Cincinnati Cyclones

-3

This logo pains me. But in good way.

When it comes to sports, I am something of a traditionalist. I think skaters in hockey should keep their jersey numbers above 1 and below 30. I think the shootout is a load of garbage and if the game ends in a tie then they need to put it down as a tie in the standings and be done with it. Hell, I prefer baseball's National League over the American League because the NL still makes the pitchers bat. Tradition doesn't mean a lot to me in many areas, but in sports it resonates with me. And this logo flies in the face of a grand Cincinnati tradition, which is that Cincinnati hockey teams' logos tend to suck.

Think I'm kidding? I'm not. It starts with the Cincinnati Swords of the AHL in 1971. The swords were owned by and affiliated with the Buffalo Sabres (thus the name), and their logo was simply a pair of crossed swords beind a C. Not the worst logo there's ever been, but not great. The Swords gave way to the Stingers of the World Hockey Association, who are the exception and actually had a good logo. I hope the hockey fans of Cincinnati in the 70s didn't get used to it, because it didn't last. When the WHA was absorbed into the NHL, there was no space for the Stingers, so they were shunted down to the Central Hockey League, where they lasted half a season. A bit later, they got the Tigers, whose logo featured an attempt at drawing a realistic tiger by someone who probably should have tried to draw a stylized tiger. Then the Tigers went away, and the city went hockeyless for nearly twenty years until the Cyclones showed up with their logo which had (to steal a line I used in a previous review for the Cyclones) eyebrows, a goalie stick so short that it would be at crotch level if used in an actual game, and a goalie mitt that looks sadly like a Davy the Dolphin Boy's flipper. They got rid of that and replaced it with a tornado that had missing teeth (think about that for a second...), eyelashes, hula hoops and hands that just sort of hung in midair. Finally, the Cincinnati Mighty Ducks came along, and I just don't even want to talk about that one.

So as you can see, any sane person would have every right to cower in fear upon hearing that the Cyclones were creating a new logo. Cincinnati hockey logos have generally stunk, and Cyclones logos have generally been the smelliest of the bunch (although the Mighty Ducks gave them a run for their money). But this logo...it's actually good!

And I mean it's really good. It has an elegance about it that I associate with major league teams. Go to the NHL website and look at the banner at the top with all the team logos in it. Imagine inserting the logo for the Grand Rapids Griffins, Elimira Jackals, or Idaho Steelheads into the banner. Any of those would stand out in a bad way, and those are among the better minor league logos out there. Now imagine inserting the Cyclones logo into the banner. It would fit right in. In fact, if you inserted that into the banner and told someone who was unfamiliar with the league that one of the logos actually belonged to a minor league team and asked them to guess which one, I guarantee you they wouldn't guess correctly. They'd probably pick Pittsburgh. Maybe San Jose or Ottawa, but probably Pittsburgh. What I'm saying here is that Pittsburgh has a minor league logo despite being a major league team. The Cyclones now have the opposite. And they're flying in the face of a Cincinnati tradition by doing so. It's just wrong. But honestly? If this logo is wrong, I don't want it to be right.

Final Score: -3 points.
Penalties: Alliteration, 2 pts.
Bonuses: Cool-Logo, -5 pts.