Nike Launches New MLB City Connect Uniform Series

[Gothamite]

41 minutes ago, monkeypower said:

There's a rule in place now, but it's not why the Angels and Marlins changed.

 

Neither can change back now to the state name, but it's not why they changed in the first place.

 

What rule number is that?

[Bill0813]

59 minutes ago, Gothamite said:

 

What rule number is that?

I don't know the number either but it's the one that says a team can't use the state name..... unless MLB needs them to also host the AS game. 

[Marlins93]

 

1 hour ago, Gothamite said:

I'm just trying to figure out what MLB rule they think forced the Marlins and Angels to change their names.

 

Hopefully I can help clarify. I recall reading several times over recent years that MLB instituted a policy about team naming conventions that has forbidden current franchises from reverting to "state" names. And it would prevent expansion and relocation franchises from adopting state names as well. As I recall, this rule/policy was instated within the last decade and was not at all the reason for the Marlins and Angels dropping state names. They also determined that teams like the Rockies, Diamondbacks, Rangers, and Twins would essentially be grandfathered in and not asked to change. This might have actually happened under Manfred (a guess) and the league decided that for whatever reason they wanted to move away from state branding even if a state is home to a single team.

 

I honestly can't remember where I read about this. It might have even been on this forum. This certainly isn't something you would expect to find in the rulebook even if it were something actually a thing, so I'd call it more of a league "policy" than anything else. I can't find anything concrete to back this up, but clearly at least one other poster here is familiar with it. I wouldn't rule out the possibility that this is all nonsense, of course. And I can't imagine that the league wouldn't be receptive to a team asking for a state name if they have a compelling reason.

[monkeypower]

1 minute ago, Gothamite said:

What rule number is that?

 

4 minutes ago, Marlins93 said:

Hopefully I can help clarify. I recall reading several times over recent years that MLB instituted a policy about team naming conventions that has forbidden current franchises from reverting to "state" names. And it would prevent expansion and relocation franchises from adopting state names as well. As I recall, this rule/policy was instated within the last decade and was not at all the reason for the Marlins and Angels dropping state names. They also determined that teams like the Rockies, Diamondbacks, Rangers, and Twins would essentially be grandfathered in and not asked to change. This might have actually happened under Manfred (a guess) and the league decided that for whatever reason they wanted to move away from state branding even if a state is home to a single team.

 

I honestly can't remember where I read about this. It might have even been on this forum. This certainly isn't something you would expect to find in the rulebook even if it were something actually a thing, so I'd call it more of a league "policy" than anything else. I can't find anything concrete to back this up, but clearly at least one other poster here is familiar with it. I wouldn't rule out the possibility that this is all nonsense, of course. And I can't imagine that the league wouldn't be receptive to a team asking for a state name if they have a compelling reason.

 

The refrain that gets bandied about the internet, I've seen it in a couple places (though I guess it could be everyone repeating what they saw once and it's turned into an urban legend/game of telephone/chicken or the egg sort of thing where it's people saying they have seen other people say it's a thing which turns into other people seeing that other people see other people and so on), is that the MLB does not allow a team to use the state name as the geographical identifier if there is another team located in that state, with the Rangers being grandfathered in.

 

Googling it now doesn't seem to come up with anything and the rulebook just has things related to gameplay. The only sort of branding references in the rulebook are the rules about player uniforms and even then, some those uniform rules aren't really written "rules" per se.

 

It could be on the internal bylaws. It could be an informal rule. It could be nothing. I guess we'll just either have to get someone to ask the MLB or wait for a team to attempt to use the state name.

 

42 minutes ago, Gothamite said:

There had been a "Los Angeles Angels" baseball team in town since 1903.  Nobody minded it.

 

When you say this, what town are you referring to? The PCL Angels only ever played in LA, so I wouldn't think too many people would have taken issue with it anyways.

 

47 minutes ago, Gothamite said:

Autry changed the name because, let's face it, in those days Orange County wasn't exactly favorable towards the big city next door.  

 

When Autry was looking at moving out of LA due to the living situation with the Dodgers and Autry thinking that the team establishing their own market would be more successful (time is a flat circle), Long Beach was the leading candidate, along with the west end of the San Fernando Valley, where he owned property. However, the team and Long Beach were never able to get an agreement done, in part because the city wanted the team to be called the "Long Beach Angels" (time is a flat circle). Autry balked at that because he thought "Long Beach" was too small/less marketable/didn't sound right (time is a flat circle) and he wanted the team to be either "Los Angeles or "Southern California/California" so talks fell apart.

 

Walt Disney told him to look at Disneyland and said that Anaheim was booming and would be a better place to put a baseball stadium than the San Fernando Valley. When Autry and the city of Anaheim connected and the name came up, unlike Long Beach,

 

Quote

Anaheim officials didn’t have such concerns. According to an official city history, then-Mayor Rector L. “Rex” Coons believed landing the franchise would spur other business development. And even if Anaheim wasn’t part of the team name, it would show up as the newspaper dateline on every home Angels game reported around the country.

 

(TIME IS A FLAT CIRCLE)

 

That quote is from an LA Times article from 1998 covering Gene Autry's death and which dives into detail about how he and the Angels impacted Anaheim/Orange County. There are a lot quotes in there that tie into this Anaheim v. Los Angeles thing that comes up all the time on the boards.

 

1 hour ago, Gothamite said:

It was changed to "Anaheim" because the city of Anaheim paid them to, as part of the stadium renovations. 

 

I also don't think Disney was opposed to it either.

 

1 hour ago, Gothamite said:

But Moreno realized that he could legally go back to "Los Angeles" so long as he kept "Anaheim" somewhere in the name, leading to the ridiculous compromise name until the naming agreement expired and he could officially bring back the original name.

 

Nobody has ever worried too much about the redundancy.  It certainly has never impacted the various name changes.  

 

Yeah, I would agree that the redundancy wouldn't have matter considering the team's name from 2005-2015.

[monkeypower]

Also, I've been meaning to make something stupid like this for a while considering it happens way too often on the boards, I knew people weren't going to be able to resist doing (even though I didn't want it to happen) after I made the Arte joke a couple pages back, and I'm putting off schoolwork right now anyways.

 

 

Remember when the Red Sox released marathon inspired jerseys?

[SCalderwood]

38 minutes ago, Marlins93 said:

 

 

Hopefully I can help clarify. I recall reading several times over recent years that MLB instituted a policy about team naming conventions that has forbidden current franchises from reverting to "state" names. And it would prevent expansion and relocation franchises from adopting state names as well. As I recall, this rule/policy was instated within the last decade and was not at all the reason for the Marlins and Angels dropping state names. They also determined that teams like the Rockies, Diamondbacks, Rangers, and Twins would essentially be grandfathered in and not asked to change. This might have actually happened under Manfred (a guess) and the league decided that for whatever reason they wanted to move away from state branding even if a state is home to a single team.

 

 

That's interesting, and if it is true, I wonder what the rationale is.  I could understand this policy being in place for states with more than one team, but I don't get it for single team-states.

 

I have no stats or evidence to back this up, but I would think that using state branding would draw in more fans than city branding.  For example, if the Arizona Diamondbacks had been named the Phoenix Diamondbacks, wouldn't they attract fewer fans?  I feel like with state branding you are being more inclusive and making more fans feel like they should root for that team.  Even someone who lives up near the northeastern corner of the state could be like, "Hey, the Diamondbacks represent Arizona, so they represent me."

 

And actually, didn't the NHL Coyotes do the exact opposite?  Didn't they switch from being the Phoenix Coyotes to being the Arizona Coyotes?  What was the rationale behind that?  To appeal to more fans throughout the state, or some legal reason, or something else?

[Marlins93]

3 minutes ago, SCalderwood said:

That's interesting, and if it is true, I wonder what the rationale is.  I could understand this policy being in place for states with more than one team, but I don't get it for single team-states.

 

Well as @monkeypower points out, I could be completely mistaken on this part. If this standard does exist at all, perhaps it does indeed only apply to states that have two or more teams.

 

If the Rays were to relocate, it makes sense to me for the Marlins to be known as the Florida Marlins again, since the state has several large media markets outside of Miami. Of course that's not even a remote possibility due to the team's agreement with Miami Dade in order to secure public funds for the new ballpark. But this would be an example of a state name being appropriate if they were the only team.

[BBTV]

So basically there's no evidence that any rule exists in written form.  

[Gothamite]

59 minutes ago, monkeypower said:

The refrain that gets bandied about the internet, I've seen it in a couple places (though I guess it could be everyone repeating what they saw once and it's turned into an urban legend/game of telephone/chicken or the egg sort of thing where it's people saying they have seen other people say it's a thing which turns into other people seeing that other people see other people and so on), is that the MLB does not allow a team to use the state name as the geographical identifier if there is another team located in that state, with the Rangers being grandfathered in.

 

Googling it now doesn't seem to come up with anything and the rulebook just has things related to gameplay. The only sort of branding references in the rulebook are the rules about player uniforms and even then, some those uniform rules aren't really written "rules" per se.

 

It could be on the internal bylaws. It could be an informal rule. It could be nothing. I guess we'll just either have to get someone to ask the MLB or wait for a team to attempt to use the state name.

 

So... internet rumor.  Not actually a rule.

 

Thought so.

 

 

[BBTV]

3 hours ago, DiePerske said:

I wouldnt want it to become the rule, but I wouldnt mind the Angels legally becoming how they behave in practice.

 

No city name, just Angels Baseball. Wouldnt want it to become a trend, but I want reality to match the legality.

 

I'm fine with going outside the box of North American conventions.  It's similar in many ways to Washington Football Team.

 

I'm also fine with the Raiders doing the same thing.

[Gothamite]

34 minutes ago, SCalderwood said:

I have no stats or evidence to back this up, but I would think that using state branding would draw in more fans than city branding.  For example, if the Arizona Diamondbacks had been named the Phoenix Diamondbacks, wouldn't they attract fewer fans?  I feel like with state branding you are being more inclusive and making more fans feel like they should root for that team.  Even someone who lives up near the northeastern corner of the state could be like, "Hey, the Diamondbacks represent Arizona, so they represent me."

 

And actually, didn't the NHL Coyotes do the exact opposite?  Didn't they switch from being the Phoenix Coyotes to being the Arizona Coyotes?  What was the rationale behind that?  To appeal to more fans throughout the state, or some legal reason, or something else?

 

Same reason the Phoenix Cardinals became the Arizona Cardinals.  The one you identified - they think using the largest possible umbrella will appeal to the most people possible.

 

 

Would people in Tucson be more likely to hand over dollars to the Arizona Cardinals or Arizona Coyotes?  I don't know, but they sure seem to think so.

 

Same reason that Autry wanted to cast a wide net with "Southern California Angels" or "California Angels" rather than tie himself to a small city within the metropolis.

[Gothamite]

9 minutes ago, BBTV said:

So basically there's no evidence that any rule exists in written form.  

 

Internet rumor given too much credence.

[oldschoolvikings]

I just want to point out that all this talk of State names and the Angels baseball club has not made that Red Sox uniform any less of a complete abomination.

 

 

Carry on.

[Ridleylash]

1 hour ago, SCalderwood said:

And actually, didn't the NHL Coyotes do the exact opposite?  Didn't they switch from being the Phoenix Coyotes to being the Arizona Coyotes?  What was the rationale behind that?  To appeal to more fans throughout the state, or some legal reason, or something else?

It was the first reason; appealing to fans outside of the Valley and becoming the state's team, ala Colorado. Essentially casting a wider net to draw from.

 

Carolina did the same thing, using the general name "Carolina" as opposed to the more specific "Raleigh" to appeal to a wider market.

[schlim]

I'm expecting a polite link to 'check out if interested' somebody's 30 team State Connect Uniform Series in Concepts within the next three pages. I can't wait to see the purple, volt and grey Erie Canal Mets uniform!

[AstroCree]

2 hours ago, monkeypower said:

Remember when the Red Sox released marathon inspired jerseys?

I'm trying not to.

[FiddySicks]

57 minutes ago, Ridleylash said:

It was the first reason; appealing to fans outside of the Valley and becoming the state's team, ala Colorado. Essentially casting a wider net to draw from.

I saw some real weird marketing pushes for them in the few years I was there just before they made the change. I vaguely but distinctly remember one of them boiling down to “We’re hard as hell to get to from Phoenix Proper, but not from the rest of the state!” 

[sky1324]

1 hour ago, Ridleylash said:

It was the first reason; appealing to fans outside of the Valley and becoming the state's team, ala Colorado. Essentially casting a wider net to draw from.

 

Carolina did the same thing, using the general name "Carolina" as opposed to the more specific "Raleigh" to appeal to a wider market.

Splitting heads here, but the Panthers did it first and they wanted the regional draw. The Hurricanes probably adopted it because they spent their first two years in Greensboro, not Raleigh.

[MilSox]

2 hours ago, QCS said:

Splitting heads here, but the Panthers did it first and they wanted the regional draw. The Hurricanes probably adopted it because they spent their first two years in Greensboro, not Raleigh.

 

The Panthers also played their first season at Clemson. So the Carolina moniker was even more appropriate for them.

[selgy]

7 hours ago, Gothamite said:

 

I'm with you on all that. 

 

I'm just trying to figure out what MLB rule they think forced the Marlins and Angels to change their names.

I think the Marlins changed due to Miami paying for their new stadium.