May 16, 2015; Arlington, TX, USA; A view of a Cleveland Indians baseball hat and glove during the game between the Texas Rangers and the Indians at Globe Life Park in Arlington. The Indians defeated the Rangers 10-8. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports
May 16, 2015; Arlington, TX, USA; A view of a Cleveland Indians baseball hat and glove during the game between the Texas Rangers and the Indians at Globe Life Park in Arlington. The Indians defeated the Rangers 10-8. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports /
The Cleveland Indians Chief Wahoo logo has long been a hot-button issue among fans and activists. Is it finally time for the club to retire him and move in another direction entirely?
I am a born and bred Clevelander. Some of my earliest memories are heading down to old Municipal Stadium with my father and brother to buy $3 general admission tickets and sit down the right field line to watch such luminaries of the game as Alex Cole, Brook Jacoby, and Cory Snyder. And on every drive downtown, I knew we were getting close to the ballpark when the monstrous Chief Wahoo statue that adorned its facade came into view.
Those of us who grew up on the shores of Lake Erie have a complicated relationship with the Chief. While the logo is a part of the team’s and the city’s history, it also has a history unto itself as a lightning rod for controversy. That the Indians – along with other professional sports teams like the Washington Redskins, Atlanta Braves, and Kansas City Chiefs – continue to use names and imagery that are offensive to an entire race of people has come to seem absurd (at least to this writer) in 2016.
With Cleveland playing a quick two-game series against the Washington Nationals in D.C. on Tuesday and Wednesday, the question of Chief Wahoo was once again raised, this time by John Woodrow Cox of the Washington Post.
This is not new for those of us who grew up with the Indians. Every year around Opening Day, the stories surface. Twice in late March and early April this season, the oft-revered, oft-reviled mascot became the subject of news and online argument, and the team hadn’t even played a game yet.
First, Indians owner Paul Dolan commented that the Chief had officially been supplanted as the primary logo of the team, in favor of the wholly uncontroversial Block C. This wasn’t actually particularly newsworthy, as it happened a couple of seasons ago, but the sportswriter community and online fandom pushed it up near the top of the sports news heap.
Then, Bomani Jones went on the Mike and Mike in the Morning radio show, the most popular sports talk show in the country, wearing a Cleveland Caucasians t-shirt that depicted a blonde haired, blue eyed chief-like character with a green money sign coming out of his head instead of a feather. ESPN, which produces Mike and Mike, allegedly “freaked out” out about it and ordered Jones to cover it with his hoodie.
And these sorts of things have been going on for decades.
I hesitated to even write this piece. Doing so is a damned if you do/don’t situation. To either side of the debate, anyone weighing in is either overreacting or underreacting.
I’m about as far removed from emotional or ancestral investment in the issue as one can be. But, as a lifelong fan of the Tribe and baseball in general, as well as someone who possesses working empathy and understands that the views of others may differ from mine and still not be categorically wrong, I have come to a conclusion: it is time to retire the Chief. For good. Officially.
Professional baseball clubs in Cleveland have had many names, going back to the National Association, then the National League, and finally the American League. The Forest Citys, the Blues, the Spiders, the Bluebirds, the Naps, and finally the Indians have all represented the city in pro ball since 1871.
The current franchise was a charter member of the American League when it declared itself a direct competitor of the National League in 1901, breaking the nearly 20 year-old National Agreement. At the time, the team was named the Bluebirds, which was often shortened by sportswriters to the Blues.
Napoleon Lajoie, a future member of the 3,000 hit club and Baseball Hall of Fame, was traded to the team by Connie Mack and the Philadelphia Athletics in 1903, and when he was named player-manager in 1905, the team was renamed in his honor to the Cleveland Naps.
After Lajoie was sold back to the A’s in 1915, the team needed a new name. The official story, as adopted by the franchise itself to this day, is that a group of sportswriters renamed the team the Indians in honor of Louis Sockalexis, a member of the Penobscot tribe, who played for the old Spiders from 1897-99. Take that origin story with as large or small a grain of salt as you’d like, but the name has now been in place since 1915, and has been associated with the team’s two World Series championships and legendary players like Bob Feller and Tris Speaker.
One of the more perverse parts of this story is that most supporters of Chief Wahoo use the argument that, as they themselves are not offended, those opposed to it are merely being overly sensitive. It may shock no one that most, if not all, of those making this argument are not of Native American heritage themselves. It may also shock no one that those same people are some of the ones who went mental because of Jones’ Caucasians t-shirt.
The fact that the name “Indians” and the Chief Wahoo logo (not to mention the Redskins and Braves, among others) is found as offensive to some part of the Native American population cannot simply be waved off as oversensitivity. And the seemingly ever-present uproar serves as a reminder that this is not at all a new issue, and that the club could have nipped this whole thing in the bud years ago.
Regardless of whether the Sockalexis origin story is true, and regardless of whether the name was originally intended as an honor, the fact is that in the century since, times have changed. Attitudes towards marginalized populations have changed. You can call it political correctness or oversensitivity or a product of people just needing something to be #madonline about, but the fact remains that those arguing in favor of Chief Wahoo are on the wrong side of history.
We live in an unequal society. Women’s rights, LGBTQ rights, and African-American rights have been ensconced firmly in the national spotlight precisely because the United States is still so rife with inequality. If the chief were instead a caricatured depiction of one of those aforementioned groups, would we even be having this conversation? No we wouldn’t. The logo would’ve been gone years ago. For some reason, the fact that it is the Native American community that is being exploited seems to somehow make it okay.
So here’s a proposal that I know will incite the bile of the Cleveland sports universe: rebrand the team and do away with the “Indians” and Chief Wahoo entirely.
*ducks*
If we want to delude ourselves into thinking that professional baseball is about the game of baseball first and foremost, that’s fine. But it isn’t the case. Major League Baseball, like all giant conglomerates in this country, is all about the almighty dollar. And generating revenue, regardless of what the “Dolanz r cheep” crowd might say, is the top priority of the club.
Instead of inciting controversy for no good reason, why not just rebrand the team? A redux of the Cleveland Blues or the Cleveland Spiders, while it would invite LOUD criticism from a sizable number of folks, would also work to stoke some headlines and, most importantly, generate a metaphorical ton of revenue from apparel sales. What fan of the club would not be rushing out to buy a new Spiders jersey or Blues hat? Who wouldn’t be clamoring for a ticket to the first game at Progressive Field played by “the team formerly known as the Indians?”
If the Dolans want to maximize their revenue and come out at least giving the appearance of being progressive and in tune to the social climate we live in, a rebranding is about the only sensical thing to be done. I’m not saying it would meet with with universal approval, or that this isn’t perhaps a cynical way of looking at things, but the benefits far outweigh the detriments in my mind.
My point is that it’s silly to continue to rehash the same arguments over and over. Because where has it gotten us? Neither side of the issue has shown a willingness to budge, and more argument won’t change that.
Within baseball, there are so many issues, including the horrendous pay for minor leaguers, a broken draft system that incentivizes tanking, the uncanny need for a salary cap and growing chasm between big market teams and small market teams, and all of the debates about how to play the game that have cropped up thanks to advanced stats and sabermetrics.
More broadly, America is struggling with gun violence on a seemingly daily basis, a Congress that refuses to fulfill its constitutional duty to fill a Supreme Court vacancy, rampant income inequality, and, oh yeah, did you know there’s a presidential election coming up?
