There are many unique sports team names across all sports. The tradition of naming sports teams such odd and unusual names came from sportswriters who bestowed the names to add a splash of color to their depictions of the teams exploits. There are many different stories on how different teams’ go by their names, ranging from basic animals like dolphins or lions all the way to names like the trail blazers or warriors. According to Professional\u2019s HQ, the reasons teams are named the way they are is because \u201cIn short, it comes from wanting to have an identity of something that can beat or dominate a person. You want the team to seem like something that can win while perhaps invoking some other qualities.\u201d\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The most common names in all sports are animal related. According to Actually Good Team Names, \u201cAnimals have always made great team names and mascots. The use of animal mascots in sports dates back to at least the 1880s, when a good-luck goat was known to follow Cincinnati\u2019s baseball team around.\u201d\u00a0One of the more recent franchise teams is the Jaguars. According to Fansided, \u201cIn 1991, two years before the city was officially awarded an expansion team, a fan contest was held to choose Jacksonville\u2019s nickname. Names such as the \u201cSharks\u201d and the \u201cStingrays\u201d were considered before finally settling on the \u201cJaguars.\u201d Though jaguars aren\u2019t technically native to the city, the oldest living jaguar in North America was housed in the Jacksonville Zoo.\u201d Roshan Patel, a junior at Ponte Vedra High School, says, \u201cI knew that animals as team names are common, but I just figured teams chose animals because it was the easiest. I didn\u2019t know there was stories to how each team go their name.\u201d Animal names are selected to feel powerful and make it easy for the fans to rally behind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The most common way cities decide on a team name is by some type of vote. According to ESPN, \u201c13 out of the 32 NFL teams were decided on some type of vote.\u201d They make it a fan vote because they want their fans to make the decision as they are devoting their time, money, and life to the team. The Dolphins were one of those 13 teams that held a fan vote. According to The Culture Tip, \u201cin\u00a01965, a contest was held to help come up with a name for the new Miami team, and some of the names suggested to the American Football League included Mariners, Marauders, Mustangs, Missiles, Moons, Sharks, and Suns. However, 622 entrants submitted \u201cdolphins,\u201d which ultimately became the winner.\u201d James O\u2019Donnell, a junior at PVHS, says, \u201cI like the fan vote idea, it gives the fans a chance to feel appreciated, or at least that\u2019s how it would make me feel if I got to vote for my teams name.\u201d A fan vote is common and the best way to give back to the fans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There are more unique names that make people wonder how they came to be. One of those is the Trail Blazers. According to Blazers Edge, \u201cThe actual name came from a practice by explorers making paths through forests and marking the paths by chopping white \u201cblazes\u201d in trees\u2019 bark so others could follow (This happened near the area of Portland).\u201d Another one that makes you wonder is the Orlando Magic. According to nba.com, \u201cWhile the group pondered which one of the finalists would be selected, Williams’ (Magic GM) 7-year-old daughter, Karen, paid a visit to her father from the family’s home in Philadelphia. After spending some time together checking out Orlando’s attractions, Pat took Karen to the airport for her flight home. As she waited for her flight, Karen said something that would leave a lasting an impression on the city of Orlando. “I really like this place. This place is like Magic.”\u201d Ashtan Augusta, a junior at PVHS, said, \u201cThe way teams get their names is really fascinating, you would have no idea on how the names became if you didn\u2019t do the research.\u201d Some of these names have the most unusual backstories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “The way teams get their names is really fascinating, you would have no idea on how the names became if you didn’t do the research.”<\/p>-Ashtan Augusta (11)<\/cite><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n There are teams that move cites and yet their name still reflects one city or location. One of these teams is the\u00a0Los Angeles Lakers. According to nba.com, \u201cThe team moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1947, and its name was changed to the Lakers to reflect the Minnesota state nickname, \u201cLand of 10,000 Lakes.\u201d Another team that did this is the Utah Jazz. According to nba.com, \u201cThey were originally from New Orleans, Louisiana in\u00a0the\u00a0late 1970s.\u00a0Jazz\u00a0music is popular in New Orleans, and\u00a0the\u00a0team was named\u00a0the Jazz\u00a0when it was in New Orleans.\u00a0The\u00a0team kept\u00a0the\u00a0name when it moved to\u00a0Utah.\u201d The teams carry their original names with them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When it comes to minor league baseball team names, they might be the most unusaual they get. According to ask.com, \u201cBut, no matter their structure, many of these teams have one major thing in common: weird team names. Often, minor league teams rely on\u00a0local \u201cin-jokes\u201d\u00a0and\u00a0references to an area\u2019s history in order to connect with fans and build a community feel.\u201d One of these weird team names is the Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp. According to milb.com, \u201cThe Suns rebranded after the 2016 season, becoming the Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp.\u00a0The name combines\u00a0shrimping, which is popular on Jacksonville’s\u00a0St. Johns River,\u00a0with the sentiment that Jacksonville, Florida’s largest city, still has a small-town feel, hinting at the moniker’s oxymoronic nature.\u201d These minor league team names might be the weirdest things when it comes to sports.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Whether the team names are super basic or really interesting they all have their different ways of becoming what they are, from fan votes all the way to being reflective of the owner. They are all very interesting names and have their own reason why they are.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Dylan McAdoo There are many unique sports team names across all sports. The tradition of naming sports teams such odd and unusual names came from sportswriters who bestowed the names to add a splash of color to their depictions…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6297,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pgc_meta":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[256,163,111,406,136],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/pvhstiburon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/shrimp-copy.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pvhstiburon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6295"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pvhstiburon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pvhstiburon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pvhstiburon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pvhstiburon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6295"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/pvhstiburon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6295\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6306,"href":"https:\/\/pvhstiburon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6295\/revisions\/6306"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pvhstiburon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6297"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pvhstiburon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pvhstiburon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pvhstiburon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}