10 NFL Team Names That HORRIBLY Represent Their CITY

a sports team's name is iconic and historical something that people venerate and celebrate for many many years but some team names are definitely more fitting than others is the future of the las vegas raiders going to be the las vegas aces the las vegas gamblers [Music] team names have been a fixture in american professional sports for over a century now dating all the way back to the turn of the 20th century when mlb teams first started to cling on to the concept and over the years we've seen plenty of franchise nicknames come and go but what is really interesting is some of the names that have stuck even though they really make no sense when you consider the city that they're supposed to be representing so let's take a look at 10 nfl teams whose names horribly represent the city they play in first up the las vegas raiders i mean correct me if i'm wrong but when was the last time you saw a pirate ripping through the waters of las vegas and before you try it no the vegas crazies dressed up in pirate garb do not count i guess the idea made a little bit more sense back when the team was located in oakland way back in the day there were probably some raiders terrorizing the open seas of the pacific coast interestingly raiders was not originally meant to be the team name either the oakland tribune a local newspaper at the time hosted a name the teen contest in the spring of 1960 before the new football franchise's inaugural season instead of raiders the contest determined that the team would be called the oakland seniors which nowadays would probably have met a similar fate as the washington football team's previous name it wasn't just the large hispanic population in the bay area that allegedly inspired the original name either apparently chet soda one of the original partners for the team was well known for calling all of his acquaintances senor which led people to believe that the contest was fixed the resulting backlash led the team to backpedal on its original name and thus the raiders were born how are they supposed to know the team was going to be uprooted and moved to the middle of the desert where a pirate or raider wouldn't dare to venture to i think they should just shift towards something more fitting like the vegas gamblers or the degenerates the arizona cardinals are another old-timey franchise whose name really doesn't make a lick of sense when you start to think about it when was the last time you're taking a stroll through downtown glendale and saw a cardinal fly overhead or landed a nearby tree pretty much well never that being said you might be surprised to know that there are actually some cardinals out in arizona but they are extremely rare also they're a different kind of cardinal than you might expect they're called a pyroloxia or a desert cardinal and while you still have the stout beacon a bit of red coloring on their exterior they have a much different look than what you might expect from a stereotypical cardinal aka the team's logo while the team's name doesn't necessarily represent the team's current location it like the raiders dates back to a previous city from the franchise's past the cardinals got their nickname when they were located in chicago because the original team's jerseys were a faded maroon color that the team owner called cardinal red and thus a team name that now makes no sense was poor it isn't just the old-timey teams that have screwed up names either think about the tennessee titans for example they were originally the houston oilers a very logical name considering oil is a huge industry in houston where they used to play their home games but once a team decided to move to tennessee the name oilers didn't make nearly as much sense anymore and while they made the curious decision to play under that name for a year or two they did finally wise up and change their name ahead of the 1999 season according to the team's owner bud adams they decided to change the name because they quote wanted a new nickname to reflect strength leadership and other hero-like qualities titans come from early greek mythology and the fact that nashville is known as the athens of the south makes the titans name very appropriate uh yeah but i don't know about that one it really sounds like you're reaching there let's be honest it would have made way more sense just to choose a name that actually fit the city like the outlaws or something to do with music i don't know anything but the titans and how about the jacksonville jaguars come on jacksonville you were founded in 1995 you have no excuse for a nonsensical name i get that you have the whole cutesy alliteration thing going on but seriously there hasn't even been a single recorded sighting of an actual jaguar down there which is curious because with all the intense wildlife down in florida you have to think that they would come up with something actually relevant to the city the fans are at least partially to blame here because the team was apparently named during a citywide contest jaguars were somehow preferred to shark stingrays and panthers even though i like all three of them far more for jacksonville's pro football team than the jaguars but alas the great people of jacksonville chose and in all likelihood that name will never change on the subject of nonsensical jungle cat names how about the detroit lions i dare someone to snag a photograph of a lion in the wild setting of downtown detroit i dare you anyway to trace back this truly absurd team name you have to go all the way back to the 1930s when the team originally known as the portsmouth spartans was purchased by a group of detroit businessmen including george richards it made sense with the popularity of the detroit tigers said george richards when speaking about the alliance nickname in addition the new ownership group explained that the club would be the king of the nfl richards and his gang do deserve some credit because the team did end up winning a championship the first season that they moved to detroit under the new moniker but man he's probably rolling over in his grave seeing what has happened to his kings of the nfl over the past few decades ah truly an epic fall from grace the cincinnati bengals are another jungle cat that has been woefully misplaced in the midwest interestingly they were also named by paul brown the team's founder who also named another nfl franchise that he was originally involved in owning can you guess which team that paul brown the midwestern businessman named anyone who didn't have the cleveland browns please take a lap anyway since his last name was already taken by the team that he had essentially been forced out of owning brown needed to go back to the drawing board in terms of coming up with a new nickname for his brand spanking new nfl franchise in cincinnati the thought behind the bengals was that it was actually supposed to serve as a link to past professional football in the city there is previously a bengals team that existed in a now defunct league from 1937 until 1942 and the original bengals team was apparently an ode to the bengal tiger exhibit at the cincinnati zoo which at the time was a huge draw for the city's tourism so it doesn't really represent the city nowadays especially considering there are no longer bengal tigers at the cincinnati zoo but when you trace back to its roots it is a name i can almost get behind in support almost jungle cats aren't the only animals that end up randomly getting plastered onto the uniforms in a city that the animal itself has nothing to do with there are actually quite a few like the indianapolis colts atlanta falcons and los angeles rams let's start with the former while there is actually a fair amount of horse culture in the state of indiana not a whole lot of it is going on inside of indianapolis city limits it may not be a new york or chicago style metropolis but it is slowly inching its way towards becoming a one million person city and it is urban in every sense of the word the fact that the city's football team is called the colts is just not representative of the city but rather the cult's old city baltimore where they first got the nickname from you guessed it another choose the name contest this one actually made sense for baltimore though the woman who won chose the colts to pay homage to the area's storied horse breeding and racing traditions the team only stayed in baltimore 20 years after picking up the nickname but when they ended up in indy the name just sort of stuck it's obviously too late now but it would have been awesome if they had done something that paid homage to the city's auto racing history maybe the indianapolis 500s or something i don't know just spitballing here the falcons like the cults when they were in baltimore got their name from a publicity stunt in the form of a naming contest that the team's owner rankin m smith held as his first order of business after being awarded the franchise apparently the name falcons appeared on a number of entries but the winner was a school teacher from georgia who was campaigning on behalf of the name because the bird is proud and dignified with great courage and fight honestly don't hate the line of thinking here shout out to this random school teacher from rural georgia for making such a compelling argument while it pains me to do so i must point out that just because the bird represents all those things does not mean that it necessarily represents the city it is admittedly low-hanging fruit but there was nothing proud nor dignified about blowing a 28-3 lead in the super bowl okay sorry falcons fans back to our regularly scheduled programming there is a small falcon population that perch in high places around georgia but very rarely do you ever see them enter the busy city streets of the atlanta metro area that is not too dissimilar from the situation that we have now going on in los angeles with the rams the team that can't quite seem to figure out where it's home is because while there are some rams in california i would bet my last dollar that you won't see any of them trotting around the city of angels with hollywood's elites and when you look at the etymology of the team name it somehow makes even less sense the rams franchise name dates all the way back to 1936 when the cleveland rams were founded by an area attorney homer marshman and if you're thinking wait there are rams in cleveland stop right there he named the team after fordham university which had used the nickname for years for those of you who don't know fordham is in the bronx aka new york city so no rams there either all in all it is truly a nonsensical team name particularly now that the team is back in la now last but not least we simply have to include the washington football team it is a little ironic because in a weird way there may be no team name that is more representative of the city and its team i mean it is literally washington's football team say no more right but when you consider the team's previous name was paying homage to the people that may or may not have been driven out of their homes by the politicians in washington dc the franchise has earned a dishonorable mention on this list especially because i know with every fiber of my being that whatever name dan snyder and his million dollar focus groups come up with in 2022 it's gonna be god awful but which team's name do you think is the least fitting team name in nfl history join us in the comment section below if you liked this video and learned a thing or two clicking the like button helps out a ton tonight we appreciate it if this is your first time coming around to tps though subscribing is a great idea because we put out videos like this every single day but as always thanks for watching and we'll see you guys next time [Music]

Channel: TPS

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Keywords: NFL Team Names That HORRIBLY Represent Their CITY, nfl team names, what do nfl team names mean, where did nfl team names come from, nfl team name meanings, nfl team meanings, nfl team mascotts, nfl logos and what they mean, nfl logos and team names, team names in the nfl, nfl, team, names, what does each nfl team name mean and where it came from, how do sport teams pick their names, worst nfl team names, best nfl team names, how do nfl teams pick their names

Id: yhsFDFd9EwA

Length: 11min 46sec (706 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 12 2021