The Great Olympic Jersey Re-Do: Group C

We’ve finally hit Group C, with plenty of Scandinavian charm and a quick dip over to the land of the rising sun left in our re-design series. I hope you’ve at least enjoyed the ride.

Let’s get right into it:

Sweden:

For many, Sweden’s jersey looks, at least on paper to be the best looking one at the tournament because they’re not taking any of this gradient nonsense, but still...somehow...Nike snuck some on there. It’s sneaky, you’d almost miss it if you weren’t looking...and yet somehow they ended taking one of the templates and making sure the crappy gradient made it on the sweater. I’m sure the Swedish government, their hockey organization and olympic committee are fuming.

Well, we’re gonna make them happy by un-screwing things up for them.

It truly astounds me how easy this is to not screw up, and how obstanate Nike was in both ensuring everyone was following a template, and also making sure that one of the biggest “gimme”s in international hockey is now marred by said templating. The unique combination of laziness and idiocy we can all be flabbergasted by. A lot of these are mostly exorcises in showing that this is indeed not very hard, but Nike chose to both make it hard and also make it look awkward and stupid.

Finland:

Ah, Tuukka Rask’s homeland...and what conflicting feelings I have.

Of all the teams that have Template #4523, I think this is probably the one team that’ll be fine in either their dark or white jerseys. Their decision to use the coat of arms instead of indulging that Nike urge to put that ridiculous edgy font on their sweaters.

That said, we’re trying to pull the gradients off of this because goddamnit this is a hockey jersey post-1998, so let’s go back through Finland’s history, and keep the good parts of the new sweater (the coat of arms), and get rid of the bad (everything else).

This was previously a tribute to Finland’s 1995 gold medal team, but I already had one team that kinda looked like that (namely, the host nation’s sweater back in part one), and regrettably, not enough time has passed (nor is it an even number year anniversary), so I went with a simpler, more 70’s inspired look for the Finns.

Japan:

Japan will only be sending their women’s team to this Olympics, but Smile Japan’s eternal optimism and dogged determination and commitment to team hockey means they’re almost always a beloved underdog in these games. And a team that can capture so many hearts absolutely deserves better than “Finland’s jersey, except red and black and so so so much worse.”

Now see? Give them clean, give them simple, give them a look they can be proud of. And not a crappy template with all sorts of goofy sublimated plastic-y crap all over it.

Norway:

Many fans will come to the defense of Norway’s olympic sweater and in theory? Probably a good reason for it. “There’s a viking ship on it!” they cry out. “It’s not that bad all things considered! It’s simpler than a lot of the other jerseys!” they say.

My opinion:

1. Like every one of the designs on these jerseys that is actually interesting, the viking ship is a sublimated design. Which will only be viewable when players are standing straight (which is just before or after games), on their fans (who are always B-Roll), or in the promotional shot. You will blink, and you will miss it.
2. The font for what is usually Norway’s interesting bit (Their rangers-esque diagonal “NORGE”) looks absolutely disastrously bad. The new Nike font is so goddamn bad for this particular thing.
3. Still that crappy gradient 90’s cut up sublimated design!

And y’know the worst thing about it is...The viking ship could’ve been integrated so much better. Y’know...like a secondary logo on the shoulder!

The second logo is for non-olympic based stuff as the polar bear is technically the national team’s logo. That can replace the “NORGE” or other shoulder logo. Either way it’s WAAAAAAY easier to make something out of it by having that logo on-hand as a logo and not as some barely noticeable design on the front of the jersey.

Germany:

Germany has the unenviable position of having three colors that look fine on a flag, but on your average hockey jersey? It’s...kinda hard to make those colors gel, and to Nike’s credit, they tried. But again?...The damn gradienting messes with everything, especially the color black, which does NOT take gradienting well.

There is a kernel of a good idea here, but it needs coaxing out...and less X-TREEM in the ingredients.

And with that last little sweater re-do...we draw to a close.

I hope you enjoyed this little consecutive experiment, and I hope you, if you so desire to watch the men’s and women’s hockey tournament, enjoy yourself and enjoy your team’s successes and stick with them, even if they don’t make it to the medal round.

Again, Thank you for reading.

Oh, and don’t give Nike your money.