Watching Phil Mickelson when he is in contention to win any golf tournament is the sports equivalent of strapping yourself inside of an old-time wooden roller coaster.  Your ride will be filled with ups and downs, fast-paced gasps and thrills, and you’re likely to come out a little bit shaky but happy you took the ride with him. 

Over the weekend, I watched every one of Phil Mickelson’s final 36 holes on television. The event was played at the PGA Championship on the brutal but brilliantly designed Kiawah Island Ocean Course alongside the Atlantic Ocean in South Carolina.   Like millions of other Mickelson’s fans, I sweated nearly every single shot Phil took over the weekend as he built a big lead and then gave back several shots while holding on for a two-stroke victory on Sunday. 

On the front nine, Phil Mickelson had three birdies, three bogeys, and three pars on his card.  He made a mess out of the first hole as he three-putted for a bogey.  On the second hole, he redeemed himself with a birdie.   Down, up, down, and up again.  That’s Phil’s golf game!

As Phil Mickelson stood in the sand aside the par-3 fifth green on Sunday’s final round, the walking commentator following the group commented that Phil Mickelson’s sand shots have been less than his best in the past year.   Right on cue, Phil Mickelson lofted up a beautiful shot out of the sand, watched it float onto the green and then gently roll into the cup for a birdie.

“Phil-the-Thrill” has still got it!

When Phil Mickelson stood on the tee box at any hole this weekend, you were never sure whether you were about to watch him “bomb” another 300 yard drive down the middle of the fairway or send a quacking duck hook into the nearby lagoon or fade his golf ball into the sand dunes of Kiawah Island’s seaside links.  The lanky “Lefty” is 6’3” tall and his long, fluid golf swing can sometimes get away from him. 

That’s one reason why Phil Mickelson has been such a fan favorite over his incredible golf career.  Everyone who has ever played golf knows that same feeling standing on the tee box and getting ready to hit their drive.  You hope your golf swing will be good enough to send the ball down the fairway, but many times the ball simply doesn’t cooperate. 

When Phil Mickelson is “on” like he was this weekend at the PGA Championship, it seemed like each of us watching were thinking about our greatest day on the golf course, too.   

When it was done, you felt as if you had worked just as hard as Phil did for the victory! 

While the media is understandably making a big deal out of the fact that Phil Mickelson, who will turn 51 years of age in June, has just became the oldest major championship winner in men’s golf history (by two years), I’m ready to go for another roller coaster ride with him at the US Open in June!

Phil Mickelson won his sixth career major championship on Sunday by taking home the Wannamaker Trophy for the second time in his career.  Phil has already won three of golf’s four major championships and desperately wants to complete golf’s “Grand Slam”.  All that is missing in Mickelson’s trophy case is the US Open. 

Phil Mickelson would love nothing better than to join that elite fivesome of Gene Sarazen, Ben Hogan, Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player, and Tiger Woods.   

With his win on Sunday at the PGA Championship, one of Phil’s perks is now being exempt from qualifying to play in any PGA tournament and major championships he wishes to enter for the next five years.  Phil will be nearly 56 years old by the time all of tho...

Many have tried, and most have failed.  Will this time be any different?

I’m talking about the chances of another successful college football coach coming into the National Football League and turning the franchise around.   Former Ohio State, Florida, and Utah head coach Urban Meyer is already making a lot of noise as he prepares for his first season at the helm of the NFL’s Jacksonville Jaguars.

Though other college football coaching winners such as Nick Saban (Miami Dolphins), Steve Spurrier (Washington Football Team), and Chip Kelly (Philadelphia) have crashed and burned in their attempts to win in the NFL, the odds are certainly against Urban Meyer as he takes over a Jacksonville NFL squad that went a pitiful 1-15 in 2020.

If the 1-15 record sounds familiar, that’s what former college coaching legend Jimmy Johnson recorded during his first year in pro football as head coach of the Dallas Cowboys when he took over in 1989. 

After his first year learning curve, Johnson would draft well and lead the Cowboys to a couple of Super Bowl victories in the next three seasons.   Jimmy Johnson then abruptly took his titles and left pro football after just four seasons in Dallas.  JJ entered television broadcasting with Fox and remained there after tiring of dealing with Dallas’ hands-on team owner Jerry Jones.  

This type of turnaround can be done, and Jimmy Johnson’s blueprint in Dallas seems to be what Urban Meyer may be using as a template right now.

When Jimmy Johnson left the University of Miami to take the head coaching reins in Dallas, he drafted a franchise quarterback in Troy Aikman and added future Hall-of-Fame running back Emmitt Smith.

In his first draft with Jacksonville, Urban Meyer recently selected Clemson’s record setting quarterback Trevor Lawrence with the first overall pick in the 2021 draft and added Clemson’s talented running back Travis Etienne at #25 in the first round, too.  With all of the Clemson players, it wouldn’t surprise me if Jacksonville changed its primary uniform color to orange soon, too!

While at Clemson, both Trevor Lawrence and Travis Etienne played on the 2018 national championship squad.  They know what it takes to win at a high level and play for a demanding head coach like Clemson’s Dabo Swinney.  

As a college football coach, Urban Meyer (now age 56) has a reputation of being quite intense.  Though two of his University of Florida football teams won national championships, Meyer burned-out out in early 2010 after a brief health scare involving chest pains and dehydration.

He hinted that he might leave college football, but, after a few months off, he returned to his job for the 2010 season.  Urban Meyer officially announced his retirement from college coaching after the 2010 season at Florida.  He went into the television booth with ESPN for the following year.

Just as quickly, Meyer turned to college football coaching at Ohio State beginning with the 2012 season and led the team to a 12-0 regular season and a #3 ranking.  He would win his third national championship as a head coach in 2014 after the Buckeyes downed Oregon to win the BCS title. 

In 2018, Urban Meyer was placed on paid administrative leave just before the start of the regular season as part of an investigation relating to his assistant coach, Zach Smith.  After sitting out three games, Meyer returned to coach Ohio State for the remainder of the 2018 season as the team finished 12-1.

As my life continues to move forward, my golf game continues to regress.  Though I was fairly good at golf during high school (shooting in the 70’s much of the time), my game has continued to vanish with less and less practice time and waning interest.

I’ve been humbled by this game.  In business outings, my younger self (at least through my 30’s) was considered a legitimate “A” golfer during four-person scramble events. Unfortunately, less golf practice meant that my scores and play had regressed into a solid “B” player during my 40’s. 

These days, I am simply the guy that you want to put onto the tee first and say, “Go ahead and hit your dinky 225-yard drive down the fairway for us and then we’ll swing for the fences!”

Golf can be a very cruel sport – especially if you let it get inside your head.   

In a golfer’s mind, you can remember the ease which you could chip the golf ball onto the green from nearly anywhere and still make that putt for a par.  As time advances and your practice time retreats, your brain still tends to remember your former skills even though current abilities have withered significantly. 

Today, trying to break 90 (considered “bogey golf”) is about all I can reasonably expect without putting additional effort back into my golf game.

The great thing about golf is that no two golfers play alike.  Nearly every golfer has their own unique style of swing.   Just watch Bryson DeChambeau try to swing for the fences this weekend at the PGA Championship.  Though most of us envy that silky smooth swing of Ernie Els, Jim Furyk’s awkward self-taught swing has brought him 17 PGA Tour wins and a US Open trophy. 

You must have a repeatable golf swing – regardless of whether it looks pretty or not.      

Success in golf stems just as much about your mental approach as your physical game.  If you think you are going to play well, you generally do.  If you believe your golf game is headed for the proverbial sewer, it probably will, too.    

Take putting, for instance.  How can a fellow like Jordan Spieth or, for us older golfers, Ben Crenshaw make so many putts from such incredible distances?  It’s because both golfers carry a supreme mental confidence about their chances of sinking putts on any green.       

Two of the greatest golfers of our time, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods, seemed to relish the pressure of playing golf in the toughest major golf tournaments.  The harder the golf course, the better they seemed to play.  Though nearly every one of the 144 professional golfers lining up on a weekly basis has won at some level, the mental toughness of a Nicklaus or Woods separates them from the field.  At any level, they truly believed they were going to win every single time they teed it up. 

One of the best young golfers on the PGA Tour the past decade has been Rickie Fowler.  Though the former college golf sensation is still making a lot of money doing network television commercials, Rickie Fowler is mired in a mighty big slump.   In 2021, we have seen more of Rickie Fowler on commercial breaks than during your weekly PGA tournament’s television coverage. 

Fowler is now 32 years of age.  He should be in his golfing prime.  Yes, he has won five times on the PGA Tour and has come oh-so-close to winning each of professional golf’s major championships.  Alas, he hasn’t carded a victory since 2019. 

The University of Hartford athletics program is transitioning out of the NCAA’s top sports level (Division 1) to the less glamorous Division III beginning next year.  In the interim, the school will honor all of its athletics scholarships and coaching agreements through 2025.

This story appeared last week without much national fanfare.   The Connecticut-based private school has less than 7,000 students with student tuition and fees of over $55,000 per year.  The school’s academic program includes several engineering disciplines, business, education, and an extensive music studies program.   

The Hartford Hawks have been competing in the NCAA’s America East Conference with regional schools such as the Universities of Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, and several other schools in the Northeast.  In fact, the Hartford men’s basketball program recently won the America East Conference tournament and played in the 2021 NCAA March Madness tournament.  The team lost 79-55 in the opening round to the eventual national champion, Baylor, and finished with a 15-9 record. 

The University of Hartford has been participating at the NCAA Division 1 top level since 1984.  The school, which does not have a football program, fields nine sports each for men and women. 

The Hawks notable sports alumni include baseball’s Jeff Bagwell (Houston Astros), basketball’s Vin Baker (Seattle Supersonics), and PGA golfer Jerry Kelly. 

So, why is the university dropping down from Division I to Division III?  If you guessed money, you would be correct! 

As expected, University of Hartford President Gregory Woodward tried to spin this move as a good thing for the school:

“As we transition to this new model for intercollegiate athletics in the coming years, I am energized by the opportunities we will have to support the success of all of our students, including our student-athletes.”

Translated – “We can’t keep losing money trying to compete in big-time athletics if our students and long-time supporters are unable to cover the costs.”

The move to NCAA Division III by no later than September, 2025 means that the Hartford Hawks’ athletics program will soon feature more students taking a primary interest in their academic pursuits and fewer being focused on a future career in athletics. 

University of Hartford Board of Regents Chairman David Gordon added, “A move to Division III will allow the University to further strengthen the academic, co-curricular, and wellness experience for all students.”

Hartford plans to officially file its intent to become a NCAA Division III in January, 2022.  The NCAA forces schools to go through a rather elaborate dance (which lasts several months) as they attempt to collect information and verify that the school has checked all of the requisite boxes for admission.

Now, let’s talk about what is really happening here. 

A private college or university generally offers a competitive athletics program in order to build school spirit among the students and to keep their alumni connected to the school.  The athletics programs generally need a primary cash cow program (usually football or basketball) to provide enough money to fund the other sports whose costs exceed any revenues. 

The

By now, most of America has heard of Aaron Rodgers. 

The Green Bay Packers quarterback has been in the NFL for 16 years.  He has earned three NFL MVP awards, taken his team into the playoffs eleven times, holds a significant number of NFL passing records, and sports one Super Bowl ring while playing football for Mid-America’s favorite team.  He is paid very well for his role in Green Bay, too.  Rodgers is slated to earn a whopping $37 million in 2021.   

Like recently retired Saints quarterback Drew Brees, Aaron Rodgers (now 37 years old) has checked all of the boxes required to gain entrance into the Pro Football Hall-of-Fame.  He was able to successfully take the reins from another Green Bay Hall-of-Fame quarterback named Brett Favre. 

Just like many professional athletes, Aaron Rodgers has increased his fame and fortune by becoming more of a national media personality.  Though best known for a series of “Discount Double-Check” commercials on behalf of State Farm Insurance, Rodgers recently branched-out into yet another realm of the media. 

After the passing of Jeopardy! host Alex Trebek a few months ago, the long-lived game show has opted to try-out several guest hosts and test how they connect with fans.  The guest hosts have included former Jeopardy! champions and an assortment of media darlings.  The rotating guest host process has helped viewers from getting too misty-eyed remembering the recent loss of the beloved Trebek (who hosted the show for an incredible 37 years).

Recently, Aaron Rodgers was given a two week slot as a celebrity guest host.  By most media accounts, his first week was shaky, but he really improved in Week 2.  Reports said that Rodgers looked much more comfortable and in command of the stage during that second week.  Being the consummate football player, Rodgers’ game show transition proved that he was quite capable of making halftime adjustments in order to win the game in the second half.    

The Jeopardy! television ratings for Aaron Rodgers were also very good, too.  Many fans of the show would like to see Aaron Rodgers offered the job permanently. 

Apparently, he would like the same thing. 

But how can a guy who still has a few years left on a very lucrative contract to play football in Green Bay be available to record a five days-per-week television game show, too?

The Green Bay Packers quarterback recently revealed, “I don’t think I’d need to give up football to do it.  They [Jeopardy!] film 46 days a year. I worked 187 this year in Green Bay. That gives me 178 days to do Jeopardy! So I feel like I could fit 46 into that 178 and make it work.”

Hmm.  

Remember, Aaron Rodgers played college football in California at Cal-Berkeley.  He owns a home in Del Mar, California (just north of San Diego) and seems to enjoy his celebrity status in the Los Angeles area, too.   He is not married (yet) and is a frequently mentioned personality in the celebrity gossip publications. 

Before you laugh about trading in his cleats for hosting a game show like Jeopardy!, Alex Trebek was making about $10 million per season on the show.   Assuming Aaron Rodgers played two more seasons of NFL football (earning about $75 million), he could earn about the same amount in eight years on television without having another 300-pound lineman throwing him into the turf....

It’s springtime here in the Deep South.  That means it’s time to head outdoors for college football spring games, golf, fishing, mowing the lawn, the return of barbeque weekends, and spending more time in the great outdoors. 

Here in the Deep South, spring also means the return of our annual tornado season.  If your primary east/west interstate highway system starts with the numbers 10, 20, 30, or 40, you are likely aware of the possible dangers of these spring storms.  They tend to occur when the last blasts of cooler winter temperatures clash with the South’s increasing levels of heat and humidity at this time of year. 

That’s a reason why we have come to depend on The Weather Channel to bring us the latest advisories about those oncoming springtime storms, right? 

Unless you happen to have bad weather after 12 Noon on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon, that is.   

On Sunday afternoon and evening, several Mississippi cities from Yazoo City up to Tupelo (birthplace of Elvis Presley) were among the locations slammed by some dangerous springtime tornadoes.  In all, 19 tornadoes were reported in Mississippi on Sunday.  Fortunately, there were no fatalities but extensive property damage occurred. 

If you tuned-in to The Weather Channel on Sunday afternoon or evening looking for coverage of this tornado outbreak in the mid-South, you were sorely disappointed. 

When I checked The Weather Channel Sunday night, it was airing another rerun of “Highway through Hell” (a Canadian documentary showing how tow trucks always save the day for vehicles in trouble along the treacherous road systems of western Canada).  Or maybe it was “Heavy Rescue: 401” (same format – which is filmed in the Toronto and eastern Canada area).  

Why would The Weather Channel run a recorded program about Canadian tow-truck operators rescuing endangered drivers instead of covering Sunday’s storms in Mississippi? 

As a former commercial television camera operator years ago, I can think of one good reason.  

Live television programming is expensive to produce.

In addition to one or more on-camera meteorologists, you also need a couple of camera operators, a few technicians to find and load a variety of weather radar sources and create the screen graphics, a director to punch-up the right camera shots or cut to graphics, and a producer to tell the director how long each segment should be and what should be covered at the moment.  At the very least, you’re talking about a minimum of ten people needed to run studio operations during any “live” weather coverage. 

That costs money.  

Even though the Atlanta-based Weather Channel (which began operating in 1982) sells advertising to offset the costs of its live daily weather coverage, the number of viewers generally dwindles during certain hours.  Those are the times where you will now find the network running non-weather shows such as the ones previously discussed.    

You can be sure that top management of The Weather Channel knows exactly how much production costs run to produce their “live” daily weather shows and the advertising revenues generated in any particular hour of the day (on weekdays and especially on weekends).

*** Draft night update – The New York Jets did not trade the #2 overall pick (I missed on that one but still think the J-E-T-S should have traded back and grabbed a few more picks). New England did NOT trade their pick (Correct!), and Dallas DID trade their pick (Correct!). As Meatloaf would sing, “Two out of Three Ain’t Bad!”

*********

One year ago, your SwampSwami celebrated the 2020 NFL Draft by evaluating some of the legitimate and wackier proposed trades rumored ahead of Round 1.   

It’s time to do it again in 2021!

On Thursday night, Round 1 of the NFL draft will take place.  It will unfold at a snail’s pace with each team allotted up to 10 minutes to make their selection.  With 32 teams, this process could take up 5 ½ hours just for the first day’s picks!  On Friday, Round 2 will provide teams a slothful 7 minutes to make their selections and then Round 3 (with 5 minutes between picks) will end another long night.  Saturday morning’s mop-up continues with Rounds 4, 5, 6, and 7.  With 5 minutes allotted to selections in Rounds 4, 5, and 6, a merciful reduction to just four minutes in Round 7 wraps-up the draft on Saturday afternoon. 

This year, the NFL is taking their annual event to lovely Cleveland, Ohio where a Cleveland-like cold rainy day will greet visitors with temperatures reaching the low 50’s for football fans.    

In Cleveland, the NFL has established something called their “Draft Experience”.  The league will have an “interactive football theme park” which is free and open to the public Thursday through Saturday outside of downtown Cleveland’s FirstEnergy Stadium – the home of the NFL Cleveland Browns. 

In addition to watching these future NFL players being selected on gigantic TV screens each day, football fans will be able to buy expensive NFL merchandise, have “virtual autograph sessions” (whatever that means or costs), see a display of Super Bowl rings, and have a photo opportunity with the Vince Lombardi championship trophy.  Fans must wear face coverings and maintain social distancing.   

As the beer flows freely in Cleveland, how well do you think that’s going to go as the night progresses? 

The annual draft is the NFL’s version of going to the grocery store to select one or more items from various sections to complete their team. 

Some of the NFL’s best teams in the past few years (Kansas City, New Orleans, and Green Bay, for example) may opt to trade down for more late round “hamburger” picks rather than go for a first round “steak”.   The best teams always seem to know what they are shopping for at the NFL Draft Supermarket and are ready to make a deal to the perennial losers.

Some NFL teams head to the annual draft with lofty aspirations and, a few years later, learn that their shopping skills are just plain terrible. 

Let’s take a look at the #1 pick in this year’s NFL draft.  The Jacksonville Jaguars were a pitiful 1-15 last season and are now on the clock.  The entire football world expects Jacksonville to select Clemson quarterback Trevor Lawrence to help turn around the fortunes of this woeful franchise. 

Until the first game of the regular season, the hope that Trevor Lawrence will make J-ville into an NFL winner will no doubt translate into more season tickets sold and a huge merchandise money-maker, too.

Thanks, Baylor!  Louisiana needed that. 

The LSU Tigers just hired one of the most successful college women’s basketball coaches in America as they introduced Kim Mulkey on Monday to their fans in Baton Rouge.  Mulkey’s introductory press conference was shown on several television stations around the Bayou State.

Given all of the negative publicity which Louisiana’s flagship university has received (most of it self-inflicted), the hiring of a Louisiana native to take control of the women’s basketball program was a much needed positive shot in the arm for sports fans of the university.  Mulkey is replacing former coach Nikki Vargas, who stepped down from LSU last week. 

Kim Mulkey is returning to Louisiana after a 21-year detour via Waco, Texas as head coach of the Baylor women’s basketball program.  She built a powerhouse program in central Texas which has produced three national championship teams (2005, 2012, and 2019) out of Baylor’s four trips to the women’s Final Four. 

Kim Mulkey is the only women’s basketball coach who has won a national championship as a player (Louisiana Tech), an assistant coach (Louisiana Tech), and a head coach (Baylor).

In her introductory press conference on Monday, Mulkey said all the right things to the home crowd in the Pete Maravich Assembly Center.  She was born and raised just 40 miles down I-12 east of Baton Rouge in the town of Tickfaw near Hammond.  Kim Mulkey charmed the locals on Monday with references to her fond memories and love of Louisiana’s food, festivals, and people. 

Mulkey pointed skyward and advised the adoring crowd to notice that LSU’s rafters showed several teams which advanced to the Final Four but not one team has raised a national championship banner – yet.  With a career coaching record of 631-104 at Baylor with every one of her teams winning 20 or more games each year, there are few basketball fans in the state of Louisiana who don’t believe that LSU’s new coach, Kim Mulkey, can deliver on that promise.

For reported salary of $2.5 million per season, LSU is making a big bet that Kim Mulkey will be able to take women’s basketball to higher levels of success very soon. 

After a successful high school career (136-5 with four high school state championships at Hammond High School in southeastern Louisiana), the 5’4” high school All-American playmaker Kim Mulkey headed north to Ruston to play college basketball for the successful Louisiana Tech Lady Techsters basketball program beginning in 1980.  She was the point guard on two national championship teams at Louisiana Tech and won a gold medal as part of the US Olympic team in 1984. 

As Kim Mulkey told the LSU crowd at her press conference Monday, she didn’t initially have her sights on becoming a basketball coach.  She was a business administration major at Louisiana Tech and had already started coursework toward her Master’s degree. 

One day, she received a message instructing her to immediately come to the office of the university’s chancellor, F. Jay Taylor.  She told the crowd, “When the chancellor called, I literally ran-up all 16 floors to the top of Wily Tower to see what I had done wrong!”  The school offered Mulkey an assistant coaching job to help Louisiana Tech’s new head coach Leon Barmore as he was taking over the women’s program from successful long-time coach Sonja Hogg. 

Wednesday night in Houston, the NBA’s Rockets took it on the chin once again at home.  The Utah Jazz (who should be forced to make a deal and give that name back to the rightful owners in New Orleans) drubbed the Houston Rockets 112-89.  Another 20+ point loss for Houston.

The good news?  Houston maintains its slim ½ game lead over the Minnesota Timberwolves for the NBA’s worst record this season with only thirteen games left in the NBA’s 2020-2021 season.   

With a record of just 15 wins and 44 losses, this year’s Houston Rockets have everything in front of them to capture the best statistical odds of getting the first pick in this summer’s NBA draft. 

Guess who slithers into H-town on Tuesday night?   Oh, yes!  It’s those evil Minnesota Timberwolves! 

For those lucky few fans who will actually pay for tickets to attend the game Tuesday at Houston’s Toyota Center, the starting line-ups for the two teams will be a lot of fun to watch.  Neither team wants to win this game with so much on the line.  The loser of the game might edge into the #1 slot for worst team in the league and have the best chance of grabbing the #1 NBA draft choice in June.

No matter how you slice it, this game is HUGE!   

Regardless of whether Houston holds onto the #1 overall draft pick, this NBA team hasn’t even had a single first round draft choice since 2015 (Sam Dekker – who was traded three times and now plays overseas in Turkey).  The team’s former General Manager (Daryl Morey – who left Houston and now tinkers with the Philadelphia 76ers roster) was what some of us call a “deal junkie”.  He was never satisfied with the team’s composition and traded the team’s recent top draft picks away for veteran players such as Chris Paul (who lasted two years in Houston) and Russell Westbrook (one and done in Houston). 

Never fear, Houston Rockets fans.  The team has been completely reorganized after Houston native Tillman Fertitta acquired the local pro basketball franchise in 2017 for $2.2 billion.   Most of the team’s upper management has been replaced along with the Rockets’ biggest star, James Harden.  However, it was James Harden who was the one literally begged to be traded after last season.  He received his wish and was shipped to the Brooklyn Nets in January, 2021.

The Houston Rockets are officially in the rebuilding mode.  The team set a franchise record with a 20-game losing streak earlier this year.  They have dealt away a few players and acquired two additional first round picks from Portland and Milwaukee.  With three first round selections this summer, the Rockets’ upcoming draft picks need to help restore this franchise into a contender once again.    

The good news for Houston Rockets fans is history reflects that when the team holds the #1 overall draft choice, some legendary Hall-of-Fame players have been selected.  On the other hand, there have been many very questionable first round selections taken over the years, too.

Since the Houston Rockets are only able to sell their fans on a little hope for the future (and a lot of hype) with their first round pick this summer, let’s take a closer look at some of the team’s biggest draft successes and busts over the years:

I will rank the five Houston Rockets #1 overall draft selections in the team’s history:

The National Football League team in Washington, DC dropped its longtime nickname last year and caved to political pressure.  The team without a nickname played its 2020 season known as the Washington Football Team.

Now that a full year has passed since the dramatic heave-ho was given to the team’s popular former nickname, isn’t it time for the WFT to take the next step and permanently replace the team’s nickname?

Though some have joked (or perhaps not) that the team should retain their former nickname and just replace the iconic image of a Native American with one or more red potatoes, it appears that the ownership of the team isn’t leaning that way. 

In this turbulent and hyper-sensitive era in which we currently live, the NFL’s Washington franchise has just announced a list of possible nicknames under consideration (it took them a year?).  

Don’t get too excited, though.  A new team moniker will not become effective until the 2022 season.   Such is life in the red-tape infested slow lane called Washington, DC.   

Your ever-faithful SwampSwami has just reviewed all 37 names in the team’s proposed nickname list.  I will now offer my gut-reaction grades of “A” (Great!) through “F” (No, that one truly stinks) along with each of the proposed new nicknames: 

Proposed Washington NicknameGradeAcesDAmbassadorsCAnchorsDArchersDArmadaCAviatorsCBeaconsDBeltersFBrigadeCCommandersDDefendersDDemon CatsBFirst City Football Club (FCFC)FGriffinsDGuardiansCIconsDMajorsDMonarchsCPilotsFPresidentsCRazorbacksCRedtailsCRedwolvesDRed HogsCRenegadesBRiders CRisingFRoyalsFRubiesDSwiftsFWarriorsCWashington DC Football Club (DCFC)DWashington Capital City Football Club (CCFC)FWayfarersDWild HogsC32FC (W32)FFootball TeamC

Let’s summarize my grading results:  

A = 0

B = 2

C = 14

D = 13

F = 8

That’s right!  I didn’t “love” any of these proposed nicknames for the Washington NFL franchise enough to issue a single “A” rating.  Only “Demon Cats” and “Renegades” made me think, “That might be pretty good!”  On second thought, the word “Renegade” doesn’t exactly remind me of what usually occurs daily in stoic and stodgy Washington, DC.  

I gave the current “Washington Football Team” a “C” rating, because the lack of creativity simply doesn’t deserve a better score than that. 

I really don’t care for any soccer names, either.  The “Washington DC Football Club”, “Washington Capital City Football Club”, or “32FC” (whatever that means) are duds.  Soccer is called “soccer” here in the US.  Save those Euro names for a soccer team!

What to do?  Never fear, I spent all of fifteen minutes (!) thinking up a few alternate nicknames which I believe are more unique and, perhaps, better than the 37 names coming out of the NFL team’s office this week.    

You may be the judge.

Washington Filibusters – This name accurately taps into the true nature of the nation’s capital.  Nothing says stalemates and hot air quite like filibusters.  This team will eat-up the clock!

Washington Congressionals – Like the Filibusters,