Today at 4 p.m. Eastern time, the New Orleans Hornets will announce a new name and logo[s]. There's no mystery to the name – that was reported as being the Pelicans long ago. The logo? That's another story. Fan-made concepts have been pouring in ever since the initial reports last month. We absolutely loved some of them, and in general the designs were pretty good, showcasing the potential of a name that, to put it mildly, not everybody loved.
But they weren't the real thing. And we won't know for certain what the real thing will be until this afternoon, but we do have a possibility to keep in mind. What you're about to see comes via sportslogos.net, which in turn comes from a tigerdroppings.com thread. Keep in mind – most of that thread consists of a debate as to whether the logo you're about to see is legit or not. It may not be. But since we've posted many prospective Pelicans logos as conversation pieces here before, we might as well do it with one someone is claiming to be the actual logo (or at least one of the actual logos). So ingest a few grains of salt and feast your eyes:
The poster who shared the logo also shared a screencap of a rendering of the logo on a hat. This set off more than a few BS detectors because the logo wasn't centered on the hat, as one would expect it would be in an official rendering of the result of a crucial branding decision for the future of a franchise valued at $340 million. Again, grain of salt.
But now that we've established proper skepticism, it's time to ask: what do you think of the logo, aesthetically? Us, we think it's okay, nothing special. Could be worse, but could be better. The emphasis is in the wrong place: the wings are the most prominent feature, whereas what really sets pelicans apart are those beaks. In general, the best of the fan logos had side views of pelicans, accentuating the beaks much more than this one does. The result is something more vanilla than great (vanilla enough, in fact, that some Tigerdroppings posters thought it was a sign the logo was real).
So, to whoever designed this logo, for whatever purpose: not a bad effort, but we're hoping that if this logo is indeed real, it's not the only one, and is instead paired with a riskier offering. We do have an easy way to spice it up, though… a method of logo enhancement we've been fond of in the past:
UPDATE: It appears that logo was legit: Twitter user Chase Robinson points to this video, in which the Hornets (including owner Tom Benson) officially announce the name/logo change. That video ends with this shot:
This, as you can see, bears more than a passing resemblance to the logo seen near the top of this post, so it's now safe to say that this will indeed be the Pelicans' logo, or at least one of them. Nice find, Chase.
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