THE WASHINGTON WIZARDS were in town Monday night and, as a point of clarification, it was not the team that tours with the Harlem Globetrotters. That's the Washington Nationals. This is the Washington Wizards, formerly known as the Washington Bullets.
That's the way it's been in professional and, to a lesser extent, college sports over the years. A name seems to have a certain shelf life, and then it's gone. Political expediency, legalities or just common sense prompts teams to drop their old dumb names in favor of new dumb ones.Salt Lake is at this very moment struggling with a name problem of its own. Because Georgia Tech owns the rights to the nickname "Buzz," the Salt Lake Buzz may be forced to change their name. The suggestions are pouring in: Beezz, Breezze, Fliezz, Skiezz, Saintzz, etc. If you ask me, all this "zz" stuff is getting way too cute. Then again, they didn't execute the guy who thought up the Cal-Irvine Anteaters.
Actually, nicknames may be improving. In 1883, the predecessors to the Boston Braves/Milwaukee Braves/Atlanta Braves were the Boston Beaneaters. Talk about striking fear into other teams' hearts.
In 1890, someone decided to name the predecessors to the Brooklyn Dodgers the "Bridegrooms." Maybe it was Larry King. At any rate, the name conjures up images of someone flustered and a little bit scared; someone liable to get cold feet.
That was, however, only a warmup to their next name-change, when some aspiring P.R. man suggested they be named the "Superbas." The Brooklyn Superbas. Wow. The guy must have gone around naming everyone, because that same year a team in St. Louis was called the "Perfectos."
Perfectos vs. Superbas. Sounds like a matchup between vacuum cleaners.
One can only wonder what kind of people thought up all those names. Give them an A for imagination but an F for common sense. In 1898, the Chicago Cubs weren't the Cubs at all; they were the Chicago Orphans. Two decades before that, it wasn't the Milwaukee Brewers, or even the Braves, it was the Milwaukee Cream.
Of course, that was the same team that had Alamazoo Jennings and Abner Dalrymple in the lineup, so bad names seem to have pretty much been the norm.
In 1876, there were the New York Mutuals, which explains only one thing: who carried their life insurance. There were the New York Gothams in 1883-84. And in 1887-90, the Pittsburgh Alleghenys were all the rage in the Steel City.
Try squeezing that into a one-column headline.
Though the Cleveland Indians are overdue for a name change, it wouldn't be their first. For a decade in the early 1900s they were known as the Cleveland Naps. Whether that had anything to do with their sleeping habits is anyone's guess. In 1901-02, Boston had a professional baseball team named the Somersets, which we can only assume was inspired by a subdivision or trailer park.
Then there were the Pittsburgh Stogies, the Wilmington Quicksteps, the Newark Peppers and the Buffalo Buffeds.
It's enough to make you think "Jazz" isn't such a bad nickname after all.
Nicknames have a tendency to go through phases, such as the one in which teams loved to be inanimate objects. Remember the era of the Southern California Sun, Chicago Wind and, yes, the New Orleans Jazz? In the late 19th century it was stylish to name your team after a color. There were the Cleveland Blues, Louisville Grays, Worcester Ruby Legs, St. Louis Brown Stockings, Chicago White Stockings and - was this stylin' or what? - the St. Louis Maroons. You wonder if Alexander Julian was making up the names. There were even the Hartford Dark Blues, apparently so you didn't get confused and think they were the Light Blues or maybe the Sapphire Blues, which would have been far less intimidating.
Just to make sure they didn't discriminate on equipment, there were even the St. Paul White Caps and Boston Red Caps.
At some point, teams became enamored by religious affiliations: the Philadelphia Quakers and Boston Pilgrims. No wonder there was a move afoot to name the Jazz the Salt Lake Saints when the team moved from New Orleans.
So if your idea of a cool name isn't the L.A. Sparks, or if you cringe every time you hear another attempt at naming a Salt Lake team with a "zz" ending, remember this: Whatever they choose, there have been worse.