Well, its 10pm and i and sitting here with my 2 liter of mt. dew, a bag of bbq chips, and I just popped in The Mighty Ducks on dvd....and then I remember...
I was not so patiently waiting for the arrival of the news of the day from the Bloomington Blaze, which came at a little after 5pm tonite. The Jerseys are great looking by the way, but I digress. I had some time today to catch up on some of the Blazes facebook questions and posts and it occurred to me, we need to educate some of the hockey ignorant.
i use the term ignorant well because that's what they are. We are a new hockey town and some of the people aren't current on what hockey is about in terms of what is done at games and how teams are represented. Hockey is not like any other sport when it comes to the so called traditions, we are passionate about everything about the sport, not just our team. Music, uniforms (sweaters not "jerseys") and overall excitement about what the "club" is doing. Normal fans of the "big 3" (football, baseball, and Basketball) just usually follow their team. Well not true hockey fans. We follow the sport and all that goes with it.
THE EDUCATION
Hockey likes to be traditional at all levels. We try to stay away from the gaudy and flashy when it come to what our club looks like on the ice. Something that gets the message of what our team is named or represents is all that is needed on the crest. Flaming sticks or flaming pucks is not necessary! So please stop suggesting it. With our new logo, perfect! Thank you for making it simple and something good to look at. A few local suggestions turned into the actual design, with some help from an east coast design firm. Congrats to all who had the input.
I heard a comment online today that stated "what kind of mascot can we get from a flaming B?" Seriously?!?! the mascot has to be determined by what is on the front of the sweater? No not really. Just because the previous team, (which did business so well, they are no longer around) did it doesn't make it gospel. Like our fantastic PR reps at the Blaze are doing, they are leaving it up to what the fans want to see as the mascot by having fans bring ideas to the Mclean County Fair all this week at their booth. Great Idea! Keep up the good work PR dept.
Another comment posted yesterday is the actual reason I decided to write this ahead of my actual story tomorrow, "and can we have something other than the Peoria Rivermen fog horn". Well hate to break it to you, the fog horn isn't exclusive to the rivermen. Hockey clubs use it everywhere, it's kinda become a tradition, so educate yourself before speaking on a public forum....i don't like to be mean, but I will if you ask for it. The horn stays!
Music at hockey games is loud. With the boards people sometimes feel like the players are separate from the fans. so the music is used to convey an atmosphere of whats going on. You don't like loud music, two words for ya, ear plugs. Music invokes excitement and energy, something we definitely need in an almost 7,000 seat arena that hosts roughly 2,300 fans a game. Not that that is a bad thing, a starting off point for growing the game for sure. Hard rock is what drives fans. Most are fast and angry, which is what most hockey players and fans are like. You don't think the players hear and enjoy the music either, next season, look down at the bench or watch an NHL bench and watch the players bob their heads to the music.....it matters. So does everything have to be about "fire"? certainly not. A good entrance song doing with burning or flames is very appropriate and a good song during a fight or when a player is going to the box, would be great, and the Blaze asking what the fans want to hear is a great idea. A certain NHL team I follow did the same thing on twitter through the owners daughters and the official team account did to great success. Their music sucked and now is getting better.
The Goal Song......
Are we the Blackhawks? No, not even close, so why do we feel like we need to use their goal song? Here's and idea.....lets get our own. Lets find a song that we can call our own....doesn't have to be a popular song, Chelsea Dagger wasn't until the Heineken commercials and the Blackhawks owned it. Something the fans can chant along with and it easy to follow would be great to bring some "ownership" to the fans in cheering the team on. Enough on that for now.....
Tomorrow I will be bringing to you an in depth look at what the team is doing to bring these new fans to the Coliseum in October, along with my thoughts on the sweaters, lack of players and overall state of the franchise as august begins.
wow you are an elitist. i have watched hockey in several leagues in many different barns and bloomington has by far the loudest music of any of them. it is so bad it actually detracts from the experience and inhibits pregame conversations with friends and fellow fans.
ReplyDeleteand instead of actually acknowledging the problem you tell folks to get ear plugs? seriously? how juvenile. "if you dont like it, leave" that's not a proper attitude.
p.s. - real hockey fans have no problem using the term jersey. why? because real fans are secure enough in their 'fanhood' to call it what it is and not have to show off the fact that it was traditionally called a sweater.