Like Your Players Sweaty?

The reports are in and the news isn’t high and dry. The new Reebok uniforms, the NHL has decided to use for the upcoming season were designed to stay dry, do just that. They stay dry. But instead of “wicking” away perspiration and moisture, it seems what it does is collect water and by way of miniature pumps and tubing, collect the smelly liquid and dump it in the gloves or boots the player is wearing.
Now, this isn’t a very unusual thing to happen, Gary Bettman taking a great idea like dryer, sleeker, comfortable uniforms and turning it into the next great aqueduct to hit the modern world, but you would have thought someone at Reebok might have asked this question: “Hey, boss. Where does the sweat go?”
A company that designs, tests, and markets a large variety of equipment and uniforms for every type of sport should have know that if a material resists absorbing moisture, the moisture must go somewhere. Collecting it in boots and gloves may seem like the ideal catch basin, but for an athlete, playing in soggy equipment I recon is like trying to catch a greased pig during the Strawberry Festival deep in the hills of West Virginia. It is just plumb hard.
Or did they think that since hockey was played on ice, the players wouldn’t sweat as much. Seeing as they are constantly surrounded by the beautifully and always cold surface, whereas their bodies would maintain an even temperature therefore not relinquish the frothy juice of sweat. Yum, yum.
NHL players should empty out their gloves and boots, collect and bottle the liquid, and label it as celebratory champagne. This will be given to the people at Reebok, for them to celebrate all the money they made from all the teams and fans that spent big bucks to have these newer, sleeker, dryer uniforms. (Maybe that’s why they used to wear sweaters?)
Well, here’s to you Reebok!!! Cheers!!!