Awesome Sports Logos Blog

NBA Playoff Basketball The Way it Should Be

It's the 2013 NBA playoffs and Miami is riding high in the East, but the West is having all the fun. What’s going on in the Western Conference of the NBA playoffs right now is everything basketball fans could hope for. The Grizzlies and the Warriors are making things fun in a way that we haven’t seen in years.

I proclaimed in an earlier blog that if your team didn’t make the final 16, you’d either abandon the playoffs altogether, or search desperately for stories to keep you on the hook. To quote the immortal line from The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, “print the legend.” You’ve got your stories. Media monsters posture each year about underdogs and upsets. This soapbox dance is nothing more than a corporate line towing. Spoiler alert: the networks, frequencies, and papers want to make you interested. In these NBA playoffs, their jobs are obsolete.

The Steph Curry led Warriors are doing something amazing against the Spurs. The large seed disparity seems like an old wives tale. In the blue corner, the Grizz look like they’re toying with the Westbrook-less Thunder. Sure, many pendulums have arbitrarily swung the other way to reach this point, but isn’t this just what we need?

The tide will most likely turn. It’s early. In all probability, the Finals will give us a matchup many could’ve predicted in November. But that’s exactly why we should appreciate what’s happening right now. This party has become strange and intriguing, a far cry from the stale pattern of playoffs past. So please, if you haven’t already; turn on the tube, read your morning news, call in to your local sports station. There’s no story to manufacture, so throw these guys a bone. Right now, the NBA playoffs are fun, and it’s time to embrace that notion.

When the NBA playoffs are in full swing, the players move up and down the court like a lightning dance. Often times, it’s tough to catch the emblem across the athletes’ jersey. You’ll have no trouble spotting the genius of the insignias on our t-shirts. Awesome Sports Logos has a few hoops logos that are pretty darn cool. One in particular we thought New Orleans should have asked us to borrow. Instead of the New Orleans Pelicans which debuts next year, what about the New Orleans Curse? Check out this sweet Voodoo Doll going in for the dunk. Even though this doll has pins stuck all over, he still has a great vertical leap. New Orleans has a long history of Voodoo and curses. So support the cause and pick up this awesome t-shirt today!

  

The New Orleans Pelicans Logo

The New Orleans Hornets recently released information on their name and logo change. Louisiana now houses an NBA franchise nicknamed The Pelicans. There’s been rampant debate over the name change, but little discussion of the New Orleans Pelicans’ new logo.

Lukewarm reception of the new nickname created poor expectations. Would the logo be hokey? Could a Pelican be menacing? Could a sea-bird become iconic? The fact of the matter is the logo isn’t bad. New Orleans was smart to minimize the Pelican’s presence in the logo and focus on the city name. This isn’t something I would be embarrassed to brandish on a hat, replica jersey or awesome t-shirt. The play on the court will decide this logo’s legacy. However, the team and the NBA will have to be careful in their support of the new moniker.

The most frightening consequence of the change could be its court side reflection. Will the Pelican’s real-life mascot come across as fun or cheesy? There’s a fine line between entertaining the kids and exasperating the adults. Winning solves most problems, but the front office can’t let their guard up while navigating the side effects of a logo change.

Haven’t warmed up to the idea of supporting The Pelicans? Not to worry. There’s another team in New Orleans that needs your support, and they’re not silly at all. The New Orleans Curse are here to work the odds in your favor. Check out the awesome t-shirts below!

Video Spotlight of the New Orleans Curse T-Shirt

At Awesome Sports Logos, we love showcasing our funny t-shirts. Here's our video on the New Orleans Curse.

The Hornets Are Changing Their Name to the Pelicans

The New Orleans Hornets have announced that next season they will be taking on the name Pelicans. According to Marc Spears of Yahoo Sports, Pelicans beat out finalists Krewe which is costumed people that participate in the Mardi Gras parade and Brass which was formerly a minor league hockey team based in the city. I applaud Tom Benson and the Hornets on the name change and here’s why. We created Awesome Sports Logos to bring back the fun and creativity back in sports logos. One of the creative aspects of sports logos that is shamefully fading is making a logo that is indigenous to the area in which the team is playing. I will never understand why a team moves and then keeps the name. New Orleans Jazz, great name, Utah Jazz, not so much.  I don’t picture Louis Armstrong playing his trumpet on a Salt Lake City street corner.

Here’s why the New Orleans Pelicans work. First, it’s not the New Orleans Hornets. Second, the Pelican is the state bird of New Orleans. Third, Tom Benson owns the rights to the team name Pelicans which was a longtime minor league baseball in New Orleans that Shoeless Joe Jackson, Earl Weaver and Tony La Russa played for. The name fulfills what a sports logo should be. Now the trick is making a mean looking Pelican which is going to be a monumental task. It’s tough to relate to a Pelican as a marquee sports animal. I don’t picture NBA Players quoted as saying, “My dream is to become a Pelican”.

While I’m happy that New Orleans is changing their logo, they missed a golden opportunity. We at Awesome Sports Logos were one phone call away. What about the New Orleans Curse?  This is one of our favorite logos that we created and would have been a perfect fit with the voodoo doll dunking a basketball. New Orleans loves the voodoo aspect of their culture. They should have taken a page from  the New Orleans Voodoo which sells a lot of merchandise and went with the New Orleans Curse.  Here’s our New Orleans Curse awesome t-shirts for you to check out.

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Kudos to New Orleans on changing their name but I wish you would have chosen the Curse. Hopefully other NBA teams will eventually follow.  This way we will no longer play Jazz in Utah, have Kings in Sacramento, try to find a Lake in Los Angeles, or hunt Grizzlies that don’t exist in Memphis. At least this was a step in the right direction. Nice job New Orleans.

Gavin Spittle

Founder, Logo Lover, T-shirt Wearer

www.awesomesportslogos.com

New Orleans now has a Good Curse Thanks to This Awesome Sports Logo

Today we spotlight one of my favorite t-shirts in our collection, the New Orleans Curse. I love the colors and uniqueness of this logo. In doing research, I was shocked to find that there was never a team called the Curse in New Orleans.  Here are the t-shirts we offer.

 

        

New Orleans has a lot of history with witchcraft, voodoo, and ghosts. In fact, hundreds of thousands of tourists flock to the “Big Easy” each year and besides loving the food and partying on Bourbon Street, they love their cemetery tours. They are nicknamed “Cities of the Dead” because the deceased have to be buried above ground since New Orleans sits on top of a swamp so tourists make their way through stone crypts and mausoleums. Personally, I’ll stick to the food and partying.

We all know about the New Orleans Saints in the NFL and the Hornets in the NBA. Here at Awesome Sports Logos, we like to show you some cool logos in New Orleans that you may have never heard of.

The New Orleans Buccaneers

 

The Bucs played in the ABA in New Orleans only three years 1967-1970. Notable players were Doug Moe and Larry Brown, two guys that are more known for their coaching years in the NBA. I love this old school logo with the hair on the chest. Whoever created this logo back in the 60’s was well ahead of their time!

 The New Orleans Voodoo

 

Even though the Arena Football League hasn’t been a success, New Orleans Voodoo merchandise sales have. In fact, the team came back in 2011 after folding in 2008 and the new owners grabbed the Voodoo logo. It's simple but awesome and the bones creating the "V" top it off. Well done!

 The New Orleans Zephyrs

 

For a city that doesn’t have a Major League Baseball team, New Orleans baseball has great history dating all the way back to 1870 where the Cincinnati Red Stockings played five games against the Brooklyn Athletics. The team moved from Denver and the name Zephyrs was kept due to the popular Zephyr roller coaster ride nearby. They’ve had this logo since 2009 and I really like how they incorporated the Fleur-de-lis with the subtle baseball bat in the middle. The Zephyrs are the Triple A affiliate of the Miami Marlins.

 The New Orleans Brass

 

The Brass was in the East Coast Hockey League from 1997-2002. I’m not the hugest fan of this logo but it does embrace the awesome music scene in the Crescent City.

 We end with two Roller Derby teams.  What? That’s right; Roller Derby has some of the coolest logos going. They don’t mind being edgy and breaking the mold and at Awesome Sports Logos, we appreciate that. We’re going to be doing a “coolest roller derby logos” blog in the near future. Here are two of them.

Big Easy Rollergirls

 

I like how they use those Saints popular colors and work in a roller derby player into the Fleur-de-lis. Big Easy Rollergirls has been skating since 2005.

 Cajun Rollergirls

 

Now this is a cool logo. Located in Houma, about an hour away, I love how they took a voodoo doll, gave it a female look and laced it up with skates but put great detail into the doll including the pony tails and female skull on its chest. This is a quality logo.

 As always, I welcome your suggestions and feedback. The goal is to get people talking about sports logos which I feel is a lost art. Oh yeah and sell some t-shirts along the way. We hope that you check out our awesome t-shirt site and like more than one shirt. Buy three shirts and get the fourth shirt free. Just remember to put in the 3THENFREE code when checking out We use the highest quality t-shirts. We want you to wear our logos for a long time. Thanks for reading!

Founder, logo lover, t-shirt wearer

Awesome Sports Logos