What’s In A Nickname?
We have this habit in this country of shortening names. For example, Robert will often be known as Rob or Bob; James commonly becomes Jim. And we often add a “y” to those nicknames for the very young, or for those to whom we are close, leading to Bobby and Jimmy, for example.
Same goes for sports teams…Hawkeyes becomes Hawks, Cyclones becomes Clones, Bulldogs becomes Dogs, and Panthers becomes…well, Cats.
In other words, we know a name is going to get shortened to a nickname.
That brings us to the Washington NFL team, which for nine decades was known as the Redskins. The team quickly got rid of the name two years ago, after many years of denying a change would ever happen, when the lead sponsor of their stadium threatened to withdraw its tens of millions of dollars if Redskins was retained.
That is what led to the last two awkward seasons where the team had no nickname, but was simply known as the Washington Football Team, which was shortened to WFT of all things. I suppose simply cheering, “Go Team” was not going to be sufficient.
The team promised a new name to be rolled out in between the conference championship games and the Super Bowl, and true to their word, last Wednesday the team proudly declared themselves to be the Commanders just in time for their 90th season this fall. The idea was to forge a tie to the military, since the team is based in the nation’s capital.
I was struck first by the fact that the dictionary defines a commander as a person in authority…so the team will have lots of people in authority and no one following orders…like what play to run.
But what was better was how immediately, the name Commanders was shortened…to Commies.
That’s right, our nation’s capital will be represented in the NFL as the Washington Commies. Quick people started selling t-shirts with a hammer and cycle logo on a helmet and the name “Washington Commies”.
They took two years…and no one figured out in this political climate that they might be called the Commies?
The team might actually have been glad that attention about the new name was short-lived, as the team’s owner was hit the next day with yet another allegation of sexual harassment.
