Over the past couple of years, I’ve made a conscious effort not to consume celebrity news. I mostly don’t care about celebrities, and know that I shouldn’t. The exception is when an artist is talking about their craft. I’ll watch Inside the Actors Studio (though why Jay Leno was on recently, I’ll never know), but not Entertainment Tonight.
I have extended the same logic to sports. If Markus Naslund is going to discuss the neutral zone trap, I might listen (athletes are, of course, notoriously lousy interviews), but I couldn’t care less about his labour negotiations. To me, it’s just a bunch of millionaires quibbling over how to divide their billions.
This is a long preamble to Colby Cosh’s post about NHL players in Europe and advertising on uniforms:
Here in North America we have a horror of letting uniforms be despoiled by corporate emblems (though I think Ziggy looks pretty cool, myself). It seems like a curious inversion of the usual response to capitalism on the two sides of the ocean. Perhaps our eyes, over here, are in greater need of that ad-free expanse of space.
I remember my shock at noting the prominent Carlsberg logo on the front of my recently-adopted Premiership team’s jersey. When I was in Dublin a couple of weeks ago, I saw a news item on the fact that the Premiership had approved expansion of advertising to the player’s shorts (they didn’t specify front or back).
Mr. Cosh proposes that “Corporate sponsorship on NHL uniforms seems like a relatively small concession to make for the existence of hockey”. I’m not sure that what the NHL and NHLPA need are new revenue streams. What they need to do is get their houses in order and practice some fiscal restraint. There’s plenty of cash kicking around for them–they just need to decide how to manage it. It pains me to picture a big Labatts logo on the shoulder of, say, a Habs jersey. So much of the game has become counterfeit and shoddy–can’t we at least hold on to the uniforms?
DarrenBarefoot.com 
I think it may also conflict with some of the lucrative deals that are already in place for equipment sponsorship. Example: Easton has sponsorship deals with players for sticks. Their models are labeled after the players (The Shanahan is one that comes to mind) that use them – and in return, I’m sure the players get a tidy sum for the use of their name. If that stick were suddenly to be wrapped in Pepsi logos, would the money go to the player, the league, or Easton? And would the logos be used solely during game-time, or would they also be present on the retail merchandise?
Jen: Your comment has prompted my depraved mind to devise another new revenue stream for the NHL and NHLPA: sex toys. “Buy the Shanahan for $29.99 and we’ll throw in the Chelios buttplug for free!” All of their money problems resolved, and it gives the Canucks “Winning Spirit” store a whole new meaning.
The CBC has shown some “NHL Classics” over the past couple of years to fill in the late night slot after hockey games. One of the games they showed was, I believe, the 1988 All-Star Game. What I found most fascinating about the game, beyond even the non-existence of the neutral zone trap, was the fact that there was no advertisements on any of the boards surrounding the rink.
Putting advertising on the team jerseys is just a horrible idea. It looks terrible on the European jerseys I’ve seen and I hope to god that it never happens here.