# Toronto Maple Leafs ....or Toronto Maple Leaves?? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 8, 2001, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/toronto-maple-leafs-or-toronto-maple-leaves/67987 "2001-06-08T00:03:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![The\_Big\_Cheese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8baadc/32.png) [@The\_Big\_Cheese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Big_Cheese)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2001, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/toronto-maple-leafs-or-toronto-maple-leaves/67987/1 "2001-06-08T00:03:08Z")
I’m not much of a hockey fan, but something I’ve been wondering about… why do the Toronto Maple Leafs call themselves the Leafs? Shouldn’t it be Toronto Maple Leaves??? ---
**Author:** ![Phelan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a183cd/32.png) [@Phelan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Phelan)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2001, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/toronto-maple-leafs-or-toronto-maple-leaves/67987/2 "2001-06-08T00:35:26Z")
No reason… They just do! GO LEAFS GO!!! ---
**Author:** ![dqa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dqa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dqa)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2001, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/toronto-maple-leafs-or-toronto-maple-leaves/67987/3 "2001-06-08T01:42:44Z")
Likewise, the plural of Marlin should be Marlin. You’d think that with as much money as they blew to get the franchise, they could hire a proofreader. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2001, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/toronto-maple-leafs-or-toronto-maple-leaves/67987/4 "2001-06-08T02:21:39Z")
The answer is pretty simple, actually; it sounds better as a nickname. The Maple Leafs were renamed that by owner Conn Smythe in 1927; they had previously been the “Toronto St. Patricks,” which is pretty horrible. Smythe chose the name simply because “Maple Leafs” sounds better than “Maple Leaves” as a name for a sports team, and anyway, they’re named after the symbol, not the leaf. ---
**Author:** ![jmonster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/dbc845/32.png) [@jmonster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jmonster)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2001, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/toronto-maple-leafs-or-toronto-maple-leaves/67987/5 "2001-06-08T03:28:08Z")
Steven Pinker answers this question in _The Language Instinct_ (pg 145). > [@](#): > > As for the Maple Leafs, the noun being pluralized is not _leaf_, the unit of foliage, but a noun based on the _name_ Maple Leaf, Canada’s national symbol. A name is not the same thing as a noun. (For example, whereas a noun may be preceded by an article like _the_, a name may not be: you cannot refer to someone as _the Donald_, unless you are Ivana Trump, whose first langauge is Czech.) Therefore, the noun _a Maple Leaf_ (referring to, say, the goalie) must be headless, because it is a noun based on a word that is not a noun. And a noun that does not get its nounhood from one of its components cannot get an irregular plural from that component either; hence it defaults to the regular form _Maple Leafs_. > > [He points out that this also applies to the Marlins] > [He gives more examples:] > > I’m sick of dealing with all the _Mickey Mouses_ in this administration. (not _Mickey Mice_) > … > We’re having Julia Child and her husband over for dinner tonight. You know, _the Childs_ are great cooks. (not _the Children_) **This is a paraphrase, but I steal his examples:** > [@](#): > > Normal compound words like _overshoot_ and _workman_ have heads (_shoot_ and _man_) that control what kind of words they are and how to conjugate or pluralize them. Words like _low-life_ and _Walkman_ are headless; a _low-life_ is neither a _low_ nor a _life_ (discuss). It’s a person. So, it doesn’t get any special rules from _life_ and pluralizes the generic way: _low-lifes_. Read this book and _The Cambridge Encyclopaedia of Language_ and you’ll know pretty much everything there is to know about language.