NHL Unis!

Yes, I remember those Caps' all whites, and the white pants with the red tops. The few times I saw the Caps on TV with those all-white unis, they didn't contrast enough with the ice, so I was glad when they wore the blue pants shortly thereafter.

Paulie, do you remember when the Kings wore the all-gold home unis in the early to mid '70s? They adopted this look for the 1970-71 season and kept it through 1978-79. For their first three years, the Kings wore gold tops and purple pants (which were then the road outfits). For 1979-80, they finally dumped the all-gold and went to the original gold tops and purple pants, which were now the home unis. The other ensemble was always all-purple ("forum blue," in Jack Kent Cooke's vernacular), with occasional alterations in the use of gold striping (very little in the first few years, more of it on the shoulders and sleeves in the later years). They wore those outfits until Bruce McNall (remember him?) opted for the Raider look in 1988-89.

I am a vocal proponent of the Kings going back to the purple/gold of their first 20 years. Their experiment with Raiders colors is the late '80s was noteworthy only because it coincided with the Gretzky years. As a hockey fashion statement, I thought the silver and black was kind of lame (it works better for the Raiders, instead of copy-cat teams like the Kings). It was also the first time a team blatantly incorporated the "gangsta" black in the uni specifically for marketing purposes. Hoods who wouldn't have been caught dead (literally) in an NHL uniform before 1989 were suddenly wearing the black-and-silver Kings unis.

The Kings have now opted for a sleep-inducing black/purple combo that hardly compares to the dashing purple/gold of their early years. I wish they'd go back.

Ditto for the Mighty Ducks. Some yuppie has decided that writing out the "Mighty Ducks" in script is somehow a better look than the duck face/goalie mask logo popularized in the early 90s and Ralph DiGiovanni's favorite. That duck face/goalie mask is a great logo, now we only see it occasionally on the road white shirts. The Ducks have also mostly abandoned their green/jasmine color, again for a purple/black combo that makes them look too much like the dull Kings. The original Duck colors "eggplant (purple) and jasmine" sounded like some exotic dish at an oriental restaurant, but in fact was a nice combo. Now they have even messed that up.

At least the Flyers still look pretty good, but I even think they have gone mostly to the all-black (no?) instead of the orange tops/black pants, which were classics. At least they have maintained orange as a secondary color...

Paulie, they should let you, me, and Mark design all of these unis...