So... Alright - What's in a name?

Episode Date: December 9, 2025

Let's find out! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

So finally, so finally today I get to do a so all right that I've been looking to do for a couple of weeks. I'm going to go ahead and be honest with you. It might be a short one. Could be very long. I genuinely don't know how this is going to go. I haven't done any pacing tests with it or anything. But without further ado, I'm very excited to dive into the origin of professional sports team names. This is something Byndog came over the other day.

We were watching hockey, and he started to tell me the origin of different hockey, NHL hockey teams, and each one was more ridiculous than the last. And I thought, this is a whole episode of So All right. I should look into this. And so I have compiled a list of some of the weirder, wilder, more interesting origin stories for professional sports teams names. You do not have to be a sports fan to enjoy this. This is just interesting historical information.

Doesn't have anything to do with bats and balls, I promise you. We're going to start it off with my very own Boston Celtics. This should be a pretty obvious origin story, but I feel like I should cover it anyway. The name was chosen because Boston was full of Irishmen, and that's according to the team owner Walter Brown. but there were a bunch of other names that they considered, which I'm going to sit with,

I just read this for the first time today. I'm going to sit with this for a while and think how things would be different if instead of being a Boston Celtics fan, I was a Boston Unicorns fan or a Boston Olympians fan or a Boston Whirlwinds fan. Could you imagine I'm cheering on

Jason Tatum and the unicorns? It's hard for me to imagine the Celtics being anything other than the Celtics and seeing anything other than lucky as their mascot. But a unicorn wouldn't be bad. A unicorn wouldn't be bad. I got to be honest. A lot of these you expect to be, you know, old stories from the 1800s, and some of them will be. But some of them happened in the 90s, like the Toronto Raptors, which became a team

less than a year after Jurassic Park released. Big hit that Jurassic Park. And so the Toronto Raptors were named after Velociraptors, I think because of success. Let me, you know, I'm going to double check that. The Toronto Raptors are, there's a second source. The Toronto Raptors are named after dinosaurs in Jurassic Park. The team's name was chosen in 1994 in part due to the immense popularity of the 1993 film, which had a massive cultural impact.

The name was selected from a nationwide contest. Wow. It was the nationwide name game contest. And I guess the team president thought that the name would help market the team to kids who are fascinated by dinosaurs. Isn't that funny? Nowadays, you feel like

you try to get kids interested in science and math through things like sports, more accessible things like sports. But back then, we were trying to get kids into sports through dinosaurs and history and paleontology. That's kind of awesome. St. Louis Cardinals have a pretty good one. In 1898, they were the St. Louis Browns who were not doing well. They were bought by a couple of brothers, and they changed the name to not the Cardinals.

In the 1890s, they were the St. Louis Perfectos. However, in their first year, a writer named William McAil heard a female fan say, what a lovely shade of cardinal in regards to their socks. And so he wrote that in a newspaper column in the St. Louis Republic and the name stuck. I don't know how long were they were the perfectos. Yeah, so I guess they were the St. Louis perfectos for just one season in 1890 before they became the Cardinals in 1900, all because a journalist overheard a lady comment on a pair of socks.

You guys are the Cardinals because of socks. Not because of birds. Your Cardinals are because of socks. I don't that sink in. She probably also mentioned the very first professional sports team in America. Cincinnati Reds. But they were not the Cincinnati Reds then.

They were originally the Red Stockings. At some point, they became the Red Legs, and then eventually became just the Reds. But then, in the Cold War, They became the Red Legs again, because Red was a bad word in the Cold War. Man, listen to this. This goes so far back. The Cincinnati Reds began their journey four years after the Civil War.

They were the Red Stockings, the first professional team in 1869. They began their first game with a 45 to 9 victory over a team called the Great Western of Cincinnati. So they became a charter member of the National League in 1876. However, their start in the league was rocky. The red stockings didn't fare as well as their predecessors. They finished 9 and 54 their first year after four seasons. Cincinnati was kicked out of the National League for playing games on a Sunday and for selling beer during games.

Both were big no-noes at the time. No shit. I guess in 1881, they were re-initiated with an exhibition series in St. Louis. The new franchise still exists today and became a charter member. of the American Association the following year. The AA, which was nicknamed the Beer and Whiskey League for its liberal approach to ballpark libations,

was reviled by the more puritanical National League owners from the start. This is from the baseball almanac, by the way. As the only A.A. Charter member that pre-exist the Young League, the Reds became the oldest baseball club and possibly the oldest currently existing

professional sports club. They were finally reinstated, into the National League in 1890 and were still allowed to sell beer and play games on Sunday. The only thing that changed was their name from the red stockings to just the Reds.

So then at some time, I can't pin down a date, but it looks like in the 40s and for a while, the Reds, because of the politically tinged climate that they were in, they changed their name from the Reds to the Reds to the Red Legs

to avoid any undue association with communism. However, players, sports writers, fans continue just to refer to them as the Reds. And eventually people just, they just abandon the Red Legs thing. Interesting. Jumping over to the NBA for a minute, the Houston Rockets you would assume were named as such because of Houston's association with NASA. But that is not the case. The Rockets originally were a San Diego-based team and were named the Rockets because San Diego was a city in motion and home to many space-aged manufacturers, so it was just kind of serendipitous that when they moved to Houston, NASA was already entrenched there.

And so it was an instant fit, which is very cool. The opposite of the Los Angeles Lakers, have we talked about the, I don't think I've thought about the Lakers yet, who began their friend. A lot of people think that they began in Minneapolis. That's not true. They were actually began in 1946 in Detroit as the gyms. They were in the national basketball. basketball league. But after one season, they, uh, they were purchased by a new owner and relocated to Minneapolis, where, uh, they became the Minneapolis Lakers, which makes a ton of sense because of all the lakes in Minnesota. And they were there until the, I want to say the late 1950s, they relocated to Los Angeles, but never changed their name, just continued to be the Lakers,

even though, you know, Los Angeles not known for its lakes. They also count all of those championships that they won in Minnesota as Lakers championships, even though they weren't Los Angeles championships, whereas the Boston Celtics only count the championships that were earned in the city of Boston by the Celtics. What are you going to do? Philadelphia Phillies is another interesting one. They picked Phillies because it's an instantly recognizable name. You hear it and you instantly think of the city of Philadelphia, which makes total sense.

But at some point during World War II, they decided to move on from the name. and they had a contest, and Blue Jays actually won. And so for a while, they were going to change the name of the Phillies to the Blue Jays. And I think for a couple of years, they actually had a Blue Jay on the logo, never officially dropped the name. And then I guess the Blue J thing just kind of fell by the wayside. And they said, fuck it. Yeah, for two years, they had Blue Jays on their patches.

And then in 1949, they just said, ah, screw it. We don't need it. A lot of people don't know this, but the Dallas Cowboys, America's team, I'm sure you've heard of them. They are, I believe, the most valuable sports franchise in America, more so than the Lakers, the Golden State Warriors, more so than New York Giants, more so than Los Angeles Dodgers, New York Yankees, more so than any other NFL team. Yeah, yeah, I think it's, hold on, let me, I don't want to be lying to you guys. guys. Yeah, the Dallas Cowboys have a valuation of about $10 billion. Second to them would be the New England Patriots at 9. Then the Los Angeles Rams at 7.6. Then you get into baseball. Number four is the Yankees. At 7.5. Number five is the New York Knicks. We're over to basketball at 7.5.

Those are your top five most valuable sports franchises in America. Anyway, Cowboys was the third pick. They were originally going to be the Rangers. As a matter of fact, the Dallas Morning News was even referring to them as the Rangers, but then the front office decided that that might be too confusing because there was a minor league baseball team, Dallas Rangers, which obviously I assume became the Texas Rangers. Probably shouldn't assume, but I'm gonna. I'm comfortable doing it in this situation. Before the Rangers was actually the second choice. The first choice, which I think is hilarious, they were initially going to be the Dallas Steers, but TechSram said you don't want to name your entire football team after

castrated cows. And so they decided to go to Rangers until they were, you know, afraid of the aforementioned confusion with the minor league baseball team and settled on cowboys. Iconic name, iconic team, funny that it was their third choice. Everybody knows, I believe, that the Los Angeles Dodgers were originally the Brooklyn Dodgers. And in the, God, what year did the Dodgers move to L.A.? What year did the Dodgers move to L.A.? Dodgers moved to Los Angeles in 1957, or at least it was announced in 1957.

But what you may not know is where the name Dodger came from. It is literally named after pedestrians of Brooklyn who were good at dodging streetcars. It's literally a team named after people dodge in traffic. They were originally called trolley Dodgers, but then shortened it to just Dodgers. My Detroit Lions became so in 1934 because the lion is the monarch of the jungle, team spokesman said. And before that, they were called the Portsmouth Spartans, decided to rebrand to the lions when they moved to Detroit, I guess. And they wanted to be known as the Monarchs of the League.

And I sure wish they would reclaim the crown at some fucking point in my lifetime. I'm sure you know that the Anaheim Ducks are named after the film, The Mighty Ducks. They were initially called in 1993 and 1994 when the franchise began. They were called the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim founded by the Walt Disney Company, I believe. The franchise was awarded by the NHL in 92 alongside the rights to a Miami team, which eventually became the Florida Panthers. An entrance fee of $50 million was required into the league, half of which Disney would pay direct. to the Los Angeles Kings in order to share the Los Angeles media market. The team's name was announced on March 1st, 1993, at the Anaheim Arena,

inspired by the Mighty Ducks, the 1992 film. They were the Mighty Ducks until January 2006, when a new owner announced that they would be renamed as simply Anaheim Ducks. Apparently, it was a good idea because the very next season, they won their first Stanley Cup. pretty wild I guess the mighty was the thing holding them back

all along I should probably talk about the Bruins who are how this whole thing started one of the original six NHL teams and Berndog was telling me the history of the team

obviously a Bruin is a Dutch term for a brown bear from like old folk stories and stuff and so the owner was a guy named Charles Adams who had become a fan of hockey recently

and was a very successful supermarket magnate. He had a company called Finast or First National, which was, I believe, the country's original supermarket chain, and their colors were brown and yellow. So he wanted the colors of the Bruins to be brown and yellow to some subtle advertising there. Then eventually after, I don't know, 10 or 15 years, I think it was changed to black and yellow.

But anytime they have their throwback jerseys and it's brown and yellow, know that those are the colors of the original owner's grocery store chain. Last but not least, let's do the Detroit Red Wings, who began in 1926 as the Detroit Cougars. They were one of the first three teams to join the NHL. They were struggling initially. They changed their name to the Falcons after being bought out of receivership by a dude named James Norris. And then they were renamed as the Red Wings in 32. So they went from the Cougars to the Falcons to the Red Wings. The Red Wings were named as such as an homage to the new owner's former team, the Montreal Amateur Athletic Association's winged wheelers. So he wanted to adapt that idea to his new

team, which is why the Red Wings have a winged wheel as a logo, which ends up working out great because Detroit's Motor City, another serendipitous moment in sports history. That's a lot, I think, a lot of team name origin histories. So let's call it there. I have no idea what this is going to edit down to, but I need to get you guys a song of the episode. Something good. Let me see.

How about Iron Sheek, cutesy, Monster Man? I don't think I've done this before as a song of the episode. I think I might have done the band before, but not that song. Iron Sheik, cutesy, Monster Man. I'm not going to tell you anything about it. Just listen to it. Go in completely and totally. and then see if you like it or see if you hate it. That'll be it for me. I'm happy to finally get

to sit down and dive into this. Hopefully you learned a little something about a team you like or maybe you just learned that sports is silly. Because it is. It's very silly. The names are silly. The origin stories of the names are silly. The whole thing is silly and it's awesome and I love it. And hopefully you enjoy the Iron Sheik song. Hopefully you're having a wonderful December, the holiday, we're in it. We're deep in the, we're smack dab in the middle of the holidays. We're past Thanksgiving and Halloween, the scary one. And now we just have Christmas and New Year's ahead of us. So we're smack dab in the middle of the holiday, of like the, we're in the eye of the holiday storm. So take care of yourselves. Be safe. Love yourselves.

Love each other. I'll see you next week. All right. I'ma-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-a-ma-a.