Wisdom and Links: Stay the Athletics, Links and Thanksgiving

Today, I’m going to talk about names. More specifically, old names. Names no longer used. And names that should last forever.

This season, the name “Hornets” returned to the Charlotte NBA team. It had gone to New Orleans when the previous team moved there, despite the fact that the name was utterly connected to the Charlotte region and had been used for teams in other sports (including baseball) before the NBA team had even started. Of course, the NBA has a history of nonsensical legacy names. There are no natural lakes in Los Angeles, for example, and the Jazz scene in Salt Lake City isn’t exactly famous like it would be in the original New Orleans market it was meant for.

But let’s get back to baseball.

The whole “Hornets” return got me to thinking about baseball team names. Now, baseball doesn’t have as many cases where the name makes no sense after a move. Oh, sure, there are the Dodgers, but the fact that many teams have generic names like “Giants”, “Braves” or “Athletics” means that the names can basically go anywhere.

Now, let’s talk about that last one. “Athletics”. Possibly the most generic name you can think of in sports. Seriously, unless you were to literally name a team the “baseball players”, there are few nicknames that can be more generic. It is something that would never come about today, where a team of focus groups and executives would come up with some sort of cool name meant to represent the city, it’s history, or the ferocity of competition. When the St. Louis Browns moved to Baltimore, they took the name of Orioles, because that’s what baseball teams in Baltimore have always been called. When the Expos moved to Washington, they became the Nationals, another long-time name for DC baseball teams (they didn’t use “Senators” because the District doesn’t have any voting senators). In football, the Houston Oilers changed their name to the Tennessee Titans when they moved, as both a reference to how Nashville is known as the “Athens of the South” and also because the word “Titan” calls to mind some giant, powerful being.

Now, for years, the A’s and the San Francisco Giants have been having a dispute over whether the Athletics can move to San Jose. The Giants own San Jose’s territory, and don’t want to give up the wealthy Silicon Valley, the Athletics see it as a possible salvation after being stuck in the purgatory that is the Oakland Coliseum forever. There is no end in sight.

But let’s just say that an end does come, and the A’s move to San Jose. What happens then? Do they change their name?

I hope not. I want the “Athletics” to stay around forever. I hope if they move to San Jose they become the San Jose Athletics, not something like the San Jose Way (a favorite of mine when I have teams in San Jose in Out of the Park Baseball) or the San Jose Venture Capitalists. For one thing, the Athletics have a lot of history under that name across three cities. The Athletics are the team of Connie Mack, Jimmie Foxx, Catfish Hunter, Reggie Jackson, the Bash Brothers and “Moneyball”. And unlike certain other teams, such as Washington’s NFL team, the name is not offensive in the slightest.

And, besides, if they were to change their name, we’d no longer be able to giggle like school children and call their fans “Athletic supporters”. Hehehehe.

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LINKS!

Jeff Passan has more on Yasmany Tomas and also Giancarlo Stanton.

Jonah Keri on the Red Sox and their high-risk but potentially high-reward signings of Hanley Ramirez and Pablo Sandoval.

In The Classical, Adam Sobsey writes about Josh Lueke.

Former big-leaguer Bill Bray looks at his memories of a MLB trip to Taiwan in 2011.

SELF-PROMOTION OF THE WEEK: This week’s “Bizarre Baseball Culture” looked at a crummy old bio-comic of Stan Musial. Next time will be more interesting.

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Happy Thanksgiving everybody. So, in the spirit, the following are baseball things I’m thankful for, in no particular order:

• Madison Bumgarner’s performance in the postseason.
• Ichiro Suzuki quotes.
• Vin Scully telling stories while also giving you the action on the field.
• Orbit, the mascot of the Houston Astros, who has skyrocketed up the mascot power rankings this season.
• Buck Showalter.
• MLB’s “Stand Up 2 Cancer” initiative.
• Clayton Kershaw.
• Mo’Ne Davis, Jackie Robinson Little League, and the other stories of the 2014 Little League World Series.
• Pitchers getting hits.
• Position players pitching.
• Mike Trout finally getting the MVP Award.
• Those times when teams from the same city but in different sports support each other on Twitter.
• Hank the Brewers dog.
• Outfield assists.
• The endless amusement/horror that comes from following Mets reporters and fans on Twitter.
• AAA Baseball.
• Pedro Martinez being on the Hall of Fame ballot now. That’s going to be a fun speech.
• Bat-flips.
• And everyone who reads my stuff, both here and at the Baseball Continuum. THANK YOU!

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As always, you can see more of my work over at Baseball Continuum.