Sneak Peek At Blues Alternate

I got an email from a reader earlier claiming to have scans of all of the new third jerseys. He's sent along what he says is the St. Louis Blues' new sweater. I can't say one way or another whether it's legitimate, but what could it hurt to share it?

We'll see the real thing tomorrow straight from the source anyway. So here's what was sent to me.

It's terrible quality. Nothing I can do about that, I guess. But if you squint and sort of tilt your head you can kind of make out the logo on the front. It's a white circle with the Blue Note and the Gateway Arch over it. It could also be the Virgin Mary.

Anyway, just a little something for you while we wait for the Blues to show us the actual jersey.

Sabres Unveil Third Jersey!

After weeks of speculation, the Buffalo Sabres have officially unveiled their new third jersey. The team broadcast the unveiling ceremony live on their web site.

They also made the official announcement of the new sweaters with this graphic.

The ceremony, which began after a team scrimmage, featured each member of the team stepping out onto the ice in the new sweater. Ryan Miller got things started, giving fans their very first look at the new duds.

It's a great redesign of their classic look — with an update of the logo and blue uniform.

We got a decent look at the full uniform when Maxim Afinogenov and Drew Stafford stepped out. You can see the Sabres will keep the sweater number on the front shoulder and add new socks to match the jersey.

You'll also notice a silver area under the arms in this picture of Teppo Numminen. They're very sharp jerseys.

Once everyone was out there, the players skated a few laps around the ice and waved goodbye to fans.

The Sabres had the following statement regarding the new sweaters on their web site.

Utilizing the original crest from the 1970s, the logo has undergone minor modifications for an overall vintage appearance.

“The first thing we wanted to do is go to our new color scheme, which is the deeper blue and gold,” said Director of Creative Services, Frank Cravotta. “After that we added the striping pattern, introduced some silver accents in it and put some silver vertical piping along the front… It makes for a new and unique look.”

The jersey also encompasses a tie at the collar to “reinforce the retro style,” according to Cravotta.

I couldn't agree more with Cravotta's statement. And to every person saying the vertical piping is "unnecessary"... can you please define what is necessary outside of a uniform that identifies a group of players as teammates? Stuff like that has me in stitches.

I've set up a photo gallery for the Sabres' third jersey. Right now, it's made up primarily of screenshots from the live broadcast of the event on Sabres TV. I'll add more images when they're available.

If I hear anything else or see any better photos of these sweaters, I'll be sure to keep you updated.

Sabres To Stream Unveiling

Just like the Hurricanes did, the Buffalo Sabres will be streaming live video of their third jersey unveiling today at 10:30 from their official web site.

That means we'll all get to watch the unveiling ceremony as it happens this morning. So just like last time, I recommend having two browser windows open — one with the live video and the other with today's Icethetics Live Chat which starts at 10.

Official: Blues Tease New Third

The St. Louis Blues news keeps coming. According to the team's official web site, it's official. The Blues will unveil their new third jersey on Sunday at FANfest.

They even teased us with a new photo of the jersey itself.

Ok, so it is just the shoulder of the sweater, but it's still something. St. Louis Post-Dispatch writer Jeremy Rutherford did say they original Blue Note will appear on the shoulders. He got a chance to see it privately yesterday and wrote about it in his blog Morning Skate.

Naturally, the Blues have even more information for us. The jersey will go on sale November 19, two days before it is first scheduled to hit the ice. But at FANfest, there will be merchandise for sale with the new Gateway Arch logo that will don the front of the new sweaters.

Here's the team describes the new jersey.

In contrast to previous Blues uniforms which were (and are) primarily accented in royal blue and gold, the new third jersey and matching socks lean toward navy blue and white. Features of the third jersey include:
• A powerful base color of navy blue trimmed in white gold.
• A new logo on the crest of the jersey featuring the time-honored Blue Note against the Gateway Arch, the iconic symbol for the City of St. Louis, captured within a gold circle highlighted by the words St. Louis Blues.
• The Blue Note, in navy, trimmed in gold and white on each of the shoulders.
• Uniform numbers on the back and sleeves in white — a first for the Blues — trimmed in gold and navy.
• A classic, old-school draw string — another first for the team — at the base of the white-trimmed collar.
• Navy socks trimmed in white and gold will complement the on-ice look, resulting in a navy blue combination from head to toe – helmets, jersey, gloves, pants and socks.

They're certainly going to be blue. Can't wait to see it!

Blues To Unveil Third On Sunday

The St. Louis Blues will unveil their new third jersey this Sunday at FANfest, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Jeremy Rutherford wrote in his blog Morning Skate tonight that the new jersey was actually shown to him and he described it in detail.

The jersey is Navy blue with a circular logo on front. In the logo is a silver-stitched Arch with the Blue Note positioned inside the legs of the famous St. Louis monument. Above the circle, it reads “ST. LOUIS” and below it “BLUES.”

Upon further exploration, I noticed that the Blues’ new jersey (which will be worn at least 15 times this season) has the old-school draw-strings near the neck with white numbers, trimmed in Navy blue and gold. There is also a Bluenote crest on the shoulder of the jersey.

It’s hard to please everyone, but the team’s hard work appears to have paid off.

I won't post the entire write-up here but I highly recommend giving it a read. As for the vitals, the most important thing...

Fans will be introduced to the jersey this Sunday at FANfest, where five of the Blues players (Brad Boyes, Lee Stempniak, David Backes, Eric Brewer and Paul Kariya) will be showing them off on the ice. They will be available to order on Sunday but won’t be delivered until mid-November.

They will first hit the ice on November 21 when the Blues face the Anaheim Ducks. (Which team is going to look better? It's a landslide.) The Blues will wear the new sweaters for 10 home games and 5 road games — for an interesting change of pace. I'm assuming a schedule will be released at some point.

Another interesting note.

The Blues toyed with the idea of powder blue (which the team wore earlier in the franchise’s history), but the ‘Powers that be’ decided they want to move forward. Davidson reportedly was in favor of the Navy blue.

And also the Thrashers wear powder blue jerseys at home and the Penguins will supposedly wear powder blue thirds this year.

Finally, my thanks to everybody who got on top of this almost immediately. Drew, Leanna, Cody, Stephen and Adam... you guys should know you all sent me emails within 12 minutes of each other. Well done.

I'm excited and I'm not even a Blues fan. Can't wait to see what these jerseys look like. Don't forget that the Buffalo Sabres also have plans to unveil their third jersey on Saturday. Less suspense for that one though because of all the leaks. We're still having a Live Chat though and now I'm thinking we may do another on Sunday. Standby for that.

Blues "Close" To Unveiling

Coming on the heels of this morning's post is some interesting news regarding the St. Louis Blues' new third jerseys.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch writer Jeremy Rutherford mentioned in his blog, Morning Skate, today that the team is close to unveiling them.

I’m told the Blues are “really close” to unveiling their third jersey, which they will wear several times in 2008-09. Owner Dave Checketts hasn’t allowed the details of the jersey to leak out, but he tells me he’s very excited and thinks the fans will be proud of the new look. (Nothing could be as bad as the last time the Blues ventured into the third-jersey business ... remember the trumpets?)

I hate to correct him, but the last time the Blues ventured into the third jersey business, they kept it! The uniforms they wore prior to last year were third jerseys back when red was in their color scheme. They adopted those jerseys when they phased out the red.

So "really close," you say? As I mentioned this morning, FANfest is this weekend. That's pretty close. I'm not completely convinced but if for no other reason than I feel like there's a strong possibility of an unveiling, I'm adding the date to the countdowns. Don't hold it against me if I end up being wrong. Wouldn't be the first time.

Cross your fingers, Blues fans.

Around The League

Time to get caught up on a bunch of news items from around the NHL. Get comfortable. This is a long one.

Vancouver Canucks goalie Curtis Sanford has decided on the fan-designed mask he'll be wearing this season. Hundreds of designs were submitted and the winner was announced yesterday on the team's web site.

I'll follow up when pictures of the final mask start popping up.

...
The Chicago Blackhawks recently attended a White Sox baseball game — I'm guessing to show the other hometown ball club that they don't love them any less than the Cubs even though they'll be playing in the Winter Classic at Wrigley Field. But they were wearing some unusual jerseys for the occasion.

See what I mean? Let's just hope they never make it on the ice.

...
The Los Angeles Kings continue to pimp their season tickets by offering a free third jersey no one's ever seen. Guess that's one way to avoid complaints. You can't whine about something that's free (...oh, wait a minute). There's an ad on their web site showing that ol' question mark jersey.

...
I got an email from an Atlanta Thrashers season ticket holder who asked his account rep about when the team would be unveiling their third jersey so he could get tickets for that game. He was told Friday, November 14 when they play the Hurricanes. That date coincides with what I've had in the sidebar....
Recently, a handful of new Phoenix Coyotes logos leaked and now it seems the team's own web site has some confirmation of at least one of them. A version of the new script logo in that post can be seen in the CoyotesFest logo.

The event is this Saturday at 11 AM. The team hasn't indicated any plans to unveil their third jersey... but neither did the Bruins.

...
Speaking of third jerseys, aside from the Sabres and Coyotes, a handful of other teams are holding fan events this weekend. Only the Sabres have mentioned anything about unveiling their third jersey, but it'll be worth keeping an eye on these other guys.

The Ottawa Senators will have their Fanfest on Saturday from 8 AM to 1:30 PM. They really want you waking up early for a Saturday morning. Anyway, on the agenda for the day is the grand opening of The Sens Store. Might they have certain new merchandise for sale? (Wink, wink.)

The Chicago Blackhawks have Training Camp Festival 2008 on the books for Saturday from 8 AM to 4 PM. The Bruins unveiled their new third jersey to very little fanfare. I'd expect the same from the Blackhawks who are likely to go with their standard black alternate that's been in service for over a decade now. Will they have it on display at this event?

The St. Louis Blues will hold FANfest on Sunday from 11 AM to 4 PM. There's a Q&A scheduled with head coach Andy Murray and president of hockey operations John Davidson with season ticket holders at 1:45 PM. I can almost guarantee someone will ask about third jerseys. What will the guys say?

That wraps things up for today. I wanted to get as much new information as I could in this post since it might be the only one I write today.

Another Sabres Third Jersey Leak

Yeah, if the Buffalo Sabres are trying at all to keep their new third jersey under wraps prior to its official unveiling — they're bad at it. Really bad.

The first leaked picture cropped up last week and was followed up on by The Buffalo News a few days later. Now another picture has surfaced.

The image on the left is the original leak. The new one on the right shows the detail of the sweater a bit better. I'm sure this picture was taken with a camera phone and the bad color can be attributed to that. Otherwise, it looks good and I have no reason to question its legitimacy.

Again, the Sabres are set to officially unveil their new third jersey on Saturday, September 20. Yeah, we've seen it now, but I'm sure we'll get a better look when comes out for real.

Sun's Silly Sens Sweater Surmising

All right, rarely will you catch me taking a newspaper to task but a recent story appearing on the Ottawa Sun's web site is laughable! I think it's fair to say that I've probably been paying almost as much attention to the new third jersey releases as the NHL marketing gurus actually doing the job. So try to understand my position as I write this.

The following make up the first four paragraphs of the article in question, written by Chris Stevenson.

The Senators will have another new look on the ice this season.

After a year's absence, most of the teams in the NHL, including the Senators, are expected to unveil another third jersey to complement their home and away duds this season (never mind that for many of the clubs these new jerseys will actually be their seventh or eighth versions over the last few years).

According to an image obtained by Sun Media and believed to be approved by the NHL, the Senators' third jersey could look something like this: Black with red and white trim and the word "Sens" climbing up from the right to left on the chest.

"I've seen a sheet that had the third jerseys on it and it was stamped 'NHL Approved,' " said a source. "That's the Senators jersey I saw."

The "image obtained by Sun Media" is this.

It was created by JerseyDatabase.com as part of a series of concepts based off of a report by Howard Berger back in July. I wrote about the concepts last month. See the next image, a screen grab from the original JerseyDatabase.com blog post.

Then a "source," which is a roundabout way of saying "anonymous poster on a message board," is quoted as saying he's/she's seen it on a sheet stamped "NHL Approved." Ok, my sides are sore from all this laughing.

Since when do legitimate news-gathering organizations quote blind sources on something this ineffectual? That's usually left to the likes of blogs — like Icethetics. I quote blind sources like it's my job, here.

By the way, I'd love to see this "approval" stamp and witness this 1950s bureaucratic process in action.

Anyway, sorry if my reaction came off as a little over-the-top, but I got a few emails linking to this story and I just wanted to offer my take on it. I'm all for "leaks" and such but let's call a spade a spade. This is just funny.

While the image above may be a close representation of what actually is the Ottawa Senators' new third jersey, this article doesn't have me convinced. What do you guys think? (Keep it clean, please.)

Sabres' Jersey Leak The Real Deal?

It would appear that leaked photo of a Buffalo Sabres jersey that's been floating around the web is the real thing.

Just to be clear, I don't consider anything "official" until it comes directly from a team, but I do trust journalists and John Vogl of The Buffalo News wrote in his blog Sabres Edge that it has been confirmed — I'm assuming he means by the team. He also had a couple more tidbits we didn't previously know about.

This jersey photo that has been leaked is, in fact, the actual third jersey, The News has learned. Two other things have been cleared up:
1) The logo is the same color as the jersey, the darker blue. It only looks different because the different fabrics aren't reflecting the same.
2) It will have numbers on the front shoulder.

In case you forgot what it looks like, here's the jersey we're talking about.

The Sabres are scheduled to officially unveil their new third jersey next Saturday, September 20 at Puck Drop 2008. I'll have complete coverage at that point right here on Icethetics.

Thanks to Mike for the heads-up on this!