The Incomplete Works of Clarence, Vol. 1

[The New Orleans NBA franchise showed off their new name and logo yesterday, a topic that Clarence apparently wanted to tackle at one point before he fell into a bottle of Jack Daniels. Anyway, when news broke about the Pelicans, Clarence asked that his incomplete ramblings be posted on the now-dated topic. Ask and ye shall receive...]

Grantland recently posted a piece on the future New Orleans Pelicans and why the name change is a good thing.  (Naturally, they used the "Pelican Brief" easy reference in the title of the article but failed to make my suggestion of selling Pelican Briefs on the website.)  In the dozen or so paragraphs, not once, however, did the author mention the old New Orleans NBA team name, the Jazz.  Because doing so would have segued into a more interesting conversation.

You already know this: There are few major sports franchises with more ill-suited team names than the Utah Jazz and the Los Angeles Lakers.  The Jazz, of course defected from NOLA to Sat Lake City 1979 and somehow kept the team name, despite the fact that there was about as much jazz in Utah as there was in East Berlin.  Meanwhile, the Minneapolis Lakers moved west (after drafting West) and somehow kept the team name, despite the fact that they were moving from the Land of 10,000 Lakes to a place with eight lakes, and frankly, at least four of them are glorified ponds.

A more clever sort than I once suggested that these two teams switch names.  Jazz just seems more at home in Hollywood, and in Utah there's a lake so great it's in the city name.  But that's probably not going to happen.

Some folks point to the Cleveland Brown move to Baltimore as the watershed moment when teams would leave the name and logo behind when they switched cities. It seems pretty obvious that this is the right move to make, preserving the history of the franchise in its home city -- especially if there are many decades of past success and fan adoration.  The Colts move to Indy is a story worth dwelling on, but I won't.  Just see the 30 for 30 called "The Band That Wouldn't Die" and just know that Mayflower Van Lines has not had a presence in Baltimore since 1984 . . . and presumably never, ever will.

[So, I guess that ends the post. See y'all next time for Vol. 2]