Monday
Jul072008
Rebranding The Sabres
64 CommentsAs promised, today brings the unveiling of the 11th design in Matt's Rebranding The NHL series — the Buffalo Sabres.
And naturally, he's designed uniforms to go with these logos.
To me it seems like the best Sabres logo always revolves around the same basic theme — the original logo from the team's inception. Sometimes you just can't improve upon what came first. Or at least it's just difficult to come up with something entirely new.
Anyway, as soon as Matt tells me what team he's rebranding next, I'll tell you. In the meantime, let us know what you think of the new Sabres artwork. Leave a comment!
Reader Comments (64)
Nice, but it needs a little more edge. the swords are to cartoony looking, they need more detail.
I like the 'slug' better (and I like it more than their original logo too). The away jersey is the only thing I like, even though I think the blue version is better than the navy one.
I REALLY like the striping on the jerseys!!! i also like how the tertiary logo uses the original colors from the 70's. Great Job!!
Can't wait for the NHL 08 file to play in these!
I honestly do not like the design. The closest thing I'd accept as an update to the Sabres original logo was the one the Slabyk did. Amazing. But this one, I really can't say much for it. It lacks the creativity that Matt usually gives us.
lthe wordmark is pretty good the rest.... okay
I love the logos - they are fantastic! I'm not a great fan of the 'slash' stripes on the home and away strips, they are great colours - especially the choice for the 3rd! Great work
I like it! It's nothing new but still like it! The B logo is great! I also like the third jersey (color blue)!
Sort of looks like a design for the Michigan Wolverines. I've never loved the Buffalo logo - any of them. The team is named Sabres and yet the uniform logo almost always focuses on the Buffalo, which annoys me. This is no better or worse than any other concepts I've seen for the Sabres.
It's certainly an improvement over the slug and the red and black giant Buffalo head logo, but it's just rather unremarkable. There's nothing fresh, exciting, or innovative here. It's well designed but dull.
That all being said, I do like the striping especially on the away jersey.
I really hate that striping. TOO MANY LINES. Wow, I dislike those home and away jerseys more than anything else Matt has done. The rest is great.
All the logos are awesome, third jersey, awesome, other jerseys, not at all. Sorry, too many lines.
It's too busy for me. Just picture these on the ice. And note the socks. We have to remember we'd be watching these on ice, not just looking at them.
I respect this work and the time put into it, but I honestly think those first two jerseys are worse than Anaheim's. Sigma Kappa was whipping out better designs in an eighth of the time Matt put into these. But again, other's will like it, so I respect it.
Hard to improve on perfection, but these jerseys look really nice.
meh,
with all the time spent on this rebranding, IMO it's a severe downgrade.
the logos are rather bland, dull, as someone already mentioned cartoony, and boring. Nothing new there and i never realized how scrawny the buffaloes legs are.
as for the jerseys, the stripes that are excessively used and fail to appear to wraparound on the arms/shoulder areas. theres an unbalance of white/blue in the away jersey. the alternate/vintage jersey is the only thing worthy that came out of this concept but has already been done before.
6/10 my grade.
that buffalo doesn't look right.
I'm not sure about the jerseys the striping leaves something to be desired but i like the subtle tweak of the logo like the tweaked panthers logo. It looks good.
Never really had an opinion on the sabres one way or another however, the wordmark looks kinda like the Cheers sign.
ehhh hes done better, but thats what i expected. Still thinks hes on a higher level than sigma kappa.
did any one notice he changed the eye colour from yellow to red on his preview, like every one asked him too
See, you guys are complaining about creativity, but its hard to be creative with the sabres, you have to make it like he did. He should have chosen a team to rebrand on his own, because the sabres aren't gonna be anything but a Slabyk look-alike
Also, the complaints about the time he put into it... he has a JOB too, hes not just sitting in his basement working on this the whole time that he had for this. He probably spends as much time as Kappa, but it takes longer for him to find this time.
i agree with most of the posts. this logo set is sub-par compared to what we have seen from GFB. the striping on the jerseys would make the players look like the team mascot
( http://www.crittersbythebay.com/yippee/cr-sabcarl.jpg ). The logos show little creativity and are a downgrade from Slabkys perfect design.
Like the others said, the swords are a little cartoon-ish.
I think the buffalo is just a bit too skinny. Couple that with the frown on the buffalo's face, and he looks kinda like a goat.
What about using a non-serif typeset?
It's ok. I was hoping for something original. Honestly it looks like almost every other Sabres concept I've seen. It's an updated version of the original logo and some swords. If this is a rebrand at least use the swords more in the primary logo. The team is the Buffalo SABRES not the Buffalo Buffalos (or any other word that means the same.) I was expecting a lot more out of this post and it's the same as almost every other thing I've seen with the Sabres. Overall... Looks nice but not original at all. (But the striping on the jerseys is done very well.)
BTW... I actually like the current Buffalo logo and jerseys. I'm not a Sabres fan but I never saw anything wrong with it.
As a Sabres fan, I had mixed feelings about this from the get go. I love the vintage logo/jerseys, I have no problem with the current one, and I've never had a problem with having a Buffalo as the primary (honestly, how much can you do with just swords?).
I feel this rebrand leaves much to be desired. The Buffalo looks gaunt; like it hasn't eaten in a month. The secondary is too similar to the primary with the crossing swords. The stripping looks like it belongs on the jerseys for a team with the name "Tigers".
With all that said, I respect GFB's work and the time he puts into it; he had a hard assignment here.
I thought it was a weird choice to make the design with Miller's name on the back but there is no goalie helmet.
Better than what we current have (hell, anything would be really), but I'm not totally into it to be honest. I've seen a similar updated vintage crest before, and it looked better than this.
But hey, at least it's slug-free. Which is always a good thing. Can't believe we still parade around in those putrid things. Then again, people in this town accept just about anything from the inept ownership of the Sabres, and even ask for seconds.
I LIKE IT!!!
send this to the sabres.... maybe they'll get a clue
To be honest, it's all stuff that's been done before. From previous work Matt has done, he usually completely reworks the team. In this case, it's nothing more than slight moderations to the old logo, which I for one am really tired of seeing. It's still an improvement on the slug, and a slight improvement on the real '70s logo, but I've seen it all too many times before.
Wow i really like this Logo. Back to Basics but a little touch of New. Your awsome men i could only hope to make logo like you.
yea, woohoo. it's no better than anything else on the blog. i'm sick of the sabres. their fans need to get over the fact that you think you have a bad logo. 50% of the blog is directed towards fixing the sabres.. and i personally don't care.
great blog, to much buffalo
"great blog, to much buffalo"
Insert "roll eyes" emoticon here. If you've read this blog with any regularity over the last year, you'd know that this blog is pretty evenly spread. Sure, maybe, MAYBE!, the Canucks and the Sabres get some more face time, but I honestly don't think they get any more attention than the Wings, Rangers, or Stars.
Here is my response. I created my own unique logo and would like to share it with you all, to prove I am not a hypocrite.
go ahead and judge it all you want...
http://i306.photobucket.com/albums/nn277/postalservice9/BSabres.jpg
Sometimes less is more ... Looks great.
It would be better if the third logo [classic colored one] was the primary. The jerseys need to be navy, not black. And striping is a little excessive. 7.5/10
Oh Wow! Who didn't see this coming. I could have told you three weeks ago that the design would be the jumping buffalo with crossed swords. C'mon, this is so lame and not at all creative.
tony, not bad.
Matt really really anticlimactic sigma kappa should take matts place
As a buffalo resident and fan, this is horrible, the buffalo on this set is nearly as bad as the slug, and those arm stripes? common
one word sweetness. is it a word. oh well you know what i mean.
how predictable...
i dont like this.
Nice.
Chris, i have an idea that just might work, and might help you out a lot with content.
a lot of people have been commenting one way or another whether this is a good redesign.
a lot of people have been suggesting a head-to-head between designers.
some people have commented on a lack of quality concepts.
so lets take all of these ideas, and combine them into something that will give this blog plenty of material for a long time.
"If We Restarted the NHL" or something catchy like that.
pick a team, perhaps something easy, perhaps something pertinent like the sabres, and say "we're redesigning this team. treat it as though the league is restarting, and all you have is a team name, and a set of colors that a city likes, but doesn't HAVE to be used. no logos or jerseys can be similar to past or present looks." collect what people submit (require at least a primary logo, a home and away jersey, and if they really want, a 3rd. no throwbacks), display it in a gallery, and then begin a tournament for that team using those concepts. the readers pick the best one.
what do they win? start a new collection in the blog's flickr account called "If we restarted the NHL" or whatever, and you'll finish with 30 new designs in there, using ONLY the winners of the tournaments, and we can look at a completely new look for the league...for better or worse, it would be the best alternative to the current.
i might be just spitballing, but something of this sort might really boost new stuff (and of course include the best stuff already submitted to fill in).
Looks great, I'm not even a Sabres fan and I want one of the jerseys!
i really like hockey week's idea.
Feel like we've seen this design reworked and reworked a thousand times. Slabyk had it right the first time.
I do have to give thumbs up on the secondary logo though. I've never been a fan of the single sabre through the ugly "B". This is weighted and balanced.
The Tiger Stripes on the jersey aren't right either. I would have used that sort of design element for the Preds, Panthers or Wild. They look too much like claw scratches, but I do understand where he was coming from trying to use a "sabre" effect to the stripes.
I definitely love the Secondary logo that was created. The Bison has some proportion and balance issues within the crest. The Bison also looks kind of wimpy for lack of better words. Other than that, the crest itself is very well done with the Sabres and border. but I would agree that Slabyk was here first and overall did the bison a little better.
I would like to see Slabyk's bison within Matt's crest.
I think Matt did an overall nice job considering he has no emotional connection to the brand identity and history of the Sabres. In the team's history the best logo is forever going to be the original. Some people may actually hate it, but the majority of Sabres fans and hockey fans in general feel the original is the team's best identity and not some trendy yellow streak.
Notice he didn't try to update the slug...there is no helping the helpless.
I'm torn on this one. I am as guilty as anyone of creating re-worked original logos, because I really feel that it is what the Sabres should do. That being said, I was hoping to see a true re-brand. Maybe something new and different (but not the Slug) would have changed my mind.
It's good work, just not much different than the John's stuff. Some detail are better and some are worse. Put the right pieces together into one final design and we have a winner. However, we've known that since the Slug came out and I was looking to see what a different direction might have looked like.
Forgot to say that Tony's design is more what I was looking for. If it came to a final vote, I'd still probably go with a revised classic (like I said, I believe that is what it always should have been), but his is different and still really nice. It is a true re-brand.
Hum! Good work as usual, but it's not as thick as we are accustomed by Ghetto Farm Boy... I mean, there's too many non important little things around the logos... Like the 2 colors in the wordmark and in the "B" logo (secondary)... These are not necessary...
The wordmark looks too... basebally
So chris, are we going to have another poll about which team he should do next, or is he going to choose on his own?
meh.
i'm not saying this isn't good.
i'm just saying it was overhyped. how long did we wait for this? too long.
take the preds logo, throw it on the front of the anything but the third [which is a rebrand how? new ish logo?] with a smidge of silver-lining and THAT'S what you do with these.
i'm not slagging gfb - but with the amount of time spent on this, i expected a lot more... there's very limited creativity in these, and a REBRAND, this is not.
give the time and software he used to anyone else and you'll see atleast as good as, or better a design.
i've been a pretty big fan of gfb's stuff thus far, but this is SORELY lacking.
5/10
looks good, but again it looks exactly like all the other sabre work we always see. this is why he should have rebranded the blues (who came in 2nd) or the stars (3rd)...all sabre work always goes back to the same theme, and we all knew that this was coming too. lets see him try to really rebrand a team. he should now rebrand the team that came in second in that poll, the st. louis blues.
I agree. Lets see a Blues rebrand next. I'd love to see something new for them.