They really should have just gone back to the Spiders, but there are a lot of team names in Cleveland’s baseball past that could have been used.
1 Like
The hubris of man to just assume whatever. Pretty sure the roller derby team (which I assume are women?) are going to get paid. I mean it would be interesting if they fought the name change purely for the principal of it.
wow… I just assumed it was women. I was also wondering if there were any male roller derby teams or how that all works. I’m realizing how little I know about the sport.
2 Likes
Derby team’s merch sales will go up, just because they are caught up in this. Baseball team will then sue derby team accusing them of profiting through all this confusion.
4 Likes
I doubt they will - the legal fight is costly (even if they could somehow crowdfund for it) and it’s making it more difficult for the baseball team to do the right thing (even if their reasons are pragmatic/profit-driven). The Guardians name seems to be popular and well-received change - are they going to win that PR fight? Perhaps they should fight it and option the rights to their story as it has the trappings of a cheesy Hollywood underdog sports movie.
2 Likes
Surely the Cleveland Whatevers have traditional rivals whose fans could be persuaded to donate out of spite.
1 Like
looks more like an ocean liner than a steam freighter.
1 Like
Really? I think confusion between people looking to buy tickets for a major league baseball team and a regional roller derby team is going to be… rare.
Before now the roller derby people never needed to SPECIFY what kind of sports team they were on their tickets or promotional materials or fundraisers or merchandise, because they were the only Cleveland Guardians sports team in town. That changes now.
2 Likes
The roller derby team really shouldn’t sell the name. No, they should license it.
3 Likes
Yeah, but if you’re smart, you resolve the conflicts before you announce the new name…
3 Likes
If the Expos ever managed to resurrect themselves, hopefully the team could have some sweet L’enfant Terrible du Cleveland!
2 Likes
It would be amazing if the roller derby team just flat out said no, if you want the name you’re going to have to steal it from us. Then treat it like an art project and just publicize every step of a corporation fucking over the little guys.
1 Like
Or even a different city.
Texas has a baseball team called the Rangers. NY has a hockey team called the Rangers.
Sportsball trademarks don’t seem to cover their usually very generic names in all contexts, or even across sports and leagues.
So this is probably just a routine some one owned the URL thing. Which because of famous statues was bound to happen. If it wasn’t a roller derby team, it’d be an informational wiki, or a defunct video store or something.
1 Like
Rocks. It’s Rocks. Just be Rocks. 
1 Like
With a trademark search, you have to check the USPTO database and common usage. That makes it tougher in some ways than a patent search.
1 Like
MLB filed a trademark claim in Mauritius back in April, then used that as a basis for filing for a trademark with the USPTO on 23 July. The roller Derby team filed their USPTO application a few days later (after the MLB announcement), but they have provenance of using their mark for a number of years already, which counts bigly.
But I expect MLB will out-lawyer the roller Derby team, and the existing guardians will get screwed.
4 Likes
Now the question is what should be done with the indians.com domain? Will they continue to renew the registration just to have it redirect to MLB?
1 Like
Oh… uhm just look that up on urban dictionary if you dare!
2 Likes
