The apron jersey trend

[tarheelhockey]

I wonder why the other teams jersey seams are vertical but Calgary's seams are all ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ in comparison.

Following the seams of the new side panels, in a manner similar to the Sabres’ infamous “pit stains” design

The Sabres franchise alone has made some astonishingly poor jersey choices over the past 30 years or so.

 

[Nogatco Rd]

So from the jersey above, you get the Edge-ified Blues:

Great post. The Blues’ were especially brutal. The awkward shape in the chest/shoulders immediately reminded me of the ‘jerseys’ they used in that ladies football league that Mark Rypien’s daughter played in:

 

[senseimike]

This is pulling from old memory so I may have some details wrong, but:

I believe the design actually started with the athletic purpose of the jersey, and the determination that a traditional hockey sweater’s seams weren’t ideal for athletic movement. If you look at where the seams go in the Edge template, they’re in ergonomic places to accommodate the twisting and stretching that happens during a hockey game.

That template in and of itself created issues, because traditional hockey jerseys usually have straight lines over the shoulders (either that, or no lines at all). So for example, St Louis relied heavily on the visual effect of straight lines running from collar to shoulder, and this was no longer practical from a production standpoint:

So that production problem got passed along to the design teams for a solution, which is where things really went off the rails. Having been given license to follow the new template, they set about the creation of a new visual profile for the NHL. Of course this was basically a license to force new jersey sales leaguewide, so it’s not like the league was pushing back on them.

So from the jersey above, you get the Edge-ified Blues:

Of course, they made up some marketing BS about this being a tribute to the Arch, but it was a straightforward matter of needing the shoulder stripes to follow the curving seams near the collar.

BUT, it got even dumber. Because again — production problem without a good design solution. Look at Oshie’s jersey above, if he gains the captaincy where do you put a letter?

Well…

So from what started as a simple matter of trying to make the jerseys less bulky and restrictive, we ended up in the theater of the absurd from a design standpoint. Nobody in their right mind would deliberately set out to create the visual mess you see in that last picture, but the train had left the station from an engineering standpoint.

Some teams had it a lot worse than others. Florida went from this:

To this:

And Calgary went from this:

To this:

And maybe the worst of all, poor Colorado going from this:

To this:

So in short, they came up with a solution for something that wasn’t really a problem… painted themselves into a corner where form and function could no longer co-exist… and ended up torching the visual identity of the league for a while.

What a thorough and awesome reply! Thanks for the intel!!

 

[Hisch13r]

Pajama jersey is referring to the jerseys without a stripe on the bottom hem. This gave them a "floating" look. I believe the New Jersey Devils are the only and last team to still have this styling.

Yeah I f***ing hate these Devils jerseys

 

[Evergreen]

Ugh I hate the apron jersey trend. the problem is that each of these new manufacturers feels they need to reinvent the wheel somehow. Reebok with the piping, Adidas with the oversized collars.

The best-looking jerseys in terms of fit were in the late 80s/early 90s. They also look the best to wear outside of hockey.

 

[NYRfan85]

Ugh, I HATED the piping, and the teams that put the jersey numbers on the front. Thankfully, we've moved on from that era!

 

[Figgy44]

Following the seams of the new side panels, in a manner similar to the Sabres’ infamous “pit stains” design

The Sabres franchise alone has made some astonishingly poor jersey choices over the past 30 years or so.

While still gross, I feel like changing the armpits to yellow might actually look better than the white pit stain look. Basically any dark color would have been at least passable. Yeesh.

 

[deepdark]

Ugh, I HATED the piping, and the teams that put the jersey numbers on the front. Thankfully, we've moved on from that era!

 

[hirawl]

Don't you just love when a thread title is great but you just have absolutely zero idea what it's going to be about before opening it. Christmas morning kind of vibes.

Yeah those were some of the worst designs ever in the league history.