considering nfl team helmet logos

in alphabetical and numerical order

1. buffalo bills
surely one can draw some ironic glee from the buffalo bills helmet logo. the team is named for one, buffalo bill, who received his nickname for being the preeminent buffalo killer of the wild wild west. yet, the team he is named for, contradictorily features a buffalo! this would be analogous to the new york jets having the twin towers on their helmet. to even further complicate matters, buffalo bill has nothing to do with buffalo, new york nor does buffalo, new york have anything to do with buffaloes. in fact, the city is thought to have not even been named for the animal but for the corrupted french phrase beau fleuve which means "beautiful river." also, is that a red spear going through the logo's head or just a design emblematic of movement?

2. cleveland browns
even though the cleveland browns are named for their onetime owner and head coach, paul brown, and not the colour (brown), their logo-less helmet may be better served with brown (the colour) as its primary feature. the franchise has obviously made the colour/name connection with their brown jerseys so why go with the orange helmets? this only draws attention to the unsavory fact that the browns remain the only nfl team sans logo. while i recognize that no two colours better represent a bleak and downtrodden rust belt city like orange and brown, i would humbly suggest that brown and brown double up as the team's primary and secondary colours with orange providing the tertiary hue.

3. green bay packers
not only is the green bay packers' helmet logo the only of the two-worded cities to be represented by just the one letter (for example: san francisco- sf, kansas city - kc, new york-ny, green bay - g), but is also the only design of which has been propagated by an extra-terrestrial based, apocalyptic suicide cult. yes, the infamous heaven's gate cult used the packers famous "g" aesthetic as their own when, in march 1997, their leader, marshall applewhite, and 39 of his acolytes committed mass suicide during the period when the hale-bopp comet was at its brightest. but perhaps the most interesting/spooktacular coincidence(?) is that the green bay packers appeared in and won their first super bowl in thirty years just a few months before the heaven's gate cult took their own lives... and they haven't won one since.

4. miami dolphins
surely, the most egregious helmet logo faux pas is occurring in miami with their dolphins. the dolphins logo features a seemingly innocuous helmet wearing dolphin majestically breaching through a brilliantly blazing ring of fire. however, upon closer inspection, one may realize that the miami dolphins logo is swimming for another team! look at its helmet; it's emblazoned with an orange "m." why isn't this dolphin adorning the same helmet that dan marino, larry csonka or reggie roby proudly wore? what team is this charlatan playing for??? upon our thorough detective work we have found that this dolphin masquerading as the miami dolphin plays for the marlow high mud thumpers of kentucky - a landlocked state, no less!!!

5. new england patriots
with its sideburn(s), powerful chin, pouty lips and kinetic design the new england patriots logo is affectionately known to boston sports fans as "the flying elvis." however, one may (as several have) muse that the long and strong profile may more closely resemble massachusetts' own, john kerry. perhaps kerry, a longtime senator and one time presidential candidate, would provide a more appropriate allusion to the pat's logo as a real life "new england patriot" than elvis, a pelvis shaking southern boy, would.

6. oakland raiders
interestingly enough, the eye-patched and smirking buccaneer of the raiders logo isn't merely a generic face but one that is said to be modeled after longtime hollywood leading man, randolph scott. while scott was mostly known for his work in westerns, it was assuredly his role as the quarrelsome, though cultured pirate, adam mercy, in the motion picture, "captain kidd," that led to his depiction as the raider of the oakland raiders. also worthy of note is the fact that scott was the subject of rumours that paired him in a longtime homosexual relationship with screen legend, cary grant. with that said, please refrain from making any "swabbing the poopdeck," "raising the misen mast" and/or "raiding the booty" bon mots. thank you.

7. pittsburgh steelers
the steelers own the distinction of being the only nfl team to have their logo appear on one side of their helmet. this was not an act of randomness but rather one of first pragmatism and later style where owner, art rooney, did this as a test to see how the logo appeared during games and its popularity led the team to leave it that way permanently. the logo's three "astroids" (red, yellow and blue hypocycloids of four cusps) were originally representative of the phrase "steel lightens your work, brightens your leisure, and widens your world" but were later known to symbolize the ingredients used in the steel-making process: yellow for coal, red for iron ore, and blue for scrap steel. and, contrary to rumours, we did not "steel" this information from the wikipedia. lolz, jk - we, like, totally did.

8. seattle seahawks
when one thinks of american indian inspired helmet logos they usually draw upon either that of the washington redskins or the kansas city chiefs. however, the first logo that comes to our mind is the totem inspired design of the seattle seahawks. sadly, no genre of american art has been more overlooked than that from our native friends of the pacific northwest. while the chiefs chose a logo inspired by death (an arrowhead) and the redskins with their decidedly racist moniker, the seahawks have literally soared above all else in featuring a tribute to their brilliantly painted carvings of story and tradition - bravo, cheers and how!

9. st. louis rams
the honours of the first ever and best ever helmet logo belong to the st. louis (by way of cleveland and by way of los angeles) rams. in an oxymoronic flurry of flamboyant machismo, commercial artist/rams halfback, fred gehrke, first painted horns on his leather helmet all the way back in 1948. thusly, if there is one quadrupedal animal who stands hooves and paws above all others in their football personification representation it is that of a ram and, incidentally enough, the horns on the helmet translate beautifully as well. sure, like most animals, rams can't carry, pass or kick a ball but their ramming, as it were, is beautifully symbolic of the action that occurs on the line of scrimmage during each and every single play. as die-hard 49er fans, we can only hope our dyed-in-the-wool (pun INTENDED) rams fans don't read into this too much and see this moment of blatant objectivity as an opportunity to toot their own horns (pun INTENDED again!!!).

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