Author: George Malik

My name is George Malik, and I'm the Malik Report's editor/blogger/poster. I have been blogging about the Red Wings since 2006, and have worked with MLive and Kukla's Korner. Thank you for reading!

Crain’s Detroit Business’s Shea on the revamped ‘Hockeytown’ logo/campaign

Crain’s Detroit Business’s Bill Shea examines the Red Wings’ revamped “Hockeytown” logo and advertising campaign:

The Red Wings last month trotted out the refreshed “Hockeytown” logo that re-imagines the phrase in fabric letters that matches the names on player jerseys. It will be heavily used in the team’s TV, signage, and digital marketing campaign all season, on merchandise and apparel, and will show up in many places inside Little Caesars Arena including on the dasher boards. It was removed from the ice for this season so that the iconic Winged Wheel logo could be featured alone (with four corporate advertising logos around it), the team said.

“Hockeytown” as it was felt dated, the team’s top marketing executive said.

“It was time for a refresh,” said Craig Turnbull, senior vice president for marketing and communications for the Red Wings and Olympia Entertainment. “It’ll be much more featured. We’re happy with the way it came out. The reaction from guests has been very positive.”

“Hockeytown” has been a backbone of the team’s branding since the expression was introduced by the Detroit office of ad agency Bozell Worldwide in 1996 to commemorate the Red Wings’ 70th anniversary. It’s become ingrained with the team, players, fans, and was legitimized by the team’s playoff success and six Stanley Cup appearances.

It’s also a registered trademark, along with the Winged Wheel logo. Using “Hockeytown” as a fan-base reminder of the team’s glory years and to reinvigorate their sense of community is one strategy. So is playing defense against any suggestion that anywhere else is Hockeytown.

Continued

 

Erm, ‘Dilly Dilly?’

Per MLive’s Brandon Champion:

Forget the sin bin, the Red Wings’ visiting penalty box has been re-branded.

Welcome to The Pit of Misery.

In perhaps the single greatest decision in the short history of the new downtown Detroit arena, the boards in front of the visitor’s penalty box at Little Caesars Arena now feature a “Pit of Misery” Bud Light advertisement.

WXYZ reporter Brad Galli posted a photo of the addition on Thursday, Oct. 4, just hours before the Red Wings begin their season against the Columbus Blue Jackets (7:30 p.m., Fox Sports Detroit).

Kris Draper praises ‘Ehnner’

DetroitRedWings.com’s Dana Wakiji discusses Christoffer Ehn’s ascent from prospect to fourth-line wing/center, via Red Wings special assistant to the GM Kris Draper:

One of the main reasons Ehn earned a spot on the team was with his excellent defensive prowess paired with his skating ability.

Someone who knows a lot about being a contributor as a fourth-line player and penalty killer is Kris Draper, the assistant to general manager Ken Holland.

Draper spoke a little bit about the 6-foot-3, 181-pound Swedish center at the Detroit Sports Media’s Red Wings Day at Sinbad’s Restaurant on Wednesday.

“Even last year talking to (director of European scouting) Hakan Andersson, he was really high on him and high on his development, with getting a little bigger and stronger,” Draper said. “His skating, he’s an unbelievable skater. He’s a guy that’s going to get up and down the ice real fast. With the way the game is being played right now, it’s so important to be such an elite skater. That fourth line, I know Glendening is going to play with him. (Blashill is) going to have a lot of confidence in Christoffer Ehn and Glendening to play some shifts against the other teams’ top lines. They feel that there’s going to be the opportunity and the ability to create some offense. The one thing when you’re playing against another team’s top line, you want to try to make them play defense as much as possible. I think they’re going to have that mindset to be able to do that. I think it’s going to be a fun line, it’s going to be a line that Blash can trust and when you have trust in your players, as a player you feel that. I think that’s going to be something important for them.”

Wakiji continues…

Griffins to hold ‘Tip a Griffin’ event on November 19th

Per the Grand Rapids Griffins:

Tip-A-Griffin Event Hosted by Uccello’s November 19

Griffins players and coaches will visit all six Uccello’s locations in West Michigan to serve food and wait tables, with tips and proceeds benefiting the Griffins Youth Foundation. Over its 11 previous editions, Tip-A-Griffin has raised nearly $100,000 for various local charities. Further information such as player location assignments will be announced at a later date.

There’s more information on the event here…

 

Tweets of note: A charitable note and Griffins sightings

Two Tweets of note this afternoon:

1. In the charitable news department:

2. And in Texas…

HSJ, Khan on Sulak and the rest of the Wings’ rookie debuts

The Free Press’s Helene St. James, MLive’s Ansar Khan and the Red Wings posted comment videos ahead of tonight’s game vs. Columbus, and here are the articles which accompany them, from St. James, who focuses on Libor Sulak…

Libor Sulak thought of his family as he prepared to make his NHL debut.

The defenseman was to be part of Thursday’s season opener for the Detroit Red Wings at Little Caesars Arena, one of five rookies on the roster. The Wings see Sulak as someone who can make them better because of how fast he can skate, an asset he showed off repeatedly during preseason.

“I’m intrigued by Libor because his skating is elite,” Wings coach Jeff Blashill said after the morning skate. “His body and strength and reach are elite. I think he’s got to learn a number of things in positioning, to make sure that he is on the right side of the puck so he’s not giving up easy chances. It’s something we’ve talked about with him through this week. The good thing is he seems to want to learn it, he seems to have a capacity to learn it.

“That will be the biggest thing for him, is can he just play from the right side of the puck and if does that, boy, he is going to be a real good player in the league. So hopefully he can learn that real fast.”

Who continues, and Khan, who focuses on the Wings’ rookies:

 

FSD posts video of Dylan Larkin, Zach Werenski breaking bread together

Fox Sports Detroit posted a video of Red Wings forward Dylan Larkin and Blue Jackets forward Zach Werenski “breaking bread” together ahead of tonight’s game between Detroit and Columbus:

Update: Fox Sports Detroit’s “The 313” discussed the start of the broadcast season as well:

 

HSJ on ‘Sixty Minutes of Hell’

The Free Press’s Helene St. James asked Red Wings coach Jeff Blashill to clarify the Wings’ “60 Minutes of Hell” mantra:

“It means hard to play against, making it hard for the other team,” Dylan Larkin said. “It’s a good model for us I think because we are capable of doing that with our speed up front and our defense.”

The shirts were the brainchild of coach Jeff Blashill, a variant on Arkansas’ Nolan Richardson’s ’40 minutes of hell.’

“We have to be hard to play against on a nightly basis,” Blashill said. “We have to make sure that we’re not a ‘tween-er’ team, we’re not kind of skilled but not winning the skill game and kind of hard but not really hard enough. We have to be miserable to play against every night.

“That means different things to different people. I have to find what that means to us. But we have to be more miserable to play against. I want teams walking into LCA going, boy, I don’t want to play this game, not this will be an easy one. It’s just kind of a reminder on a daily basis of making sure that we stay really, really miserable to play again.”

Red Wings-Blue Jackets game-day comment videos

The Free Press’s Helene St. James, MLive’s Ansar Khan and the Red Wings posted game-day comment videos, with St. James spotlighting Libor Sulak and Dylan Larkin…

 

 And Khan speaking with Dennis Cholowski…

Continue reading Red Wings-Blue Jackets game-day comment videos