Johnnie Walker Just Dropped a NYC Championships Bottle of Blue Label
New York City is still buzzing after a historic NBA Finals in which the Knicks won their first championship in 53 years. The parade might be over and fans have mostly stopped climbing light posts and celebrating in the streets, but that doesn’t mean that whiskey brands don’t want a piece of the action. Case in point is the new Johnnie Walker Blue Label NYC Championship Limited Edition Design bottle, which dropped late last week.
This release is not an official partnership with the New York Knicks or the NBA, it should be noted. So don’t expect to see any logos from the team or the league, or any slogans like “Knicks in Five” on the label. Instead, this is meant to celebrate “the moments, memories, and achievements worth toasting”—you know, like the first Knicks title in over half a century—with some Big Apple-inspired design. Specifically, that means things like a version of the New York City skyline, “team‑inspired color accents” (orange and blue, of course), and “iconic” symbols that represent the city like a bagel and a slice of pizza.
The liquid inside is the same Blue Label that you’d find in a regular bottle of this peak expression from the brand—a blend of malt and grain whiskies, some from Diageo’s ghost distilleries that closed long ago, with only one out of every 10,000 casks making the cut according to the official marketing materials. That includes malt whiskies from distilleries like Benrinnes, Cardhu, Clynelish, and Caol Ila, and grain whiskies from Cameronbridge and the long-closed Port Dundas. There is no age statement, but presumably there are some older whiskies in the blend that have been matured for at least a few decades.
This isn’t the only Knicks-themed—sorry, N.Y.C. championship-themed—whiskey bottle that has come out. Maker’s Mark released a Knicks-centric bottle a couple of years ago, and this one was actually tied to the team. (The bourbon brand is an official partner.) That bottle has the team logo on the label and swaps out the signature red wax top for Knicks orange. The brand hasn’t released a new championship version of this bottle, but these are probably in high demand at the moment amongst Knicks fans who also love bourbon.
Perhaps Josh Hart didn’t get the memo, or he might just be more of a tequila fan, because he was photographed with a bespoke decanter of Patron El Alto, almost two feet tall and encrusted with diamonds and the words “Hart of the City.” The real reason for this is that Hart appeared in an ad for Patron earlier this year, a wise move for the tequila brand considering how the Finals turned out.
You can purchase the new Johnnie Walker Blue Label NYC Championship Limited Edition Design bottle now directly from Diageo’s The Bar website (SRP $289).
