name and numbers of the away. With the home being blue-dominant, it creates a disconnect to have so much red on the road.

Overall Rating: 6.75/10

The stars might be big, but they're not shining too bright deep in the heart of Texas.

Mac W.- Colorado Avalanche

Mac' NHL redesign continues with the Colorado Avalanche! While a appreciate the fact that you're coming up with your own logos for this series, I can't say there's much a point in the cases where they're a downgrade from what already exists. Here, the primary loses all hints of being an "A" and half the logo disappears against the burgundy background of the home sweater. I can't exactly say the jerseys are a big upgrade either, as the beautiful mountain striping is constrained to the hem. If this is going to be the look, I'm not sure why you wouldn't add a stripe to the yoke to match the rest of the striping. One thing I will say, is you've fixed the two things that have irked me about the Av's away since they unveiled it and that's 1) Swapping the grey outline of the striping for blue and 2) Getting rid of those nasty black numbers. I can't stand black in the Avs color pallet and have long awaited them removing it from their equipment. On that note, it'd be nice to see what you had in mind for equipment here as no concept is quite complete without the full look taken into account.

Overall Rating: 8.25/10

A new peak for the Avs, but unfortunately far from the summit already established.

That's all for today folks. 

This week's COTW Nomination heads to Jordan's Adirondack Thunder Concept

Like what you see? Hate what you see? Want to see something different?

Let us know in the comments and be sure to shoot your designs to concepts@hockeyjerseyconcepts.com to make your mark on our daily posts.

We'll see you all next week!