The Hawks’ new uniforms are here, with triangles and ‘volt green’ for all
We’ve known for a while that the Atlanta Hawks were planning to unveil new uniforms before June’s 2015 NBA draft in time for the 2015-16 season, and we’d already seen a couple of leaked images giving us a sense of what they might look like — first the triangular patterns and green accents on the leaked Christmas Day unis, then the new winged-A-lookin’ alternate logo, then the sneak peek at the new wordmarks to appear on the chest and shorts of the uniforms. The official reveal comes Wednesday morning, but Chris Vivlamore of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution got a jump on the proceedings with a Tuesday night leak of several photos of the new kits:
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… so, yeah, it seems safe to say those early looks were just about bang-on. There’s the triangle pattern in the fabric, the full-scale replacement of the “Hawks” jersey wordmark with newly stylized “Atlanta” and “ATL” blocks and, lest we forget, quite a bit of that neon green accent coloring. The NBA’s “most modern and cutting edge uniforms,” indeed!
As noted by Chris Creamer of SportsLogos.net, that green seems intended as a nod to a brief period in the early 1970s when the Hawks moved away from a red, white and blue color scheme to one that prominently featured neon green in the home, away and, most notably, alternate uniforms. The Hawks weren’t particularly good during that stretch, finishing below .500 in both the 1970-71 and ’71-’72 seasons, but they did employ the legendary “Pistol” Pete Maravich during that stretch, which seems as good a reason as any to go green.
Hawks CEO Steve Koonin confirmed the homage at Wednesday’s unveiling:
For what it’s worth, the video presentation unveiling the new uniforms called it “volt green,” and also recast the triangles as a “feather pattern [that] captures the essence of an attacking hawk.” It’s all about the essence, after all.
While the textured pattern and the heavy dollop of green have raised some eyebrows in the hours since Vivlamore’s post, it’s probably worth considering the new unis in the context of the Hawks’ ongoing mission of trying to draw in younger fans, with team CEO Steve Koonin looking to strengthen his club’s ties to the young, upwardly mobile, predominantly African American prospective fan base in the heart of Atlanta. From a January story on the Hawks’ efforts by ESPN.com’s Kevin Arnovitz:
Twice a week on summer nights, Koonin assembled more informal focus groups at his house in Buckhead composed of his 27-year-old son, David, and a diverse group of his millennial friends and co-workers, fans and non-fans. Koonin hooked up his iPad to a 65-inch Apple TV and asked the millennials their impressions of various marketing proposals.
Over beer and homemade bagel bites, they weighed in on everything from potential smartphone Hawks apps to mockups of new team uniforms that look like a cross between something a Marvel superhero would wear and the Oregon football unis (which the research said millennials are nuts about, even if your dad thinks they’re hideous).
“I wanted to get confirmation because I wasn’t the target,” Koonin said. “When I worked in television, I was much more of the target demographic and I could relate to the product and there was a gut sense of what worked. With the Hawks, I’m a middle-aged white Buckhead executive talking about African-Americans and millennials.”
It’s an approach that’s given rise to unique elements like the hip-hop organ mastery of Sir Foster, the Tinder-centered “Swipe Right Night” promotion, the release of an emoji-heavy mobile app tied to the unique tattoos of forward Mike Scott, and more. With the Hawks soaring on the court, as well, winning a franchise-record 60 games and making it to the Eastern Conference finals for the first time in team history, Atlantans responded — the Hawks averaged 17,412 fans at home games this season, playing to 93 percent of Philips Arena’s capacity, up from 14,339 and 76.6 percent in 2013-14.
Whether this latest rebranding effort will help nudge those numbers even further north remains to be seen, but it certainly seems like a bold move intended more to draw the eye of younger consumers than to elicit “way to keep it minimalist!” pats on the back from those of us who dug the Philadelphia 76ers’ new old look but didn’t much care for the Los Angeles Clippers’ attempt at a reboot. Koonin apparently swears he’s displeased by Tuesday’s leak, but if young fans wind up voting for the patterns and neon with their dollars, he could wind up loving all this extra attention.
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Dan Devine is an editor for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
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