"Vegas Golden Knights" - Ha ha ha ha

[RickJay]

The NHL has decided to add a 31st team in Las Vegas. They will be known, hilariously to my mind, as the “Vegas Golden Knights.” Note the absence of “La.” They’re just to be styled “Vegas.”

Of course, this franchise will be an epic disaster for the real NHL teams to subsidize. They could at least have chosen a decent name, though.

[cmkeller]

At least they’re not the “Ice Knights”. The stupidest hockey names (mainly minor league, obviously) are the ones where they take some random thing that would make a decent team name and stick “ice” at the beginning because it’s hockey, even though the other word has nothing ever to do with ice.

[ekedolphin]

You think that’s bad? The minor-league hockey team for Indianapolis was called, simply, the Ice.

[running_coach]

Will the Golden Knight mascot have only one arm?

[running_coach]

@cmkeller

At least they’re not the “Ice Knights”. The stupidest hockey names (mainly minor league, obviously) are the ones where they take some random thing that would make a decent team name and stick “ice” at the beginning because it’s hockey, even though the other word has nothing ever to do with ice.

Please tell me there’s a team named The Icy-Hots. Or the Ice Colds.

[Czarcasm]

Considering LV’s seedy past, I would have gone with the “Icepicks”.

[running_coach]

@Czarcasm

Considering LV’s seedy past, I would have gone with the “Icepicks”.

Since it’s a bunch of rejects from other teams and the minors and won’t have really gelled as a team, how about the Las Vegas Mob?

[Chronos]

I’m apparently missing a lot of backstory, here. Why is this team going to be so bad, and what’s so bad about “Golden Knights” as a name?

[RickJay]

To me the funny part about the name is “Vegas” instead of “Las Vegas.” It’s linguistically equivalent to having a team called the Angeles Dodgers or the Diego Chargers.

What’s going to be awful is the franchise will, after some novelty wears off, be a financial catastrophe and will end up a ward of the league, like the Phoenix Coyotes. Meanwhile, real hockey markets go without hockey teams.

[running_coach]

@Chronos

I’m apparently missing a lot of backstory, here. Why is this team going to be so bad, and what’s so bad about “Golden Knights” as a name?

Expansion teams are usually bad because(At least in baseball, is hockey different?) they get the worse players from all the current teams as a starting roster.

“Golden Knights” doesn’t evoke “Vegasness”, “desertness” or even “hockeyness”.

[Leaffan]

The expansion draft rules are here.

I hate the name too, but like many others (Ducks, Blue Jackets, hell Penguins even) you get used to it after a while.

[Snowboarder_Bo]

@Chronos

I’m apparently missing a lot of backstory, here. Why is this team going to be so bad, and what’s so bad about “Golden Knights” as a name?

From the NHL thread:

@Snowboarder_Bo

So I went down to T-Mobile Arena this afternoon for the big announcement… took some photos and some video… talked to people in hockey jerseys from all over, all eager to find out what our team name was gonna be… talked to my friend who did the pyro and confetti… then came time for the big announcement and we all found out that our team was gonna be named…the Vegas Golden Knights:mad:

The crowd was visibly and audibly not thrilled. Many of us put our wallets away. A good number of us then walked away, unwilling to have anything to do with that name.

Of the 3 that were still in the running, Bill Foley picked the worst one. It’s awful. Coupled with the clip art logo and the terrible font, this is a disaster of a name. The team colors are even stupid. Oh, and for some reason, he left “Las” off the team name.

I fully expect this will catch on, and we’ll soon play the Jose Sharks , the York Rangers, the Angeles Kings and, of course, the Bay Lightning.

:rolleyes:

Months and months and months and millions of dollars spent, and this is the fucking team name??? :eek:

Cite.

@Snowboarder_Bo

They couldn’t get the rights to Black Knights because that’s the team name of Bill Foley’s alma mater, West Point. The US Gov’t wasn’t going to give away that name.

Gary Bettman was there, of course (and think Og he relishes the role of the heel) and he made a little speech about how “this will be your identity in the NHL, this is a big deal and all of you are a part of it blah blah blah”, and then they spring this shitty name on the crowd.

The internet trolling started about 23 seconds after the announcement, most likely by someone standing in the crowd with me. You can hear the crowd go “Whaaaaaaaa???” and boo in the video I shot.

@Snowboarder_Bo

The NHL reportedly would not allow any gambling references, so there was never any hope of the Las Vegas Aces, Las Vegas Blackjacks, etc.

Everyone in the crowd was prepped for the Las Vegas Desert Knights. It’s the best of the three finalist names and would have reflected the geography in some way. The ex post facto justifications for the name and the team colors on the NHL cite is just so much rationalizing.

Here’s the best part: I don’t want a team name that signifies “defenders of the realm” and “protect those who cannot protect themselves”. I want a team name that signifies “unstoppable juggernaught that crushes everything in it’s way” and “destroyer of all who oppose us”.

Also, leaving “Las” off the team name is just stupid, stupid, STUPID! Can you imagine any team owner being dumb enough to call his team the 'Frisco 49ers? The Antonio Spurs? The York Yankees? It’s not a tribute to our city to go hacking the name up, ffs.

I may have opportunities to see games at the new arena, but you can bet your ass I won’t be rooting for the local team, not with a shitty name and shitty logo like that.

Hell, I was ready to drop a couple hundred bucks on a jersey last night, but when I heard the name I said “well, I’m not giving them money for that” and about 15 people near me nodded and said the same thing.

Months and months of work and millions spent on legal fees, and this is what they come up with. Fuck the Vegas Golden Knights.

@Snowboarder_Bo

Keeping in mind that they are dependent on the goodwill of the league for revenue and access to players, I think this is the closest anyone writing on ESPN is gonna get to saying outright “this is terrible and needs to be completely redone.”

NHL team brands? It isn’t even fit to sit alongside any of the ECHL or AHL team brands. I’ll keep wearing my Elmira Jackals and my Milwaukee Admirals and my Florida Everblades and my Greenville Swamp Rabbits, etc. jerseys.

THOSE are some awesome team names and logos.

Fuck the Vegas Golden [del]Showers[/del]Knights.

Dumbest of all is the fact that the helmet in the logo isn’t even a knight’s helmet.

Plus jokes write themselves: golden showers, golden girls, etc.

[RickJay]

Well, the Ottawa Senators’ logo is of a Roman soldier, not a senator. So, hey, the logo’s okay.

I predict the “Las” will be added to the name within ten years, assuming the team isn’t moved to the Toronto area, Seattle, of Quebec City or whatever.

[running_coach]

@RickJay

Well, the Ottawa Senators’ logo is of a Roman soldier, not a senator. So, hey, the logo’s okay.

Wiki.

The club logo is officially the head of a Roman general, a member of the Senate of the Roman Republic, projecting from a gold circle.

Yeah, right.

[cmkeller]

I don’t see that leaving out the “Las” is quite as dumb as people are saying it is. Plenty of people will say “We’re going to Vegas” rather than “We’re going to Las Vegas”. A number of movies have titles like “Honeymoon in Vegas” or “Vegas Vacation”. That’s very different from Los Angeles, New York, San Diego, etc, which no one ever refers to by half the name.

[zbuzz]

@RickJay

Note the absence of “La.”

Note the absence of “s.”

[Czarcasm]

@zbuzz

Note the absence of “s.”

There’s plenty of “s” in that town.

[Chronos]

Yeah, and even if they had officially left the “Las” in as part of the name, everyone would always refer to them as the “Vegas So-and-Sos”. So why not leave it off to begin with?

[kayT]

So all expansion teams are just a bunch of second-raters and we should just stick with the original six? And as names go, there are other, worse ones. The Wild, for example.

[DCnDC]

@RickJay

To me the funny part about the name is “Vegas” instead of “Las Vegas.” It’s linguistically equivalent to having a team called the Angeles Dodgers or the Diego Chargers.

Nobody ever refers to LA as “Angeles” or San Diego as “Diego.”

I know of very few people who don’t refer to Las Vegas as just “Vegas.”