Admirals AHL Logo Game

I was surfing around tonight when I stumbled across something kind of funny. I happened to click on the Milwaukee Admirals' web site. (Can't remember what for. Usually I have no interest in the AHL.) In the Fans section of their site is this funny little Flash game based around AHL team logos.

It's called Logo Face-off and you can find it here.

Basically, you control the goalie with the arrow keys on your keyboard, moving him left and right. Various team logos are falling down at various speeds and your goal is to catch all the Admirals logos. Weird because as a goalie you shouldn't be stopping your own team, you should be stopping everybody else.

I don't know how long this game's been there or how long it will stay, but if you're bored, it's a decent way to kill a few minutes.

For the record, I got 74 points.

Icethetics Live Chat III

From The Ground Up: North Names

The five markets with the most votes to be included in the North Division of our fantasy hockey league are final. Over 7,000 individual votes were cast in the poll (which is strange since its sister poll had more than 3,000 more.)

Here, I'm outlining those markets (alphabetically) along with the acceptable locators (listed below) for your team name nominations — which I'll begin accepting today by comment only. This is interesting because we're staying squarely in Canada for this entire division.

• CALGARY, Alberta
  Alberta | Calgary | Lethbridge


• EDMONTON, Alberta
  Alberta | Edmonton | Red Deer


• REGINA, Saskatchewan
  Saskatchewan | Regina


• SASKATOON, Saskatchewan
  Saskatchewan | Saskatoon


• WINNIPEG, Manitoba
  Manitoba | Winnipeg

DO NOT SUBMIT NAME NOMINATIONS VIA EMAIL. THEY WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED.

Submit your team name nominations by leaving a comment below. Email submissions will be discarded. I will accept nominations for one week at which point new comments on this post will be closed. Up to 20 name submissions that fit within the following parameters will be included in the name selection process which will begin next weekend.

If you want your submission included, DO NOT:
• use the name of any current or past NHL or WHA team.
• use the name of any current AHL or ECHL team.
• use the name or close variation of any current or past professional sports team within the same market or geographical area.
• use the name of any team from Project: IHA.
• use any name that would be considered vulgar, obscene or in any way inappropriate. (Sorry, this is my call.)

If you decide to use a locator not already on the list above, be prepared to have it discarded. I'm not setting that in stone as a restriction, but I'm also not guaranteeing I'll include anything not on the list. Sorry for all the restrictions but sometimes you have to "guide" originality.

It was suggested that when submitting names you also submit a short reasoning for that name. I won't require that but I will recommend it since it might help your submission get votes later on if folks know where you got your idea.

Don't forget to make your submissions for the Northeast Division. You have until September 20.

Start submitting!

I've been reading some of the submissions and it's a little pathetic. I think a lot of you are trying too hard to find a name that "means something" to the point where you're losing sight of the fact that we're trying to name sports teams. Forget about trivial nonsense and suggest some names you'd want to chant in an arena of 20,000 people. Just something to think about when making your nominations.

From The Ground Up: Northeast Names

The five markets with the most votes to be included in the Northeast Division of our fantasy hockey league are final. Over 10,000 individual votes were cast in the poll.

Here, I'm outlining those markets (alphabetically) along with the acceptable locators (listed below) for your team name nominations — which I'll begin accepting today by comment only.

• BOSTON, Massachusetts
  Massachusetts | New England | Boston | Worcester


• MONTRÉAL, Quebec
  Montreal


• NEW YORK, New York
  New York | New York City | New Jersey | Long Island


• QUEBEC CITY, Quebec
  Quebec | Quebec City


• TORONTO, Ontario
  Ontario | Toronto | Hamilton | London

DO NOT SUBMIT NAME NOMINATIONS VIA EMAIL. THEY WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED.

Submit your team name nominations by leaving a comment below. Email submissions will be discarded. I will accept nominations for one week at which point new comments on this post will be closed. Up to 20 name submissions that fit within the following parameters will be included in the name selection process which will begin next weekend.

If you want your submission included, DO NOT:
• use the name of any current or past NHL or WHA team.
• use the name of any current AHL or ECHL team.
• use the name or close variation of any current or past professional sports team within the same market or geographical area.
• use the name of any team from Project: IHA.
• use any name that would be considered vulgar, obscene or in any way inappropriate. (Sorry, this is my call.)

If you decide to use a locator not already on the list above, be prepared to have it discarded. I'm not setting that in stone as a restriction, but I'm also not guaranteeing I'll include anything not on the list. Sorry for all the restrictions but sometimes you have to "guide" originality.

It was suggested that when submitting names you also submit a short reasoning for that name. I won't require that but I will recommend it since it might help your submission get votes later on if folks know where you got your idea.

Don't forget to make your submissions for the North Division. You have until September 20.

Start submitting!

I've been reading some of the submissions and it's a little pathetic. I think a lot of you are trying too hard to find a name that "means something" to the point where you're losing sight of the fact that we're trying to name sports teams. Forget about trivial nonsense and suggest some names you'd want to chant in an arena of 20,000 people. Just something to think about when making your nominations.

New Email & Live Chat

Just wanted to point out that I've added a new email address. You can now reach me at icethetics@gmail.com. But for those of you who have trouble spelling Icethetics, you can still use my old address, nhllogos@gmail.com.

Also, I have another Live Chat scheduled for this afternoon at 5 PM. We can talk about whatever. Anything from the recent third jersey news to the next step in the process of creating our fantasy league to... your favorite color. I'll probably have it up for about an hour or two.

That's all for this morning. I'll have name nomination posts up shortly for the North and Northeast Divisions.

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.

From The Ground Up, Part 8

A lot happening this weekend with the Icethetics fantasy hockey league — not sure if that's the name, just what I'm calling it right now. Let's outline what's what.

First, the North and Northeast Division city selection process is over. We have the five cities that will be included in each division. That will be revealed tomorrow in the post where you guys will begin submitting name nominations for those teams.

That brings is to the Pacific and Central Divisions. We are now finished with the nominations for those divisions and I've narrowed down 20 names from each city. I know this may irk some of you, but let's face it, some of those names weren't exactly spectacular to begin with. Plus, simplicity is king in my book.

The next step is you guys choosing each team's name. This will be a simple process. For each city you'll be directed to a page with all 20 name finalists. You will rate each name individually from 1 to 5 stars. The name with the highest star rating will be the team's official name. In the event of a tie, a runoff poll will be held the next week.

This process assures that you aren't forced to choose one name over another. You simply rate each name on its own merits. You like it or you don't. This should allow us to get a fair consensus of what everyone considers to be a good team name.

Here's the thing, at this point is when we start doing one division per week. It'd be an insane amount of work for me to keep up with both divisions. So this week you'll rate the names for the Pacific Division. Next week the Central. The week after that Northeast... and so on. The process of determining the names for all 30 teams will take six weeks starting today.

There are links in the Fantasy League section in the pollbar directing you to the list of names for each city in the Pacific Division. Rate as many or as few names as you want and you're done. All the results will be finalized next weekend and we'll start with the Central Division.

An important note. A few cities have the same team names available. Rush, for example, was nominated and is a finalist for both Anchorage and Los Angeles. Obviously, two teams cannot have the same name. If, by some miracle, the same name is selected for two cities, the city for which it got the higher rating gets to keep it. The other city has to give it up and go with the second place name. If there's a tie, we'll do a runoff poll.

If you guys have any other questions, feel free to ask. I'll address them as a reply to your comment or email, or make an addition to this post.

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.)

Oilers Put 30th On Ice

A photo of Edmonton Oilers rookie Taylor Chorney on the team's official web site reveals the new paint job on the ice at Rexall Place. It's the traditional Oilers logo with a giant "30" at the bottom.

You can go to their site or see the image below.

By the way, I said "traditional" because you'll notice the distinct lack of a red circle encompassing the logo. It's what I anticipate seeing on this season's third jersey.

Thanks to Darren for the tip on the photo.

It's a simplified version of the 30th anniversary logo I posted last month. That logo was found in public document filings by journalist James Gordon. For a refresher...

I imagine that or something similar will serve as a special patch somewhere on the Oilers' jerseys this season.

IHA Poll: St. Louis Spirit

Cast your vote and leave a comment about your decision. Then tell all your friends to drop in and vote! The more voices heard, the more accurate the results!

Starts Fri Sep 12
Ends Mon Sep 15

This is the final IHA logo poll. It closes on Monday so sometime in the middle of next week I'll post all the winners and this project will be complete.

Happy voting!