Angels Name Change Gets More Interesting

[appleclock]

no teams should be named for their state if there are other teams in that state. (In other words, the Florida Marlins should become the Miami Marlins unless they move somewhere else.)

When they became the California Angels, they were the only AL team in California, much like the Marlins were the only team in Florida when they came into existence. If they wanted to change the name back to California that would be cool I think.

[Mac the Knife]

hey that's how it is here in the dfw area. The cowboys are called the Dallas Cowboys although they play in Irving. Soon, they're gonna be moving to Arlington which isn't even in Dallas County. Arlington's in Tarrant County, the Rangers play in Arlington, FC Dallas actually plays in Frisco, a suburb of Dallas. You don't hear any complaints about this.

Maybe in FC Dallas' case its because its soccer and NOBODY CARES.

[Mac the Knife]

no teams should be named for their state if there are other teams in that state. (In other words, the Florida Marlins should become the Miami Marlins unless they move somewhere else.)

When they became the California Angels, they were the only AL team in California, much like the Marlins were the only team in Florida when they came into existence. If they wanted to change the name back to California that would be cool I think.

Yeah, the change had more to do with Gene Autry's desire that the Angels represent all of California - a worthwhile sentiment that they need to return to.

[rmackman]

I just like the sound of California Angels...however Los Angeles is Spanish for THE ANGELS!

[winghaz]

The last I checked, Orange County is in the Los Angeles metropolitan area.

[IronChefShark]

No, California Angels sounds worse today then it ever did because there are FOUR other teams that play in the state. It is foolish for one of those teams to attempt to represent the entire state. As bad as it is to take the state name when there is one other team in the state, it is much worse to take the name of the state when there are four other teams in the state.

There is no good argument for the return of the "California Angels" moniker. There, its done. There is no point in arguing it.

[NJTank]

Im fine with LA Angels just drop the Anaheim than

[jkrdevil]

No baseball team would move to a city Anaheim's size without the surrounding metro area that L.A. provides. People are saying Las Vegas is too small for MLB, so Anaheim at 328,014 is, too. Without the L.A. area, they wouldn't get it done.

The last time I checked, Anaheim was located in Orange County, California.

Orange County is home to 3,056,865. Those aren't people that the City or County of Los Angeles provides to the Angels' target audience... they're residents of Orange County. Therefore, the argument can be made that Orange County is providing Anaheim with a "metro area" capable of supporting a Major League Baseball team.

Incidentally, the City of Las Vegas may be larger than the City of Anaheim, but Orange County dwarfs the Las Vegas metro area by nearly a million-and-a-half people (1,305,837 to be precise). That's the reason that Anaheim/Orange County is a legitimate market for Major League Baseball and why Las Vegas, to date, is not. Hell, Orange County alone is larger than nine metro areas that currently support baseball, including Cleveland, St. Louis and Cincinnati.

Arte Moreno's desire to brand his baseball team as the "Los Angeles Angels" has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not the Angels can survive as an Orange County-supported entity. The vast majority of asses in the seats on any given night at Angel Stadium belong to Orange County residents. That's not about to change. Arte simply thinks that by slapping the "Los Angeles" geographic indentifier on his squad he's going to be able to convince broadcast and marketing partners that his squad is a Los Angeles entity that is on equal footing with the Dodgers in the Los Angeles-proper marketplace. The reality is, that isn't going to happen... ever. We all know that the team is located in Orange County. We all know that the vast majority of the team's fan base is located in Orange County. By contrast, we all know that the vast majority of baseball fans in Los Angeles City and County proper are Dodgers fans.

Further, the whole notion that Anaheim is a suburb/"bedroom community" of Los Angeles is assenine. The number of Anaheim residents who are commuting to Los Angeles for business purposes is dwarfed by the number of Anaheim residents who are either commuting to other communities in Orange County or working in Anaheim itself. It isn't as if Anaheim or Orange County residents simply live in their city/county and are dependent upon Los Angeles for jobs, transportation, cultural attractions, etc. Orange County is self-sufficient in all of those areas.

Bottom line? Is Anaheim a smaller city than Los Angeles in population? Yes. Is Orange County a smaller county than Los Angeles County in population? Yes. Does that make Anaheim a "suburb" of Los Angeles? No. Does it mean that Anaheim isn't a self-sufficient municipality? No. It's a smaller city. Period. That doesn't mean that said smaller city - and the county in which it is located - are either beholden to a larger neighboring city/county or incapable of supporting a major professional sports franchise.

If it weren't for Los Angeles how many people would live in the OC? People moved out to the OC because of it's proximity to LA. They wanted to live in the LA metro area but not live in the city. Last time I checked something like like is called a suburb.

A comparable example is the Jets and Giants. Sure East Rutherford isn't a big city but the population on Northern New Jersey alone is the size of major media market. Northern New Jersey though is still suburbs of NYC because NYC is the urban center. Many people in Northern New Jersey don't commute to NY but it doesn't make it less a surburban area. Thsu you have teams that play in northern New Jersey but are called NY. That's because the teams want to market to the entire metro area much the same way the Angels want to.

[HedleyLamarr]

Who cares if the Angels call themselves the Los Angeles Angels? We already have:

-New York Yankees, New York Mets

-Chicago Cubs, Chicago White Sox

-Los Angeles Clippers, Los Angeles Lakers

-New York Rangers, New York Islanders

-New York Giants, New York Jets

Some play within the city limits, and some play in the suburbs. The Phoenix Coyotes play in Glendale. The Tampa Bay Lightning play in St. Petersburg. The Detroit Pistons play in Auburn Hills.

Just pick a frickin' name, whether it be Los Angeles or Anaheim or anything.

[Brian in Boston]

If it weren't for Los Angeles how many people would live in the OC? People moved out to the OC because of it's proximity to LA. They wanted to live in the LA metro area but not live in the city. Last time I checked something like like is called a suburb.

Pure, unadulterated balderdash. Orange County's history is chock-full of people who have moved to the region solely because of all that the area had to offer on it's own, not because of it's proximity to Los Angeles.

People have been living in what is now Orange County since before written history took hold. The Shoshone people certainly weren't drawn to live along Orange County's coast, or in it's canyons, because of the area's proximity to Los Angeles. Nor, in 1769, were the first European settlers convinced to lay claim to what they dubbed Santa Ana because Los Angeles was just up the road. Father Junipero Serra founded the Mission of San Juan Capistrano - the county's first permanent settlement - because he wished to establish a community on the fertile soil of the Santa Ana region, not because Los Angeles was nearby. In 1887, silver-mining in the Santa Ana Mountains brought fortune seekers from the Eastern United States to Orange County. Later still, such events as the discovery of oil in Huntington Beach, the birth of the modern aerospace industry in Irvine, and booming agricultural development throughout the county drew people to OC. The fact of the matter is, Orange County has drawn settlers to within it's boundaries for hundreds of years because of the naturally abundant resources it has to offer: scenic coast line, fertile soil, mild weather. Those resources would have existed whether Los Angeles was situated to the north or not.

In fact, the vast majority of people who I know that live in Orange County have little to do with Los Angeles... and not because they somehow consider themselves superior to LA. In point of fact, LA isn't an entity that dominates their thoughts much at all. Simply put, they enjoy a quality of life in Orange County that is completely devoid of Los Angeles influence. These people live in Orange County communities, work in Orange County communities, shop in Orange County communities, partake in social activities in Orange County communities, attend cultural institutions in Orange County communities, receive medical care in Orange County communities, are educated in Orange County communities, fly to and from Orange County at the OC's own international airport, and - yes - attend sporting events in Orange County communities. The closest they come to interacting with Los Angeles is when they attend a movie that was produced by a studio based in Hollywood... and they do that at a multiplex in an Orange County community. They do not need Los Angeles to survive.

I find it ironic how often people will try to paint Orange County residents as desperately attempting to distance themselves from Los Angeles, when - in point of fact - it can just as easily be said that Los Angelenos (and their apologists) seem every bit as intent on desperately establishing some sort of LA stewardship over Orange County.

The fact of the matter is that if Los Angeles ceased to exist tomorrow, Orange County would be just fine. The sun would rise, the sun would set and the OC would be a vibrant, bustling region filled with people who live there because of all that the county has to offer on it's own merits... not because Los Angeles is nearby.

Oh, and by the way: There are plenty of places that one can live within Los Angeles County in the "LA metro area but not live in the city". Frankly, given the traffic woes in California, the people who want to live in proximity to LA but outside the city proper aren't likely to move to Orange County. Rather, they'd live in "suburbs" like Santa Monica, Pasadena, Glendale, Burbank, Calabasas, Culver City, Alhambra, Carson, Torrance, etc.

[CubsFanBudMan]

No baseball team would move to a city Anaheim's size without the surrounding metro area that L.A. provides. People are saying Las Vegas is too small for MLB, so Anaheim at 328,014 is, too. Without the L.A. area, they wouldn't get it done.

The last time I checked, Anaheim was located in Orange County, California.

Orange County is home to 3,056,865.

But that wasn't your argument, now was it? In fact, I got the Anaheim population from your post. No sign of O.C. in that one.

Are you suggesting that Orange County Angels is a good name? Because I can't imagine <I>everyone</I> in Orange County wants to be tied to Anaheim, just as they don't want to be considered L.A. You're opening a can of worms -- and arguing that a community with 10 percent of the population is a more proper name for a team in that market.

The Dallas Cowboys are moving out of Dallas County to Arlington. You think Arlington Cowboys is the right way to go now? Sounds like you do.

As I've said before, as a former L.A. resident I understand your position, Brian, but if it wasn't for Disney, "Anaheim" would never had been a part of sports team names. I think it's fine that MLB has corrected that now. Did the Rams ever consider "Anaheim?"

[Brian in Boston]

But that wasn't your argument, now was it? In fact, I got the Anaheim population from your post. No sign of O.C. in that one.

Are you suggesting that Orange County Angels is a good name? Because I can't imagine <I>everyone</I> in Orange County wants to be tied to Anaheim, just as they don't want to be considered L.A. You're opening a can of worms -- and arguing that a community with 10 percent of the population is a more proper name for a team in that market.

The Dallas Cowboys are moving out of Dallas County to Arlington. You think Arlington Cowboys is the right way to go now? Sounds like you do.

As I've said before, as a former L.A. resident I understand your position, Brian, but if it wasn't for Disney, "Anaheim" would never had been a part of sports team names. I think it's fine that MLB has corrected that now. Did the Rams ever consider "Anaheim?"

I began my argument in this thread by citing the population of Anaheim. I logically expanded my argument to encompass Orange County only after you opined - erroneously, I might add - that "without the L.A. area" to bolster it's worthiness, Anaheim "wouldn't get it done" as a Major League Baseball market.

The point I was making is that Anaheim's ability to "get it done" as a Major League Baseball market is not dependent - as you contend - upon proximity to Los Angeles. Rather, the city's worthiness as a professional sports market is determined by a combination of it being a modern American city of over 300,000 people, located in a county that is home to 3,056,865 people, as well as being the home to numerous entetainment attractions.

With regard to the latter note, you're right to an extent: Disney had a great deal to do with Anaheim entering the pro sports vernacular. However, I'm not referring to the decision to rebrand the California Angels on Michael Eisner's watch. Rather, I'm referencing the fact that the City of Anaheim possessed the wisdom to allow Walt Disney to build Disneyland within it's boundaries in 1954. To think that Disney wanted to build in Burbank - within the ballyhooed Los Angeles County - only to be turned down by civic leaders there. So much for Greater Los Angeles being a visionary community leading the way in Southern California.

As for Orange County as a place-name, I'd be fine with it. It's certainly no less appropriate than MLB's use of Tampa Bay (which is technically the name of a body of water) or Texas (an all-encompassing, statewide place-name that was adopted a full decade after Houston had already become a Major League Baseball market elsewhere in the State of Texas) as place-names. In fact, we now know that under Disney's corporate watch, "Orange County" was actually briefly considered as a possible place-name designation.

However, I don't agree that Orange County residents outside of Anaheim refuse "to be tied to Anaheim, just as they don't want to be considered L.A.". You equate the two scenarios and I don't believe that's the case in the hearts and minds of the vast majority of Orange County residents. Given the choice, evidence suggests that most Orange County residents would rather have the team branded "Anaheim" than "Los Angeles". At least that was the impression given by most residents of Orange County who happened to voice their feelings on the issue in the wake of the name change. Their reasoning seems to be that Anaheim is the name of the Orange County community that is actually home to the team, as opposed to a city in Los Angeles County that hasn't been the host community to the Angels since 1965.

And comparing the Dallas Cowboys' situation to that of the Angels is a stretch, as the two scenarios aren't exactly alike. First, a precedent has never been established to use any other place-name designation besides "Dallas" in the Dallas Cowboys' name. They've always been the Dallas Cowboys. By contrast, including this season's ludicrous Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim sobriquet, the Angels have only been branded with the "Los Angeles" place-name for six of the team's forty-six seasons (for the first five years of the team's existence, the place-name was accurate). The Angels bore the now accurate "Anaheim" place-name for nine seasons and the catch-all "California" place-name for thirty-one seasons.

Further, to the best of my knowledge, neither the City of Arlington, Tarrant County or residents of either geo-political location have protested the continued use of "Dallas" as a place-name once the Cowboys set up shop in their new Arlington stadium. That contrasts sharply with the situation in Anaheim and Orange County, where both political officials and residents have voiced their displeasure over Arte Moreno's machinations.

[CubsFanBudMan]

Well, the only reason I reluctantly butted into this unwinnable argument is because of the glaring oversight when you dismissed lmupepbander's point -- i.e. a team named for a city that's 10 percent the size of the larger city that it's a suburb to -- by citing population numbers.

If you want to talk pure numbers in the analogy lmu presented, there's no "not quite" about it. It's fact. Anaheim is to L.A. what Orchard Park is to Buffalo -- a city 1/10th its size. That's the only point I intended to make, so I'll leave it at that.

The rest of it was just my opinion as a former L.A.-area resident. And I have no interest in debating my opinion. But since I see you like to debate and you have a strong opinion I disagree with, I will disengage or I have no doubt this will go on and on and on and on.

(And I'll take some satisfaction in the fact that the Angels are pretty much the "Los Angeles Angels" now. I believe it is the correct outcome, even after living in the L.A. area and witnessing the O.C./L.A. divide firsthand. Again, no one cared about the Los Angeles Rams.)

Carry on... I value your contributions, but I'm pretty sure I've read all of these arguments before. They didn't change my mind then, and likely won't now. But some of the newer members can benefit.

[Brian in Boston]

Well, the only reason I reluctantly butted into this unwinnable argument is because of the glaring oversight when you dismissed lmupepbander's point -- i.e. a team named for a city that's 10 percent the size of the larger city that it's a suburb to -- by citing population numbers.

If you want to talk pure numbers in the analogy lmu presented, there's no "not quite" about it. It's fact. Anaheim is to L.A. what Orchard Park is to Buffalo -- a city 1/10th its size. That's the only point I intended to make, so I'll leave it at that.

The rest of it was just my opinion as a former L.A.-area resident. And I have no interest in debating my opinion. But since I see you like to debate and you have a strong opinion I disagree with, I will disengage or I have no doubt this will go on and on and on and on.

(And I'll take some satisfaction in the fact that the Angels are pretty much the "Los Angeles Angels" now. I believe it is the correct outcome, even after living in the L.A. area and witnessing the O.C./L.A. divide firsthand. Again, no one cared about the Los Angeles Rams.)

Carry on... I value your contributions, but I'm pretty sure I've read all of these arguments before. They didn't change my mind then, and likely won't now. But some of the newer members can benefit.

You're quite right in surmising that this can go on and on with no resolution.

A great deal of that is due to the fact that you believe Anaheim is a mere "suburb" of Los Angeles, while I do not. Apparently, the driving force behind your definition of suburb is that Anaheim is a community 1/10th the size of nearby Los Angeles. Period. End of designation.

By contrast, my determination that Anaheim is not a suburb of LA is based upon the fact that the vast majority of Anaheim residents do not commute to Los Angeles for work, travel to Los Angeles for health care services, visit Los Angeles regularly in the pursuit of cultural and/or recreational activities, etc. Rather, the vast majority of Anaheim residents either engage in the aforementioned activities within Anaheim or in other Orange County communities. In short, they don't depend upon Los Angeles in the way that a suburb would normally depend upon a core community.

It's been a spirited debate. All the best.

[Mac the Knife]

They could end the whole LA/Anaheim argument by going back to California. Whether from LA, Anaheim, Orange County, El Segundo or Oxnard, the fans are from California.

But Brian's right, there is no resolution here that'll satisfy everyone.

[tp49]

By the same token then it begs the question if the A's decided they wanted to change their name to the San Francisco A's then would that be ok?

[The_Admiral]

Oakland and San Francisco have more of a twin-cities thing going on, I think, like Dallas and Fort Worth, Tampa and St. Petersburg, and Minneapolis and St. Paul. Anaheim is obviously a suburb. Brian in Boston is doing this whole Orange County Pride schtick under the idea that everyone in a greater metropolitan area commutes to and uses the main city. There are people in Chicagoland who live in Schaumburg, work in Wheeling, go to a hospital in Park Ridge, see a movie in Arlington Heights, and go golfing in Barrington Hills, but they still see themselves as being Chicagoans to an extent, and not being part of some "northwest suburbs" sphere. You can go from suburb to suburb without touching the main city and still be part of its metropolitan area. I don't see why Anaheim is any different.

ICS and I have had our share of spats, but he's right on the ball that the Angels have no right to use "California" as their location. FOUR OTHER TEAMS. Come on.

[FiddySicks]

Oakland and San Francisco have more of a twin-cities thing going on, I think, like Dallas and Fort Worth, Tampa and St. Petersburg, and Minneapolis and St. Paul. Anaheim is obviously a suburb. Brian in Boston is doing this whole Orange County Pride schtick under the idea that everyone in a greater metropolitan area commutes to and uses the main city. There are people in Chicagoland who live in Schaumburg, work in Wheeling, go to a hospital in Park Ridge, see a movie in Arlington Heights, and go golfing in Barrington Hills, but they still see themselves as being Chicagoans to an extent, and not being part of some "northwest suburbs" sphere. You can go from suburb to suburb without touching the main city and still be part of its metropolitan area. I don't see why Anaheim is any different.

ICS and I have had our share of spats, but he's right on the ball that the Angels have no right to use "California" as their location. FOUR OTHER TEAMS. Come on.

Ill just say this. Anaheim is a growing city that wants to lose its affiliation with Los Angeles in favor of becoming its own area. This doesnt help it at all. And (now correct me if im wrong) arent most suburbs set up so that the majority of the people who live there work within the larger city? Thats noit really the case with Anaheim. Anaheim and the surrounding areas in Orange County has enough work to support its population and doesnt really have any further need to feed off of Los Angeles.

[The_Admiral]

And (now correct me if im wrong) arent most suburbs set up so that the majority of the people who live there work within the larger city?

Some are, some aren't. Every single suburb of Chicago is not a bedroom community; while plenty of suburbanites drive or take the train into the city each day, many others work in the same city they live in, or commute to other suburbs within the area. With the size of greater Chicago as a whole, you have to expect there to be some actual business happening beyond just the city limits. I think with smaller metros, the suburbs aren't as developed, but when you're talking about the Big 3, you start getting more self-sufficient suburbs. Arlington Heights, Schaumburg, Naperville, and Elgin, off the top of my head, are very large suburbs of Chicago that are full-fledged cities in terms of population and jobs, and also fairly removed from the city itself, but they're quite obviously part of a greater whole, and you don't see the residents get any big ideas about being an entirely separate entity from Chicago.

Maybe this has to do with Chicago and L.A., and wanting to associate with them. Richard Daley is "the mayor" (or "da mare") for people as far-flung as Cary. People here still feel a connection to the city as long as they read the Trib, watch channels 2/5/7/9/11, and so on, whereas Anaheim seems all too willing to consider itself entirely separate, even though they're basically in the same boat as Schaumburg: it's big, there are jobs, but it's mostly just a nebulous--but pleasant--mass of houses and malls.

[LMU]

One more thing to point out:

Anaheim: 328,014

Long Beach: 476,564

Long Beach actually has its own financial district, and one of the busiest ports in the world, as well as an arena and convention center. Anaheim has no downtown (if you don't count Downtown Disney), no skyscrapers, and minus the convention center, theme parks, and stadia, it looks exactly like every other suburb in the LA area. Even Irvine, in South OC, has a booming financial district.