04/23/24
June 08, 2013
SportsFilter: The Saturday Huddle:
A place to discuss the sports stories that aren't making news, share links that aren't quite front-page material, and diagram plays on your hand. Remember to count to five Mississippi before commenting in anger.
I'm decades past 12 years of age and I'm still giggling like an idiot.
posted by NoMich at 01:47 PM on June 08, 2013
Maybe they can lure the Big Unit out of retirement.
posted by bender at 02:02 PM on June 08, 2013
posted by beaverboard at 02:23 PM on June 08, 2013
The Ottawa RedBlacks
posted by tommybiden at 04:00 PM on June 08, 2013
The Ottawa Redacts
The Ottawa Headsmacks
The Ottawa BreadAxe
Yeah, even the parodies are better actual names.
posted by Etrigan at 07:13 PM on June 08, 2013
*whoosh!!* The RedBlacks jokes are going waaaaay over my head. Anyone care to explain?
posted by NoMich at 11:51 PM on June 08, 2013
NoMich:
No jokes from my point of view. "RedBlacks" is just a bad name. The Ottawa franchise used to be the "Rough Riders" and (a later incarnation) the "Renegades". Their team colours were red and black. So it's like they just got lazy and said "Look at our connection to history! We're red and black, too! We're the...uh...RedBlacks!"
posted by grum@work at 09:04 AM on June 09, 2013
Should have gone with RedGreen.
posted by Mr Bismarck at 09:18 AM on June 09, 2013
OK, there have been many complaints about the name of the Washington franchise in the NFL, Redskins. I'm sure there would be complaints about a team called "the Blacks" should the location, team composition, or whatever suggest a racial motive. So why does Ottawa have to double down on possible racial epithets? Maybe it's worse than a double race thing. Maybe the reference is to the political persuasion of those of a certain race. We had enough of the "Commies under the bed" back in the Senator Joe McCarthy days. Does this hysteria need to be reawakened in Canada's capitol city? So maybe I'm being a bit too harsh. RedBlacks is really a stupid name for anything. Having two teams with the same nickname some years ago did lead to much confusion among many not familiar with the CFL, but couldn't a variation of Rough Rider be used? Perhaps the Ottawa "Turbulent Flights", "Bumpy Roads", or "Motion Sickness" would be better.
posted by Howard_T at 10:12 AM on June 09, 2013
It's just awful.
posted by tommybiden at 12:49 PM on June 09, 2013
Thanks for the explanation, grum. I just wanted to make sure there was nothing deeper going on with the name.
posted by NoMich at 03:09 PM on June 09, 2013
Awful it is indeed, but it probably would not raise much of an eyebrow in New Zealand, home of the All Blacks and the All Whites.
posted by beaverboard at 03:20 PM on June 09, 2013
The 12-year-old version of me would be giggling like an idiot when he realized that with their most recent free agent signing, the Blue Jays rotation has Dickey, Johnson, and Wang.