Last week, The Cleveland Baseball Franchise released the above statement. The New York Times broke the story that a name change would be announced the day before, and on December 14th, there it was.
2020 was an incredibly awful year, but for the Change the Mascot organization that has been battling to leave old native themed sports mascots in the past, this year has been a huge success. Since the 70s this movement has been successful in changing mascots at the grade school and collegiate level, and in minor and semi pro leagues. Professional league teams, though, have resisted.
Something changed this year, making the previously improbable finally a reality. The worst professional league offender, the Washington Redskins, retired the name and logo. They changed to the classy, simple Washington Football Team, and started using a wordmark instead of an Indianhead. And now, following suit, the Cleveland Indians, one of the oldest American baseball teams, using the same name for 105 years, has decided to change.
This shouldn't be a huge surprise. Cleveland has been making strides in the last few years to move to this obvious conclusion. They retired their racist caricature mascot Chief Wahoo in 2018. However, like the mascot, the Indian name will survive for one more year, the 2021 season being its last. And the franchise will undoubtedly hold onto the trademark as long as possible by releasing Indians imprinted merchandise periodically. I wouldn't be so concerned about this. It's a business decision, and in a year, the franchise will be rebranded and busy peddling their new rebranded merchandise.
Speaking of that... I hear the franchise may be planning on resurrecting the mascot from a Cleveland precursor franchise. The Spiders could be the second arthropod mascot of a major league team, after the Charlotte Hornets. University of Richmond might be pissed.
A cause for celebration, surely, even though the Indians could have done as Washington did, and discontinue use immediately. Instead they will wait an entire season. Below is an article from the Washington DC ABC affiliate, which showcases reaction tweets from Indian fans. Some are uplifting and supportive, and some are disappointedly not.
