The Washington Redskins have officially announced that the NFLfranchise will change its name and logo after 87 years. The decision came only 10 days after the organization had released a statement confirming they would undergo a thorough review of the name.
“Today, we are announcing we will be retiring the Redskins name and logo upon completion of this review,” Monday’s statement said. Also, it added that team owner Daniel Snyder and head coach Ron Riveraare working in order to develop a new name and logo. Although there is nothing confirmed yet, twonames theyare apparentlytaking into account are Redtails and Red Wolves.
“Today, we are announcing we will be retiring the Redskins name and logo upon completion of this review”, Monday’s statement said.
The NFL official site still refers to the team as the Washington Redskins and it will not change it until the new team’s name is released. But, why will the Redskins change their name after 87 years? The thing is that the name haslong been denounced by Native American groups as an ethnic slur, and officials finally took actions of the matter.
However, it would not be fair to say that’s the only reason; sponsors play a big role in this too.“As part of this process, we want to keep our sponsors, fans and community apprised of our thinking as we go forward”, the statement said. Also,hundreds of universities and schools have abandoned team names and mascots with Native American symbols due to the same reasons.
Several corporate sponsors put pressure on the team to make this decision, including FedEx, who has the naming rightsto the team’s stadium, and Nike and Amazon, who have removed the team’s merchandise from their online stores. It will only be a matter of time to discover the Washington’s NFL franchise new name and logo.