From The Ground Up: Divisions

Check the pollbar. You can now vote on your preferred divisional boundary alignment for the Icethetics fantasy league.

Since I can't offer higher resolution images within the poll, I'm offering them here with a list of cities available to each division. All divisions here are named by geography.

Here are some things to think about with regard to the divisional boundaries. The larger the division area, the fewer teams you get out of that area in a way. Remember, every division gets 5 teams. Smaller divisional areas have a better chance of getting a city you want, for example.

So, if you think there should be more Canadian teams and fewer southern teams, you'll probably want to pick D. If you want more eastern cities than western, go with C. A has the best geographical spread. B and E rely heavily on northern cities. Just a few observations. There are plenty of other ways to look at each setup.

Happy voting!

From The Ground Up, Part 3

Part 1 · Part 2

Today voting ended on the poll about how many teams our little fantasy league will have. Much to my disappointment, you all chose 30 — same as the NHL and same as the IHA. I know I run the risk of alienating readers by calling 34% of you a disappointment, but that's something I'm just going to have to live with. (Unless someone can give me a really good reason why we should be unoriginal and then I'll eat my words.)

I'll tell you I almost didn't include it because I wanted to stay off the beaten path. I used it more or less as a test to see how much you guys were willing to stray from what you know and move into new territory. Comfortable is comfortable but let's not make a habit out of recreating the NHL here. That's not the point, remember?

I've been reading the comments in the last two posts. A lot of you seem to like the idea of doing a league with all non-NHL cities (with an Original Six exemption, oddly enough). That's not a terrible idea considering what we've witnessed in the last two polls. But to do that would be an executive decision by me. Instead, here's the plan.

THE PLAN
Instead of creating a giant list of cities and allowing you guys to pick your favorites, I have a better idea. First, you're going to choose the geographical boundaries for the divisions.

I've created five maps for you to choose from. I think they're each different and good in their own way. None of them are even close to being in line with the NHL's current divisional map. You guys can study them and pick your favorite. Once we have the divisional boundaries decided, everything we vote on will be done division by division. Makes less work for me.

At some point tomorrow the new poll will appear in the sidebar with the five choices.

The next step will be selecting the markets that will have teams. I say markets (or metropolitan areas) for a couple of reasons: 1) I'd like to avoid multiple teams from the same market like New York or L.A. (I know it's one decision I'm taking away from you. Sorry. Let's make this easy.); and 2) if, for example, a city like San Francisco is chosen, I want there to be the option of placing the team in San Jose or Oakland or something.

I'll pick 12 cities from each divisional area (based on market size, most likely) and the 5 with the most votes will be awarded franchises. Simple as that. If you don't think this is the good plan, present a better one to me either by email or as a comment.

THE FUTURE
I've also been planning into the future of this league and while I won't go into detail right now, I will offer a few tidbits. Once we have all the cities picked out for each division, we'll move on to naming the teams, one division at a time. We'll take nominations and every entry that meets the guidelines will be included in the voting. More details on that later.

To keep the rest of the process from becoming excruciatingly tedious, we won't be voting on things like logos and colors separately. Once all the teams have been named, I'll begin taking logo submissions. That means you pick the color scheme to go with your logo set. The team's colors will be determined by the winning logo. All entries that meet the guidelines will be included in the voting. More details on that later.

All of the accepted entries will appear on one page and you'll rate each logo from 1 to 5 stars. The logo with the highest rating wins. In the event of a tie, we'll hold a run-off poll. After we have logos, we'll do jerseys. After that who knows. But all that will probably take us several months anyway.

THE NAME
By the way, this league is going to need a name. Start making suggestions. The only criteria I have is that it must use the name Icethetics in it and it cannot have the acronym IHA or NIHL. Let's hear some creative ideas.

For what it's worth, I like the idea of the guy who said we should pretend we're creating a new league in a world 20 years after the collapse of the NHL. Let's say some Bettman-like character holds the trademarks to every team name and logo from the NHL and he's vindictive. You steal one of his logos or team names — even a little bit — and he'll eat your children. You don't want your children eaten do you?

Let's try to be original and, mostly, have fun!

From The Ground Up, Part 2

We're moving forward with the fictional Icethetics-based hockey league I mentioned last Sunday. From those of you that voted, 69% are in favor of creating and branding a fake hockey league and 59% of you think it should be strictly set in North America.

Next, you're going to decide how many teams this North American-based league will have and how it will be divided up. I've created five scenarios that you can now vote on in the pollbar. They are as follows:

36 teams
2 conferences / 6 divisions
The 2 conferences will each be made up of 3 divisions. Each division will have 6 teams, meaning 18 in each conference.

32 teams
2 conferences / 4 divisions
The 2 conferences will each be made up of 2 divisions. Each division will have 8 teams, meaning 16 in each conference.

30 teams
2 conferences / 6 divisions
The 2 conferences will each be made up of 3 divisions. Each division will have 5 teams, meaning 15 in each conference.

27 teams
3 conferences / 6 divisions
The 3 conferences will each be made up of 2 divisions. Each conference will have 9 teams, meaning 4 or 5 in each division.

24 teams
2 conferences / 6 divisions
The 2 conferences will each be made up of 3 divisions. Each division will have 4 teams, meaning 12 in each conference.

I threw in the 27-team option just for something different — an odd number of teams, conferences and uneven divisions. I'm assuming most of you will just want as many teams as you can get and go for the 36 — and that's fine too.

None of it is set in stone. If you have a better idea, write it in the comments. The only thing I'd like to hold to is the maximum number of teams at 36 and minimum number at 24. I think 40 is too many and 20 is too few. Other than that, if you have a better idea of how they should be divided up, I'd love to hear it.

The poll will remain open until Saturday afternoon. Next week I imagine we'll move on to deciding which cities will get teams. Happy voting!

From The Ground Up

The IHA Project is going superbly as evidenced by the logo designs we've seen coming in for the fictional hockey league. But despite that, I still read comments and emails almost daily asking why nobody got any input on team names, colors, locations, etc. As I've said more times than I can count, that's not what the project is about.

However, it's made me realize that you guys would like a project where you get to exercise your creativity more — or at least your own opinion. A project where you build an entire fantasy hockey league from the ground up. Despite the time it will take to do this, I'm on board.

I'm adding a new element to the pollbar. It's called Fantasy and for the next few weeks it will feature polls that will allow you to guide the direction of this new league. Here is the question: Would you like to participate in the creation and branding of a fictional hockey league at Icethetics? If the response is positive, we'll move forward. If it isn't, I'll drop it.

The other question is about the geography. Two answers. North America or the globe? That's it for now. We'll see where we are next weekend when both polls have closed.

I hope this project doesn't prove to be a bad idea. I think this is something most of you want and I'm willing to facilitate it. So have fun with it. And if anybody's asking "what's the point?" The point is it's a hobby for logo designers and marketing wannabes. It gives you a chance to express yourself creatively if you want. And if you don't, it's something fun to look at every now and then.

Let me explain a little more about how this will work if we do go forward. Everything will be voted on. We'll start by choosing the number of teams in the league. Then which cities get teams. Then what names those teams will get. Then what colors they'll have. Then we'll go into logo and uniform design. I won't lie. It'll be a long process but everybody's voice will be heard. And I'll try to keep it as simple as possible while still making your vote the determining factor in every aspect.

And if you've got any suggestions for this process, don't hesitate to email me. I've got a lot of this already figured out but I'm always open to better ideas.

By the way, here's my plan for the IHA. We still have two divisions left. I'm going to see this through to the end. We'll get logos for all 30 teams and then it will be finished with it. No jerseys or anything like that. This project was always about the logos only. They'll all be turned over to Nicolas for use with his fantasy league — the International Hockey Association.

The one exception may be an IHA Logo Tournament just like all the other logo tournaments we've done. I'll gauge interest after we have all 30 and move on from there. But for anyone who's interested in following up with him about this fantasy league when the project at Icethetics comes to an end, I will find a way to get you in touch with him — likely via email.