Against the grain

[Psycho Circus]

Personally, I will never understand mascots. Some of them you really have to think hard to figure out what they're supposed to be, let alone what they have to do with anything.

I agree. My football club's mascot is an alien!? Our original badge just had a ship on it, due to the 3 well known Manchester riverways and now it has a ship with a big gold eagle on?

I've never seen any eagles or aliens in Manchester...

[AndyC]

Personally, I will never understand mascots. Some of them you really have to think hard to figure out what they're supposed to be, let alone what they have to do with anything.

I agree. My football club's mascot is an alien!? Our original badge just had a ship on it, due to the 3 well known Manchester riverways and now it has a ship with a big gold eagle on?

I've never seen any eagles or aliens in Manchester...

Sports teams are just goofy, because they all need a cool mascot, even if it makes little or no sense. My hometown has a Junior B hockey team called the Sugar Kings. The town is in the middle of maple syrup country, it has a big maple syrup festival every spring, and when they formed the team in the early 70s, the founders tied the name to that. Most of their crests over the years have been some variation of a maple leaf. Now, jump forward to the 90s, and the maple leaf suddenly becomes the background for a lion biting a hockey stick in half. Huh? The reasoning is, of course, that the lion is "king" of the beasts. Now, if they were just the Kings, that might make sense, and actually at least one variation of the crest just omitted the "Sugar." But they're not kings of beasts, they're kings of sugar. Maybe the lion's diabetic; I don't know. It just struck me as a dumb thing to do for the sake of some kind of macho pride. The team's named after maple syrup. Live with it.

It was actually around the same time that the local minor hockey league got a new name. For years, they'd just been "Woolwich." That's it. No need for a name. They represented the township, and had its name right on their uniforms. It actually made them kind of unique. At some point - again, in the 90s - somebody decided the team needed a name. Did they pick something unique? Something reflecting the community? No, they picked the Wildcats, which seems to have no connection to Woolwich other than alliteration. Oh, and it's cool, and allowed them to have a tough-looking crest. I guess Wildcats must be a good name, since about half of kids' sports teams seem to be called that. Maybe that's an exaggeration, but come on. There had to be something better than Wildcats.

The irony is that you look at team pictures from the old days, when guys were playing with minimal padding and helmets were optional, and they didn't feel the need to have a tough name or a tough mascot. Go figure.

[Psycho Circus]

Maybe the lion's diabetic; I don't know.

I just choked on my coffee! 

[Rev. Powell]

Family Guy- It hasn't been funny for years, you are not The Simpsons, give it up and focus on American Dad (which is hilarious)

Agreed.   

[Mr. DS]

Family Guy- It hasn't been funny for years, you are not The Simpsons, give it up and focus on American Dad (which is hilarious)

Agreed.   

I like Family Guy but it seems the last couple episodes they cranked out (Peter loses his memory & Meg goes to jail) really suck.  I didn't laugh once.  I think they've used up all the funny pop culture references and are out of material. 

[HappyGilmore]

Sports teams are just goofy, because they all need a cool mascot, even if it makes little or no sense. My hometown has a Junior B hockey team called the Sugar Kings. The town is in the middle of maple syrup country, it has a big maple syrup festival every spring, and when they formed the team in the early 70s, the founders tied the name to that. Most of their crests over the years have been some variation of a maple leaf. Now, jump forward to the 90s, and the maple leaf suddenly becomes the background for a lion biting a hockey stick in half. Huh? The reasoning is, of course, that the lion is "king" of the beasts. Now, if they were just the Kings, that might make sense, and actually at least one variation of the crest just omitted the "Sugar." But they're not kings of beasts, they're kings of sugar. Maybe the lion's diabetic; I don't know. It just struck me as a dumb thing to do for the sake of some kind of macho pride. The team's named after maple syrup. Live with it.

I'm not disagreeing about mascots.  In fact, I hate 99% of them.  Except this one:  The Phillie Phanatic.

I don't know what it is, really: Animal, alien, what?  But I will say this, us Philadelphians are not big, green, fat things with big noses, but this is our 'representative.' 

But yeah, overall, mascots, eh.  Could do without them.  They don't really 'add' to the overall aspect of the game itself, except maybe for littler kids who aren't really into the 'sporty' side of the game yet, and it acts as an entertainment for them...

[Leah]

being in a hangover for two days now 

[Rev. Powell]

But I will say this, us Philadelphians are not big, green, fat things with big noses... 

Dunno about that.  I used to see quite a few people meeting that description wandering around South Street on weekends in the 1980s...

[Trevor]

I think that FIFA should give away free tickets to the Soccer World Cup and not contract poor, underpaid Chinese slave labor to build these horrible mascot toys.

What animal is that? Looks like somebody crossed a cheetah with a lion.

Its' name is Zakumi and it does look like an unhappy marriage between a cheetah and a lion. 

[Joe the Destroyer]

I think that FIFA should give away free tickets to the Soccer World Cup and not contract poor, underpaid Chinese slave labor to build these horrible mascot toys.

What animal is that? Looks like somebody crossed a cheetah with a lion.

Its' name is Zakumi and it does look like an unhappy marriage between a cheetah and a lion. 

It looks like it got really high, stole Cloud Strife's hair, dyed it brown, then murdered about twelve people and that's the best poker face it could come up with. 

Our mascots here in Spokane just lack originality.  We don't have any major teams.  Basically, a minor league hockey team (Spokane Chiefs), minor league baseball (Spokane Indians), and arena football (Spokane Shock). 



Boomer the Bear of the Spokane Chiefs.     I dunno.  A bear just seems boring, and this one looks like he suffered severe head trauma as a child, and hasn't been quite right since.



Then there's Otto of the Spokane Indians.  I don't know what he is, but he looks like the product of the Phanatic (a much better mascot) and Dino from the Flintstones.  I'm sure that was a pretty sight...  What dino...things have to do with Indians is beyond me. 



There's really not much I can say about Shox the Fox.  He's not as dopey looking as Boomer, and not quite terrifying like Otto.  At least this one kind of makes sense.  I mean, it's a reach, but it works. 

But yeah... Not a big fan of mascots.  They seldom seem to match up with teams, and for some reason I just want to kick them. 

[Trevor]

It looks like it got really high, stole Cloud Strife's hair, dyed it brown, then murdered about twelve people and that's the best poker face it could come up with. 

Boomer the Bear of the Spokane Chiefs.     I dunno.  A bear just seems boring, and this one looks like he suffered severe head trauma as a child, and hasn't been quite right since.

I wish I could find a pic of the Standard Bank duck that appears at cricket matches in South Africa ~ a blue duck with a bright yellow bill. 

[AndyC]

Our mascots here in Spokane just lack originality.  We don't have any major teams.  Basically, a minor league hockey team (Spokane Chiefs), minor league baseball (Spokane Indians), and arena football (Spokane Shock).

The Shock. That's another trend in sports teams that has bugged the hell out of me since it started. Using singular nouns, especially those that don't describe a solid thing. I don't know how to put it better. The Spirit, the Shock, the Avalanche - the Stupidity. I don't know who first came up with the idea, but it's another example of somebody doing something different to be cool, and everybody else saying "Let's be different in exactly the same way." More dopey bandwagon behaviour in sports.

And what do you call the individual team members of a team like the Shock? Shockers? Waves? Fingers in the light socket? It doesn't make sense. How hard is it to come up with a plural name that describes a physical thing?

[Mr. DS]

Andy you don't happen to have a pic of you and the clown do you?

[Trevor]

And what do you call the individual team members of a team like the Shock? Shockers? Waves? Fingers in the light socket? It doesn't make sense. How hard is it to come up with a plural name that describes a physical thing?

We have strange names for our local sports teams:

Bafana Bafana: the soccer team
Banyana Banyana: the ladies national soccer team
Ama-boko-boko: the Springbok rugby team
Ama-kroko-kroko: the paralympic team [they chose the name themselves]

Annndddd...... last but not least:

Ama-Useless: our national cricket team who never seem to win when it matters.

[Mr. DS]

Speaking of mascots, the Olympic ones really sucked.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympic_mascots