Redskins Announce New Name: Greenback$

Washington lost their trademark for all things "Redskin."

How about The Foreskins?  See, there's a lot of D-head politicians there after all...

Now I don't know if the Name "Redskins" offends anyone or not.  In my experience, I've never met anyone offended by the name of any product or organization enough that they would say anything other than, "I don't use that product."  I think I may have attended some il-advised protests as a young man against Nestle for selling baby formula to 3rd world countries without the clean water to use it correctly in the 70's.  But damn, those Crunch Bars are great, so my political activist staying power dissolved like so much Strawberry Quik in a glass of milk.

So I don't know anything about politics, or marketing, or owning an NFL Franchise for that matter.  But how can the owner of the Redskins not be dying to change their name, especially in light of the cash that he could possibly make?

If stadium naming rights can pull in tens of Millions PER YEAR (Reliant Energy coughs up approximately $12 million per year to keep its name on the front gate [and everywhere else] at Reliant Stadium, making it one of the most expensive naming deals in American professional sports.) can you imagine how much an owner could collect from a 10-year contract from a willing, aptly-named business for TEAM naming rights?

"Redskins" is not worth keeping because the political pressure and possible eventual loss of revenue and whatever else is making the owner jumpy...Put it out there for the highest bidder, like a NASCAR team sponsorship.  The Washington Red Wagons, or perhaps the Washington Red Robins?  The Red Wings?  Red Roofinns!  The possibilities are endless, and the price tag enormous.  I bet for ten years $100 million is the low point start-the-biding amount.  Collect up front, and go buy yourself 2 or three other sports teams you can visit all year long, one season after the other.

And that lump sum doesn't begin to scratch the surface of the profits from new merchandising, which you can reset every 10 years.  I'm so excited for this possibility that I can't even remember what Washington's football team used to be called!

I'm going to go write a protest letter about how Bears rights are being violated...