I’m having a really hard time deciding between the Spiders and the Cockroaches.
“Las Cucarachas” should be a Texas team or somewhere in the southwest.
When would they play? Cockroaches are nocturnal and once you turn on the lights…
They’d sure get around the bases fast!
Cleveland Rocks!
If it’s really been decided it will be leaked very soon.
Good, if true.
Now, do the Braves.
God I hope not. I far prefer the Spiders or anything that isn’t nearly identical to another MLB team name.
How about the Steamers?
Wapo says it’s the Guardians
Yes, Guardians. Tom Hanks narrated the video announcing the change:
Cleveland Indians on Twitter: “Together, we are all… https://t.co/R5FnT4kv1I” / Twitter
I was curious as to what the Guardians alluded to… apparently it’s based on this:
Ugh. Just… ugh. Now I’m thinking MCU and I can’t even. You just know they chose this name for potential tie-ins with Disney, and now my day is ruined.
Yeah, they named their $500,000,000 team after a bridge. That’s so cute. And completely believable. Not.
Anyway, the name is as the name is. It’s an improvement, but a sideways one.
I’m not a sports fan, but the NHL team in Anaheim was named after a movie title. (Anaheim Ducks, “The club was founded in 1993 by The Walt Disney Company as the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim, a name based on the 1992 film The Mighty Ducks.”) There may be stupider origin stories for team names.
I completely forgot about that, and now I’m even more convinced there’s a Disney tie-in with this name change. 
From what I understand the Guardians of Traffic are iconic in Cleveland, and when Cleveland announced a name change there were a number of fan made logos with the Guardians (as well as Spiders, the original name of the team, which was another popular name).
Guardians? Ugh. How boring. I was so looking forward to the Spiders. I suppose there’s enough arachnophobes out there to make it not the safest business decision.
The Spiders were actually a different team; they played in the National League in the 1890s, but when the National League contracted, they folded. The Indians came into being at about the same time that the Spiders ceased to exist; it appears that some of the Spiders’ assets were sold to the ownership of the Indians.
I have to admit my first thought was the DCU character The Guardian. Meh. I don’t foresee them doing anything Disney-related apart from the occasional promo night, just like every MLB club does every year.
I agree that it was a missed opportunity, “Spiders” was such a cool name, has a historical reference, and there are many branding opportunities. But Guardians is at least an improvement and it’s not awful, it’s less generic than a name like the Nationals or Athletics. (And they didn’t go with “Cleveland Baseball Team” like a different sports franchise in a similar situation.)
Like there would be no MCU tie-in with Spiders?
That film comes out in December by the way.