Here’s The Latest Stupid Way That The NHL Is Messing With Its Broadcasts
The NHL unveiled a whole roster of alternate jerseys for this season, and the Tampa Bay Lightning’s features a big skull, which you can see at center ice in the above screenshot. At first, I wondered if it was just some synergy with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, but I have since learned that it’s a tribute to the city’s annual Gasparilla Season, which is headlined by a pirate parade with a fraught racial past.
But does that center ice logo look kind of uncanny to you? Maybe a little too smooth or artificial? Honestly, does it even look like ice at all? Watch the players skate over it, and see for yourself.
You guessed it: That logo is as phony as a three-dollar bill. Here’s how the Tampa ice looked in real life, which was visible on the replays during Saturday’s shutout loss to the Red Wings.
This isn’t an isolated incident. It’s started happening all over the league. For those wondering why the hell anybody would want this, I have a few different ideas:
- The NHL really, really wants to push people to buy the new alternate jerseys.
- Some powerful people with horrendously bad taste think it looks awesome.
- All of the above.
I cannot stress enough that this garbage needs to disappear immediately. The experience of watching hockey on television over the past several years has felt increasingly detached from reality, with dynamic digital ads superimposed on the boards and other logos pasted onto the glass and the ice. This latest add-on feels like the apotheosis of an utterly boneheaded trend. It is a crime against aesthetics, and a gigantic stain on a beautiful sport. When a player suddenly looks like he’s skating over a portal to another dimension every time he crosses the middle of the rink, it cheapens all the skill and athleticism that goes into his movement. I simply want to see what is actually happening in the arena, and not the Cyberpunk 2077 version of the game. A little bit of restraint shouldn’t be too hard an ask, but at this rate, the glow puck is eventually going to look elegant in comparison.
