On February 2nd, 2022 or 2.2.22, the Washington Football team will announce, on Good Morning America, the new name of the franchise. Speculation suggests the Washington Football Team would relate or correlate the Groundhog to it’s potential new name, the RedHogs. Seemed logical, until today.
Washington Football Team Name Change Video
NFL Name Change History
The last NFL team to have a name reveal would have been the expansion Houston Texans. Of course before that was the Tennessee Titans. Before that was the Jacksonsville Jaguars and the Carolina Panthers. We have seen teams move cities in the blink of an eye, like the San Diego Chargers, to the Los Angeles Chargers. The St. Louis Rams to the Los Angeles Rams – again. The Los Angeles Raiders to the Oakland Raiders to the now Las Vegas Raiders.
Washington Football Team Final List of Names
It was mentioned that Tonya Snyder had a list of the final names for consideration shown below:
- Armada – A spanish name for a fleet of ships or army. No real relation to the heritage of the team.
- Brigade – There is a team in Baltimore called the Baltimore Brigade, which is a AFL team.
- Commanders – No reference to anything within the heritage or long standing traditions of the team.
- Defenders – Most likely a Military reference for defending this country considering its D.C.
- Presidents – It would never be this considering the political landscape of the US.
- RedHogs – There is an animal that is of such name. Its not intimidating looking, but at least the Hogs has a reference to the offensive lines of years past.
- Redwolves – A real animal that at one time was native to this area before being pushed into parts of Pennsylvania.
Evidence
LL – Possible Circle Logo; LR – Circle Logo
Pictured above is a aggregate of evidence which roots the speculation of Commanders. The question is, how much of this are fans meant to see? The two left images were shown in the video from the link above, but the two right images were blurred during the video only to be leaked by NBC Sports. Watching the video, the two right images are part of a stack of paper on Team President Jason Wright’s lap as he talks with Ron Riviera about the name change direction.
Of course, in order to garner attention from fans and media, the teaser was simply that. The only thing actually factual in the entire video was the day of the reveal. For almost a month now, fans and analysts alike are trying to find clues to the new name.
I even check the trademark database for names every couple of days.
Conclusion
Some fans are searching domain name transfers as well, like @LarryLegendBTW who conducted the WHOIS search of commanders.com:
After a exhaustive search of the WHOIS database, for every NFL team they use Mark Monitor to manage their domains. The evidence, at least to this author, is that the Washington Football Team is going to start a new era as the Washington Commanders.
The common complaint from Washington Football Team fans is simply, after 2 years, this was the best you could come up with? There was a disclaimer from Washington Football Team leadership which identified the fan favorite Washington Redwolves, but due to trademarks, the name Wolves is not permitted to be used based on another teams name. Of course this other team is the Minnesota Timberwolves.
It’s hard to believe that a phone call between the owners or team presidents could not work out a deal of sorts to modify the trademarks to satisfy and include the teams fanbase choice as part of their overall decision.
The Washington Football Team is steeped in tradition, with a long history of football success entrenched in the city. In 1999 Dan Snyder bought the team after previous owner, Jack Kent Cooke passed away. Since the day that Dan Snyder bought the team, the history has been tarnished and the fan base has been reduced physically, and emotionally from what they once were.
Here is the new name of the Washington Football Team for 2022:
The Washington Commanders
Dan Snyder can’t get out of his own way. What a joke.
I can see the evidence section and really trying to correlate the pieces, but you would have to think this team would do a better job of concealing and showing what they really want the fans to see. I am not sold on Commanders, and you make a valid point about the trademarks, but in 5 days, we’ll put this all to rest.