A Little Team Building

I'm a big sports fan in general. I like certain teams more than others. In basketball, I root for the Celtics and the Timberwolves. In hockey, the Red Wings and Bruins. In baseball, the Red Sox and Nationals. In football, the Patriots and Rams. In college basketball, the Tar Heels and whoever is playing Duke.

I also like minor league sports and Christine and I visit the farm team of the Bruins (called...the Bruins) and the farm team of the Red Sox (called..with much aplomb, the Red Sox). But I realize that there are a lot of teams out there and some organizations really strive to have their nicknames be unique. I'm not going into the countless teams that have really bizarre names as it's not their fault that they showed up late to the ball and there are already 500 teams each called the Wildcats, Tigers, and Isotopes.

However, I think a little more discretion needs to be given when coming up with these names. For example, on the radio today, I heard someone mention a local low-level minor league baseball team from the area called the Worcester Tornadoes.

Now, you are probably asking yourself: "Hey, Dim, I'm not all that down with Geography. In fact, I break out in hives when I land on the blue wedge in Trivial Pursuit. Does Worcester get a lot of tornadoes?"

No.

In fact, this team was named pretty much after one tornado. This one. Here's an actual picture of this beast.

This team's mascot is modeled after an F4-F5 windstorm that killed 94, injured over 1,200, and left 10,000 people homeless. Go tornadoes!

Here's their t-shirt. I guess the image of a black funnel spewing debris all over creation wouldn't have sold a lot of souvenirs, so instead they settled on a basebat bat twirling spaghetti. Mangia!

Now, I don't harbor any ill-will toward the team, but come on. Someone gets a big fucking retarded F in Sensitivity 101.

Then there was a team in Birmingham, Alabama called the Birmingham Fire. They played over ten years ago in a league called the World League of American Football, which was also known as "What the fuck is the World League of American Football?"

Now, I don't blame these guys for not seeing into the future that some wacko would be going around setting churches ablaze in this area in 2006, but calling your team the "Fire" is just bad karma. It's like calling your team the Swarm of Locusts or the Death of the Firstborn. Bad things happen when you do shit like that.

So, what's next? A professional chess team from Boston called the Massacre? A minor league kickball squad dubbed the New Foundland Titanics? An amateur beer pong stable knighted the New Orleans Katrinas? A semi-pro badminton conglomerate monikered the Chicago Mrs. O'Leary's Cows? Oh wait...it already happened...

(sigh)

Go Flaming Cows,

- Dim.