Kalamazoo Wings

1

The Kalamazoo Wings of the ECHL are, depending on how you count, either the second or third incarnation of the team. The first was of course the Kalamazoo Wings of the International Hockey League, who played from 1974 to 2000 (although they changed their name to the ridiculous "Michigan K-Wings" in 1995). The second was the Kalamazoo Wings of the United Hockey League, who played from 2000 to 2009 and who really had nothing to do with the original Wings except for getting permission to use the name. When the owners got fed up with being in a league as poorly run as the UHL was, they moved to the ECHL, which may or may not be the third incarnation. During all this time, the teams have essentially used the same logo. There's a simple reason for this, which is that it's a good logo.

Admittedly, this is not a logo that wows you the way some do. But it's a good, basic logo that makes its point. The red, white, and blue color scheme is one of the most traditional schemes in sports (I haven't actually counted, but I'd be very surprised to learn it isn't the most common color scheme for professional sports teams in North America). The logo features the city's initial with a stylized wing on it, with the team name written across the "K". The whole thing is slanted to give an impression of speed. What more do you want?

At the left you will see the original logo of the IHL team. There's only one color, the word "Wings" is missing, and it's upright instead of slanted, but this is for all intents and purposes the same logo as what the team is using today. Over the years there have been a few color changes (mostly to conform with their NHL parent), and for a while the word "Wings" was written in a different font below the "K", but all in all this logo has not seen a lot of changes despite being 34 years old now. You'd be lucky to find a team half as old as this logo is that hasn't had three or four completely different logos in that time frame. And after all this time, the Wings' logo still doesn't look dated. In fact, even if they went back to the very original logo, it still wouldn't look dated.

We have a word for that word in the English language. That word is "classic". And classic is exactly what this logo is.

Final Score: 1 point.
Penalties: Name-Logo, 2 pts; Ripoff, 4 pts.
Bonuses: Cool-Logo, -5 pts.