November 22, 2004
Washington ????????
There is going to be a press conference at noon today to announce the name of the Washington franchise. I don't think the Exposés is going to make it. :(
Update: Here's the story. It's the Nationals.
Does anyone else besides me have a problem with the name "Nationals"? They play in the National League, and are called the Nationals. It just seems a bit...repetitive. Couldn't they come up with something a little more original. Blech.
Yeah, it's really bland. Apparently the new owners will be encouraged to change it when they move into the new park (2008, if it goes according to plan), and I don't doubt that they will.
I personally liked "The Greys" a great deal. Classy, elegant, old-school: a nice touch for bringing baseball back to DC.
Any info on the jerseys/uniforms? I couldn't find any pics/renderings.
Mike
Second thought... should we all run out and buy the Nats merchandise? If the ballpark financing doesn't get sorted out by the end of the year, maybe they'll have all this gear and never have anyone actually use it. Then it would either be worth a lot or a little... I'm not sure.
Not yet, and I don't know when that's coming out. Just the caps so far.
I really like the name, reminds me of the old old days when teams didn't really have names just cities, and if there were more than one team the press would identify them by something else, like the Americans or the Nationals.
I was hoping for The Washington Truth, but I haven't found anyone who agrees with me yet.
What are the odds that the new owners will change the name from the Nats to something else? Nationals doesn't seem to have been too popular.
This from Newsday:
Commissioner Bud Selig preferred the name Senators for Washington's new team, but the mayor objected because the District of Columbia does not have representation in the U.S. Senate. Williams preferred the Grays, a tribute to the Homestead Grays Negro League team that played in Washington in the 1930s and 1940s.
"The Mayor on the Grays. Bud was on Senators," Tavares said. "And I think you see a compromise candidate. But I don't want to sell it as that. I think it's a great name."
Let's be honest here. The best choice would have been the Washington Monuments.
That's true since they are fielding a team of stiffs.
Headline for when the Nats win big:
Nats go Nuts!
When they lose:
Nats swatted.
I would have gone with Grays, but I think Nationals is a perfectly fine name. It signifies that they're in the capital city, it fits their league, and there's some historical basis for it. My only issue is that the logo makes it look too reminiscent of the National League logo.
I think one reason Nationals was chosen was that although it's a perfectly fine name in its own right, I don't think anybody will raise a fight if the new owners decide to give it something more distinctive. If they had gone with Grays, and the new owners had other ideas about marketing the team, people would have raised a big stink about changing it. It's a good name, but it has a generic quality that a new owner could either work with or discard. It's a hell of a lot better than "Devil Rays."
"Monuments," I never liked. I know the Washington Monument has been around a long time, but it seems like a silly name, a pun. What does it signify, that the players are tall and rigid?
I love the Monuments because it fits my two criteria:
1) It's not bland (Nationals...).
2) It doesn't refer to an obscure animal (Devil Rays, Diamondbacks, Marlins).
I'll take a pun over blandness.
Lame, lame, lame. Thats name, logo and...er...other stuff.
You gotta like the cursive "W" on the caps, though.
Right - its "Nationals" for now. But when the team is sold, or when they move into the new riverfront stadium in 3 years look for the name to be changed. I think the name Naitonals was chosen precisely because of its blandness. Watch for the River Rats or the Devil Dogs coming to a t-shirt near you!
Why do all the new sports team logos look like microbrew labels? You see this all over the minor leagues.