The 5 Cities With the Worst Pro Sports Team Names
It’s always a joy when the local sports team’s name just perfectly matches the city or state it represents. Sometimes, the team draws inspiration from a regional physical feature, like the Colorado Rockies. Maybe it’s named after a local type of dude, like Minnesota Vikings (paying homage to the many Minnesotans of Scandinavian descent) or New York Knicks (same, but for the Dutch). Or perhaps some local culture, like the New Orleans Jazz or St. Louis Blues. Or something the city is known for, like the Detroit Pistons (from the city where the car was invented) or Indiana Pacers (home to the Indy 500 and its pace cars). Cities can take that a step farther and go the Houston route and name multiple teams (the Rockets, Comets, and Astros) around the same theme (NASA does a lot of important work in Houston). Sometimes, the name is a play on the city’s name, like Angel City FC or the Los Angeles Angels (of Anaheim or whatever).
You could even name a team after a local animal, like the Vancouver Grizzlies or Arizona Coyotes, or a cool piece of local lore, like the New Jersey Devils, named for a swamp creature, or the Charlotte Hornets, named because the city was referred to as a “hornet’s nest” in wartime. Maybe you want something more conceptual, like the Portland Trail Blazers (watch out for dysentery!) or Miami Heat or even literary, like the impeccably named Baltimore Ravens. Shit, you could even be a weirdo and name your team after something that killed a bunch of locals, like the Carolina Hurricanes, Chicago Fire, or San Jose Earthquakes. Some cities adopt rhyming patterns for some reason, like the Mets, Jets, and Nets, all of whom are the distant number two team in their city in their respective sports.
Or, if you’re like dozens of pro sports owners, you could name your team something bad and dumb.
Here are five cities where multiple local sports teams have names that are absolute duds. Some don’t fit the city they play in. Others are bland and uninspired. And some are just plain bad.
5. Atlanta
Lowlights: Atlanta Hawks/Atlanta Falcons, Atlanta Braves, Atlanta Flames
Atlanta, one of the nation’s coolest cities, has somehow assembled a group of sports teams with names that are either generic as hell — it feels like a billion teams are the Hawks, Falcons, or some other non-regional bird of prey — or boring, like the Flames (the first of two NHL franchises to abandon Atlanta for a less interesting city). And then, of course, there’s the Braves, a problematic moniker (and associated chant) the team seems to have very little interest in changing.
4. New York’s second favorites
Lowlights: Brooklyn Nets, New York Islanders, New York Jets, New York Red Bulls
New York’s most popular teams have some iconic names. The origin of the Knicks and Yankees may be lost on some younger fans, but they’re synonymous with the city. The Rangers and Giants aren’t unique among pro sports franchises (the Texas Rangers and San Francisco Giants also exist) but they’re pretty solid and are firmly entrenched in the city’s culture.
The second-most popular teams in the city though? Not as much. The Nets is as laughable a team name as there is in pro sports — imagine a hockey team called the Goals or a baseball team called the Fences — the Islanders (they play on Long Island) is nearly Houston Texans-level on-the-nose, the Jets seemingly exist just to rhyme with the Mets (actually a fine name), and New York Red Bulls is just pluralizing the name of a company that makes energy drinks that taste like gasoline.
3. Kansas City
Lowlights: Kansas City Chiefs, Sporting Kansas City, Kansas City Royals
Adopting the European “Sporting Club” naming convention makes no sense, given that pro sports teams in America are franchises for their sport and their sport only, not sports clubs started by, like, dockworkers or whatever. You likely already know what the issue with the Chiefs name and imagery (and the same damn chant the Braves fans do) is so no need to repeat myself here. And the Royals (named for a livestock show, not the actual king) is almost too quaint/small town for me.
2. Salt Lake City
Lowlights: Utah Jazz, Real Salt Lake, Utah Starzz
The least jazzy city in the entire United States (seriously, I’m shocked that jazz music isn’t illegal there) stole a flawlessly named team from New Orleans. Even the franchise’s all-time greatest players, Karl Malone and John Stockton, seemed to embody whatever the opposite of jazz is.
I get the impression that whoever borrowed the “Real” from “Real Madrid/Real Valladolid/Real Sociedad” probably thinks it means the English word “real” and, when it actually means “royal.” I should probably note that there is not (I hope) a King of Utah.
Utah Starzz was, I guess, some kind of play on Jazz (hence the extra “Z”) but, oh my god, why did they give this team this Bratz dolls-ass name? Just shameful. Terrible.
- Washington D.C.
Lowlights: Washington Wizards, Washington Mystics, Washington Commanders, Washington Capitals, Washington Nationals, D.C. United, Washington Spirit. So, uh, all of them.
It’s a truly sad state of affairs when a blatantly racist team name is changed and one of the cooler cities on the east coast still comes in last.
You don’t have to think too hard to figure out why a city once known as the nation’s murder capital might have wanted to shed the (very cool) Washington Bullets name, but Wizards? It’s more than a little embarrassing that the NBA’s GOAT was stuck playing for the league’s second-best magic-themed franchise. The WNBA’s slightly less ridiculous Mystics is meant to complement the NBA’s Wizards and, well, congratulations on two awful names.
The Capitals and Nationals are poor attempts at capturing something uniquely local, but the names just don’t work. Why have a plural team name if it’s not something that works for players as a singular noun? Does “I am a Capital” or “I am a National” sound good to you? Do they even make sense?
D.C. United yet another MLS name that copies a European naming convention without understanding how it works. Clubs with “United” in the name were born of multiple clubs merging. DC’s soccer lads were not.
And finally, we have the Commanders. They FINALLY (reluctantly) got rid of the racist name people with common sense have been fighting against for decades and their permanent replacement is somehow worse than the one-year placeholder name Washington Football Team. Aside from the obvious “support the troops, bro” corniness of it all, why name the team the Commanders? Commanders are in charge of lots of troops. If an actual military squadron was roughly the size of a football team, it would have one commander (uh, presumably the coach? Maybe the GM?). You can’t have 53 commanders, man. If you’re going to go that route, why not just call them the Soldiers? Shit, you could even call them the Troops (please don’t do this) and make “support the Troops” the official team slogan!
If any expansion teams need help with naming or branding, my services are available the low, low price of $1 million (payable in installments).