When A Hurricane Is A Disaster

I'll go on record and admit that my fashion sense is equal to a blind person wearing gloves. I'm not up on current trends, I have no idea what pairs well together, and I don't get how there's an entire industry that determines what's in and what's out when it comes to clothes. What I can tell you is that I feel like there's a distinct lack of fashion sense in the hockey world when it comes to jersey designs, and today's unveiling was nothing short of a disaster in my humble view.

The Carolina Hurricanes opted to roll out their new road uniforms for the 2025-26 season and beyond today. Here's what they look like.

Before I start taking the microscope to this new road jersey that the Hurricanes will wear, it should be noted that the design is based off their Stadium Series jersey worn in 2023. That jersey was black and red, but the logo on the front is virtually identical in its two-colour version and the sleeve striping is also similar. Frankly, this entire road jersey unveiling feels totally unnecessary as there was zero need for the Hurricanes to change this jersey set. Cash grab, anyone?

If there is one good thing we can take from this new road kit, it's the fact that the "Canes" jersey has been mothballed. As you may know, I despise the use of team nicknames on jerseys for the simple reason is that is not the actual branding of the team. Yes, the Hurricanes are colloquially referred to as the "Canes", but that's never been in their branding strategy nor is it how the team refers to itself in any professional manner. Ditching those eyesores was long overdue, but replacing them with the new jerseys above has me reconsidering my whole stance on those "Canes" jerseys as an option.

I feel like Tom Dundon, having dropped part of $4 billion on the Portland Trailblazers, came up with this plan where this jersey is nothing more than a way to recover those spent monies. People will say, "Teebz, it's pretty clear this was in the works before he bought the NBA team," but we don't actually know when the negotiations to buy the Trailblazers began. All we know is that Dundon had a tentative deal to buy the team by mid-August. If the negotiations started months before that, putting this new jersey idea into action to sell more merchandise would ease the burden of spending that money. Besides, Dundon's never been shy about making money.

That all begs the question why the Hurricanes couldn't go back to their original road uniforms that match the rest of the uniform set. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that road jersey outside of "we can't see one million more units of that, sir." If that's the only thing holding you up on choosing a professional-looking jersey, you're probably doing jerseys wrong. In fact, I know you are.

I did say in that 2019 article, "It's within the owner's playbook to rebrand his team if he likes. After all, he owns everything from the logo to the jerseys to the wordmarks," so if this is what Tom Dundon wants for his team he has to live with it. However, I'll also remind everyone that I finished that article with these words: "the Hurricanes go and do something unspeakable at the highest level of professional sports by making their franchise look like a minor-league promotional night". It seems they want that label because these jerseys look like they're wearing white practice pinnies over another shirt. NHL hockey deserves an NHL logo, and the ones worn above by the players are the Walmart version of the Hurricanes' logo.

This disaster of a road jersey that the Hurricanes trotted out today should only be worn as a practice jersey. The Stormy logo on the sleeve is terrible - what other team wears their mascot as a logo? - and the aesthetics of this jersey are just awful. The Hurricanes started out with solid jerseys in 1998, but they keep adding dumb stuff to their closets including black jerseys, nickname jerseys, and now this disaster. At some point, the Hurricanes have to adopt a professional look, right? Like this minor-league stuff has to end, right?

All the power to the world goes out to Tom Dundon for owning an NHL team. That's an expensive undertaking, so I doubt he's going to listen to me and my views on hockey. Heck, I'll even disclose that I own a red Hurricanes jersey, so you know that I do like the Hurricanes to some degree. In saying that, however, there's a zero-degree chance one of these new road jerseys will ever land in my closet.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!