From the Sports Desk...The NBA has filed for trademark rights to six potential nicknames for the league's new, stolen Oklahoma City franchise. Now, here's what's funny. All of the names are absolute train wrecks. They're laughably bad. It seems these are the joke names, then the real ones are going to be announced later.
These are the proposed names. Seriously.
The Bison - What? No Muskox or Wildebeest? Why not The Cattle?
The Barons - The Noblemen. Cool. Good one.
The Energy - That would be the name of a junior high math team.
The Marshalls - Yep, they spelled it wrong. Marshal has one "L." Why does that not surprise me? Good one there, Enos.
The Thunder - A WNBA expansion team name if there ever was one.
And the best of the bunch...
The Wind - The most benign of all weather? Why not The Gentle Breeze? Or The Drizzle? "Ladies and gentleman, your Oklahoma City Low Pressure System!" Not only that, but there will be an unending barrage of fart puns the whole two years you are in existence.
Well done Oklahoma City. Off to a great start.
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The Schooners.....short for Oklahoma City Prairie Schooners......(sheesh).....
Thank you, thank you, I'll take my royalties now, please
The Oklahoma City Rodeo Clowns has a nice ring to it, I think.
How about "The Bombers"? Has a nice ring to it, sure Brooklyn won't mind.
I like The Rodeo Clowns, Greg. It's on par with the ridiculousness of that bunch.
The freaking Wind...
Still can't get over that.
How about the "Oklahoma Rip The Hearts Out Of Another City, And Still Sucks"?
Atta Kid, Ross. As funny as that is, it's a little better than The Wind.
No matter what they call this bogus franchise, I will refer to the as The Wind. Both years they are in existence.
let's go all out. the oklahoma city broken wind.....
I told you it was coming. Well played Senor.
If they were really cool they would name then the JOADS, but nobody would get it. Maybe the DUSTSTORM
Alright... I freaking agree with all of you. These names are (sorry, this is un-PC) retarded. Everyone on our local news insists that they are going to be "The Thunder", which blows my mind. They are horrible, all of them.
You could call them the Oklahoma City Joads. But all that would get it would be You Dr. Howard, myself, the rest of the Loyal 77 (they're a bright bunch), Bruce Springsteen, the ghost of Woody Guthrie, Zack de la Rocha and the Steinbeck Society. But that's not bad.
Suzanne, I'm glad to see we are still friends. What would be the mascot for the Thunder? A menacing cloud? Bizarre.
JW
IS Super Sonics taken? That name truly blows and is pretty much associated with losing.
What in the name of Saint Robocop are these people thinking? First they hijack a beloved NBA team then they treat us to this list o' fail. I want to say these are laughably bad, but I aint laughing. Depressed as all get out is more like it. They ought to name it for what it is-Oklahoma City Screwjob.
How dare you, Baier, how dare you. We have a championship.
Oh, I forgot, 25 points and a gold star to w1deawak3 for not only being funny but dropping a "Saint Robocop" reference.
Fantastic.
Here in Las Vegas, our minor league baseball team is called "The Las Vegas 51s", named after Area 51. You know, where the space aliens are.
We win.
Johnny!!! Man, I like you.....but, still.....I DO know about the Joads, and I'm not one of the aforementioned......Way to put a girl down.....I'm sending back my Night Cobra decoder ring.
;)
Come on Shadow, you're in the Loyal 77, you were mentioned. Indirectly, sure, but you were mentioned.
Don't send in your Night Cobra Decoder Ring, love. I may need to communicate vital messages. Secretly. You don't want to be left out of that.
Uh, that and we don't offer any refunds.
Jeff, to be truthful, mate, I think the Las Vegas 51's is hilarious. Their hats are awesome.
I think the Oklahoma City Hail Storm has a nice ring to it. It'd go along with their summertime theme of severe thunderstorms and tornadoes.
The Oklahoma City Slickers
The Oklahoma City Baseballers
The Oklahoma City Hoopsters
The Oklahoma City Globetrotters
The Oklahoma City Cow Pies
The Oklahoma City Dunks
The Oklahoma City Okie-doh-kies
The Oklahoma City Bull Whips
The Oklahoma City Ranch Hands
The Oklahoma City Dudes
The Oklahoma City Dribblers
The Oklahoma City Bandits
The Oklahoma City Seattle Sucks
The Oklahoma City Blow me
The Oklahoma City Tumble Weeds
The Oklahoma City Help!
The Oklahoma "So Long and Thanks for Kevin Durant?"
How about:
The Oklahoma City Wall?
Or, the Panhandlers? (Oh, I guess that only works if they move the team to Slapout)
Oh just go all the way and call it the Oklahoma City Ninjas. That would be a perfect mascot for a team full of imports to a state full of indigenous rangers.
Freaking wind.
Freaking wind...
Make up your mind Johnny.....I read your save Starbucks blurb....Is our new legitimate franchise "bogus", or "sold out" by Oily Howard...All NBA nicknames SUCK
Johnny,
I am sure it is difficult for you to speak to facts ince you live in a depressing city where it rains far too frquently. I can at least understand the emotional dribble...Speaking to the facts that you have distorted about a "bogus" team, and "two years of existence", there are already 16,000 reuests for season tickets for 2 or more seats per request. These requests are for the Oklahoma City (Supersonics? Wowthat is a great name, great color scheme too.)While OKC hosted New Orleans we boasted an average attendance of 18,000+ per game and held the highest number of corporate sponsors ( in dollars) in the NBA...It is not the fault of OKC that your city could not support a team or afford an arena taht you still owe 30 million on. Perhaps if Howad had invested in your community instead of over priced coffee houses who's minimum wage employees make patrons feel stupid you would stil have the Sonic Booms
How are those any different? Your new team is both.
Something like this:
Your bogus and stolen franchise is a result of a deplorable act from a spoiled billionaire that sold out the city that made him rich.
Trying to spin the embarrassing potential nickname for your lame duck franchise by saying all NBA nicknames are bad is a laugh. (You're saying the Spurs, Mavericks, Bulls, Cavaliers, Pistons, etc suck? Please.) There is no way you can try to make The Wind or The Thunder cool. But The Wind will only be there for three years, so don't worry about it.
Good try Jordan. That dog don't hunt. Nobody outside Oklahoma sees this as just. You're in way over your head if you want to debate with me.
And, did Tom just try to compare Oklahoma City to Seattle?!?
Bloody hell...
Agreed, Johnny. Seattle IS the shit, I have to give you that. Oklahoma City is... not. I guess we'll just have to see what happens, huh? I must say, I am curious to see how it plays out when we have a couple of losing seasons, but who knows.
See, Suzanne, this is why we're friends.
Now it is a "stolen" franchise Johnny? Make up your mind! Did Howard Shultz sell it, or Did Clayton Bennent promise to bring back the sun and run off and steal the team while everyone had their heads turned to the sky looking for a beam of sunlight? The Oklahoma City Supersonics are neither stolen or bogus. In addition to the 350 million paid for the team (purchased, not stolen), Oklahoma City taxpayers are also spending 75 million dollars to pay for our other arena, Key Arena...Thats the one whre the Sonics used to play but the Seatle community could not support it in a profitable manner. It required a few Oklahoma billionaires and our tax dollars to support two cities. Johnny, you can email a request for season tickets for yourself and the other ten people that attended games at Key arena.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...
Give me break. I'm not going to crack on the justifications. It's waste of my time. It's like picking on the "slow" kid on the playground. Oklahoma feels one way, the rest of the nation feels another. I'm done here.
The freaking Wind...
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/080229&sportCat=nba
http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/columns/story?columnist=adande_ja&page=sonicsmove_080702
Not to rub salt in your wounds Johnny, but teams do move - the Jazz, the Lakers. (Actually, find a more incongruous name than the Utah Jazz btw). It's not OK's fault. It's more of a league issue.
In Denver we got the Avalanche from Quebec. NHL probably screwed the pooch moving all those teams to the warm weather areas that have not real attachment to the game.
Oklahoma is o.k. Johnny.
I know, I know. I'm just having fun teasing them, E.
I'm well aware of the history of franchises moving. This one was a crock though.
I'm obviously joking about all this. Except the names of the franchises. That really is embarrassing.
Yeah, well The Wind. That name really sets itself up.
Along those same lines a friend of mine from that area pointed out thus, 'Oklahoma is OK is the tag on the liscence plates. You live there and that's all you've got to say, Uh it's 'ok'?'
He also had some Bill Hicks quotes that were pretty stinging, but Bill was from Texas so, you know, glass houses.
It does NOT say "Oklahoma is OK" on license plates. Just to point that out. Now it says "Oklahoma: Native America." Which is not much better, but whatever. Anyway, that was OT, but you know, since it has been left to me to be the only sane defender of this damn state...
P.S. I actually kind of like "The Barons". It's not too bad, really. But please God, no, don't make us be "The Wind"!
Sorry. I couldn't hold out any longer.
She's like the wind.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kO4I7i2mSAI
Swayze I don't know how you held off as long as you did.
JW
I think we should name it after our native american history of the old west.We should name the new NBA team the Oklahoma City WAGON BURNERS.
NBA Oklahomo City "Jizz" instead of "Jazz".
Or maybe the "Wads".
Cum see the Wads!
I'm surprised no one took pause with Scaramouchs suggestion of 'Bombers' considering the bombing there.
When the NBA schedule released last week (or 2 weeks ago) it had the Oklahoma City Thunder as a team.
Since then, they have removed "Thunder" but it seems like that is only becasue they havent made the announcement yet. Looks like that is the winner.