A brand spanking new concept today, in the vein of some of my other ongoing and broken down ideas, it will no doubt have some legs.
I have over the past few months amassed a large number of logos of various sports teams from every area of competition. The majority are North American (as is often the nature of the online world), but I am always on the lookout for more (that is an open invitation to point me in the direction of where I might find them).
My problem has been that I have so many now, but did not really have an idea of how to present them to the world. So, I have decided to run with themes. So this week, for the inaugural Sports logos worthy of ridicule or admiration (or both), I have decided to run with Tigers.
As the mascot of a sports team, the tiger can rarely be beaten. In real life they are a powerful and majestic beast, with a pretty cool set of colours that you can swipe straight off the shelf. Let’s face it; tigers are maybe the most recognisable and popular of the world's charismatic big animals. They feature significantly in ancient mythology and folklore, and continue to appear in modern films and literature. You can find tigers on heaps flags and coats of arms and as the national animal of a number of Asian nations. Indeed, in a poll conducted by the TV channel Animal Planet, the tiger was voted the world's favourite animal, voted on by more than 50,000 viewers from 73 countries, with 21 percent of the vote. So the tiger is as good a place as any to start.
First, I must reveal a potential conflict. My brother is a very keen follower of the Richmond Tigers in the AFL. In many respects, for the past thirty years Richmond have proven as inept and ineffective on the field, as the tiger itself is graceful and powerful in the wild. I hope that this does not cloud my judgement. To the logos!
Let us start with an early one. First, we go way back to 1902 for the Detroit Tigers initial primary logo. It only lasted a year, and I can only wonder why. Actually, that isn’t right, I can see why. Actually, for the world’s most popular animal, someone has struggled to draw it. I will be honest and admit that I am unable distinguish whether or not it is actually a tiger. Reflecting upon it, I thought that it looked like my son Henry’s interpretation of a puppy. If it were an Rorschach inkblot test, I'd say it looked like two people having sex (but I always think that they look like people having sex).
For whatever reason, Detroit changed their logo. Perhaps the deformed puppy look failed to sell enough merchandise, but by 1927 the logo looked like this. An improvement, I think, but by golly, this one looks like one exceptionally bewildered tiger. With little medical history to go on, we may speculate as to advanced dementia or something. To be totally honest, I can only assume that even prior to the Great Depression, Detroit was hit hard by a severe shortage of decent artists.
To complete the Detroit trifecta, this logo was in use from 1961 until 1993, and is the one that I associate the team with most. Given the period with which this logo was active, I think that it entirely appropriate that the tiger looks like he also suffering from a few complaints. Perhaps that thousand yard stare was picked up after seeing some heavy action in ‘Nam, or maybe he just partied too hard and fried his brain with coke. Either way, he appears to be struggling. It was probably fitting to retire him.
One might be forgiven for thinking that Detroit have the pissy tiger logo award all sewn up, but that would be ignorant of the excellent efforts of the Hamilton Tigers ice hockey team. Obviously inspired by the efforts of both Detroit and the Elephant Man Joseph Merrick, the team owners decided to embrace deformity with their effort here of 1921.
Probably realising that profoundly malformed heads can be a bit of a turn off for the fans, Hamilton looked to the early effort of Detroit, only this time employing a more talented infant to draw them a tiger. Just to make sure, they got him or her to colour it in for the punters. It is definitely an improvement, but Hamilton soon gave in and decided to go with a black and yellow letter T instead.
You may well be thinking that this is the extent of very poor representations of tigers, but that would be failing to acknowledge the excellent effort of the Auburn Tigers logo that was in use from 1974 through to 1982. It is hard to imagine how one might debase and defile the grace and grandeur of such a striking animal better. Why Auburn University felt that a stoned guy skulking in a tatty old tiger suit would best represent the aggression and passion of this wonderful beast is beyond my comprehension, but I believe this logo to be the absolute worst of the lot. And they don’t even have the excuse of a Great Depression to fall back on!
The fun doesn’t end there though. Another honourable mention must go to the Pacific Tigers logo from the 1960s. It was a more innocent time in many ways, but the non-existence of Photoshop unfortunately did not mean a lack of odd cut and paste jobs. One assumes that the tiger in this logo is envisaged as leaping over the stadium with both grace and brawn, but you know, it isn’t. It has been cropped from some picture of it walking, stalking or whatnot, and whacked in awkwardly with a few unconvincing lines designed (poorly) to make it look like jumping. In the words of the Internet mob: FAIL.
To finish up this post, I would like to reach out into a couple of more ‘cartoonish’ logo that reminiscent of the old Richmond FC logo. The first is from college football of the late-1970s. Specifically, I am talking about the Missouri Tigers. Yeah, he looks like he is tripping on some of the brown acid that you were warned about at Woodstock, but this guy at least looks like he can RUN. Look at him go!
Compare that with the cute, but kind of feeble Cincinnati Bengals guy from the late 1960s. Unlike the Missouri tiger above, this running back seems stunted, petite and actually looks to be scared. The size of the ball makes him look like a baby. Not really the sort of thing to strike fear into the hearts of your opponents.
All right then, that's it for this week. Coming up though:
[Most of these logos come from the excellent Chris Creamer’s Sportslogos.net. Much thanks to everyone there for giving me hours of fun!]
I have over the past few months amassed a large number of logos of various sports teams from every area of competition. The majority are North American (as is often the nature of the online world), but I am always on the lookout for more (that is an open invitation to point me in the direction of where I might find them).
My problem has been that I have so many now, but did not really have an idea of how to present them to the world. So, I have decided to run with themes. So this week, for the inaugural Sports logos worthy of ridicule or admiration (or both), I have decided to run with Tigers.
EPISODE ONE: TIGERS
As the mascot of a sports team, the tiger can rarely be beaten. In real life they are a powerful and majestic beast, with a pretty cool set of colours that you can swipe straight off the shelf. Let’s face it; tigers are maybe the most recognisable and popular of the world's charismatic big animals. They feature significantly in ancient mythology and folklore, and continue to appear in modern films and literature. You can find tigers on heaps flags and coats of arms and as the national animal of a number of Asian nations. Indeed, in a poll conducted by the TV channel Animal Planet, the tiger was voted the world's favourite animal, voted on by more than 50,000 viewers from 73 countries, with 21 percent of the vote. So the tiger is as good a place as any to start.
First, I must reveal a potential conflict. My brother is a very keen follower of the Richmond Tigers in the AFL. In many respects, for the past thirty years Richmond have proven as inept and ineffective on the field, as the tiger itself is graceful and powerful in the wild. I hope that this does not cloud my judgement. To the logos!
Let us start with an early one. First, we go way back to 1902 for the Detroit Tigers initial primary logo. It only lasted a year, and I can only wonder why. Actually, that isn’t right, I can see why. Actually, for the world’s most popular animal, someone has struggled to draw it. I will be honest and admit that I am unable distinguish whether or not it is actually a tiger. Reflecting upon it, I thought that it looked like my son Henry’s interpretation of a puppy. If it were an Rorschach inkblot test, I'd say it looked like two people having sex (but I always think that they look like people having sex).
For whatever reason, Detroit changed their logo. Perhaps the deformed puppy look failed to sell enough merchandise, but by 1927 the logo looked like this. An improvement, I think, but by golly, this one looks like one exceptionally bewildered tiger. With little medical history to go on, we may speculate as to advanced dementia or something. To be totally honest, I can only assume that even prior to the Great Depression, Detroit was hit hard by a severe shortage of decent artists.
To complete the Detroit trifecta, this logo was in use from 1961 until 1993, and is the one that I associate the team with most. Given the period with which this logo was active, I think that it entirely appropriate that the tiger looks like he also suffering from a few complaints. Perhaps that thousand yard stare was picked up after seeing some heavy action in ‘Nam, or maybe he just partied too hard and fried his brain with coke. Either way, he appears to be struggling. It was probably fitting to retire him.
One might be forgiven for thinking that Detroit have the pissy tiger logo award all sewn up, but that would be ignorant of the excellent efforts of the Hamilton Tigers ice hockey team. Obviously inspired by the efforts of both Detroit and the Elephant Man Joseph Merrick, the team owners decided to embrace deformity with their effort here of 1921.
Probably realising that profoundly malformed heads can be a bit of a turn off for the fans, Hamilton looked to the early effort of Detroit, only this time employing a more talented infant to draw them a tiger. Just to make sure, they got him or her to colour it in for the punters. It is definitely an improvement, but Hamilton soon gave in and decided to go with a black and yellow letter T instead.
You may well be thinking that this is the extent of very poor representations of tigers, but that would be failing to acknowledge the excellent effort of the Auburn Tigers logo that was in use from 1974 through to 1982. It is hard to imagine how one might debase and defile the grace and grandeur of such a striking animal better. Why Auburn University felt that a stoned guy skulking in a tatty old tiger suit would best represent the aggression and passion of this wonderful beast is beyond my comprehension, but I believe this logo to be the absolute worst of the lot. And they don’t even have the excuse of a Great Depression to fall back on!
The fun doesn’t end there though. Another honourable mention must go to the Pacific Tigers logo from the 1960s. It was a more innocent time in many ways, but the non-existence of Photoshop unfortunately did not mean a lack of odd cut and paste jobs. One assumes that the tiger in this logo is envisaged as leaping over the stadium with both grace and brawn, but you know, it isn’t. It has been cropped from some picture of it walking, stalking or whatnot, and whacked in awkwardly with a few unconvincing lines designed (poorly) to make it look like jumping. In the words of the Internet mob: FAIL.
To finish up this post, I would like to reach out into a couple of more ‘cartoonish’ logo that reminiscent of the old Richmond FC logo. The first is from college football of the late-1970s. Specifically, I am talking about the Missouri Tigers. Yeah, he looks like he is tripping on some of the brown acid that you were warned about at Woodstock, but this guy at least looks like he can RUN. Look at him go!
Compare that with the cute, but kind of feeble Cincinnati Bengals guy from the late 1960s. Unlike the Missouri tiger above, this running back seems stunted, petite and actually looks to be scared. The size of the ball makes him look like a baby. Not really the sort of thing to strike fear into the hearts of your opponents.All right then, that's it for this week. Coming up though:
Pissy Pirates!
Animals in Sweaters!
Surely Mascots!
[Most of these logos come from the excellent Chris Creamer’s Sportslogos.net. Much thanks to everyone there for giving me hours of fun!]
Comments
My husband is a Richmond fan too.
And Freefalling, my commiserations to your husband. I can only hope that he was around for the glory years, because I know how difficult it can be to follow them at times. My brother's relationship with them is tragic, he loves them and he wants the to do well, but he hates them because they are in some ways the bane of his life!
As an Essendon fan, I had become too accustomed to success, and only now (the past three or four seasons) am I getting a taste of the bottom of the ladder. Richmond fans have has had that for over twenty five years now.
http://www.fifa.com/worldfootball/clubfootball/news/newsid=742294.html