Give Me An A!

If you are going to have a winning team, you need a cool team name. This is very important. It should inspire your team and strike fear into the other squad.

Let’s look at some examples of these fear creating names:

The University of Akron Zips- In Ohio, this name strikes fear in opposing teams. This is attributed to the many injuries in Ohio caused by drunk fans getting caught in their own zippers. This name beat out the second place choices The University of Akron Velcros and The University of Akron Button Flys.

The Freeport Pretzels (High School)- The pretzel is a food that many people fear. However, more fearsome foods can be found. Studies show that the foods that inspire the most fear are Spam, pizza with ham and pineapple on it, and anything served on an airplane. Therefore, a better team name is the Freeport Airplane Meals.

The Calgary Flames- this is a good start but a little non-descript. More fear-inducing choices include The Calgary Forest Fires or the Calgary Light My Farts.

Hebron Green Giants- naming your team after a line of canned goods should be enough to intimidate your opponent. Being more specific as to an actual canned food will be even better. The Hebron Canned Creamed Corn sounds scary. Other choices- the Hebron Canned Young Tender Sweet Peas or the Hebron Canned French Style Green Beans.

Johnstown Johnnies (Pennsylvania)- this is a good scary name. Scarier alternatives- the Johnstown Port-A-Potties, or The Johnstown Porcelain Gods.

Missoula Osprey- an Osprey is a type of raptor, and certainly “raptor” is more threatening than “osprey”. My suggestion here is to push the name even more and call the team the Missoula Velociraptors.

Lubbock Crickets- if you have to name your team after an insect, I recommend modeling your team after the honeybee. The honey bee will fire up any team when they hear this bee factoid: Bee mating occurs when a bunch of “drone” bees pursue the female. After the winner mates, a portion of his phallus falls off and he falls backward and dies! Now, that’s sacrifice. If only the LA Lakers played with such selflessness and commitment. Of course, the Lubbock “Honeybees” doesn’t sound right. In this case, I would go with the scientific name for the honeybees: here come the Lubbock Apis Melliferas! Give me an A!..

You should also try to match the team name and the stadium name. Sometimes they don’t fit. For example, The Sacramento Kings basketball team plays at Arco Arena. Shouldn’t they be playing in the Kingdome? But the Seattle Seahawks play football in the Kingdome. Surely a Seahawk should play in a place called the Skydome. But baseball’s Toronto Blue Jays play there.

The Detroit Red Wings play hockey at Joe Louis Arena. The Vancouver Canucks play at General Motors Place. It seems General Motors Place should be in Detroit.

The Anaheim Mighty Ducks play at the Arrowhead Pond. The Detroit Tigers play at Tiger stadium. So why don’t the Chicago Bears play in a stadium called the Chicago Forest, or at least, the Chicago Zoo?

Finally, the USC Trojan football team plays at Los Angeles Coliseum. And The University of Akron Zips play at the Rubber Bowl. Seems like the Trojans should play at the Rubber Bowl.