In fact, only 16% of Commanders fans think the team should keep its name. largely They want to change the team name to something else. Also.
“I've always been a fan since I was a little kid, but the old name was obviously a bit problematic, and I looked at it,” said Andrew Ravenscroft, a resident of Washington, D.C. “I was in favor of changing the name, but it's kind of a weird name.”
In July 2020, after former owner Daniel Snyder faced growing pressure from sponsors and local officials, the team announced it would drop the controversial “Redskins” name and conduct an “exhaustive” search for a new name. The franchise adopted the name Washington Football Team for 18 months before unveiling the Commanders name, logo and uniforms in February 2022 at a chilly ceremony at Landover Stadium.
Almost immediately, the rebranding was panned: A citywide Washington Post poll conducted that month found that 49% of DC residents said they disliked the name, including 17% who said they disliked it. A similar poll this spring found that 48% of DC residents disliked the team's name, including 15% who said they disliked it.
“It's not a surprise,” said George Perry, the team's former vice president of strategic marketing and now a lecturer in business and marketing at Christopher Newport University. [87] “Even after all these years, you're pretty attached to that brand, regardless of other people's feelings about that brand. You're attached to the Super Bowl, you're attached to your favorite players, you had your jerseys and your shirts. I think it's going to be a challenge to get fans to support a different name, whatever the name may be.”
No NFL team has ever changed its name three times in 10 years without also changing region. Changes are expensive, and league rules state franchises can only change their name, logo and uniforms once every five years, though there are exceptions, such as for changes of ownership.
It's perhaps not surprising that calls to drop the team name intensified shortly after Snyder sold the team to an investment group led by Josh Harris last July.
The open-ended question in the latest poll resulted in a variety of suggestions from fans, with 3% of Commanders fans saying “Red Wolves,” 2% saying “Warriors” and 2% saying “Warriors.” “Red Tail” and small The percentage presented was “red skin potatoes”.
The club had been searching for a name for 18 months, ruling out Red Wolves and Wolves (and derivatives) due to trademark conflicts, as well as Warriors due to its association with Native American themes.
“This inclusion of iconography and imagery that may approximate Indigenous peoples does not represent a clear departure that many in the community have urged us to make, and frankly, was our intention a year ago when we began this effort,” team president Jason Wright said in a lengthy 2021 post on the team's website.
“It's been a long time coming and I was so happy to hear about it,” said Montgomery County resident Matt Price, who was in favor of the team changing its old name and thinks the current name is “smug and pompous.”
“Who would get excited about that?” he said.
Price suggested picking a common animal, but acknowledged he'd be fine with the team reverting to its interim name, the Washington Football Team. And he's not alone: 17 percent of people said they'd like the name to change back.
But some fans (16%) spontaneously supported bringing back the “Redskins” name in the poll, including Washington, D.C., native John Navinette Jr., who grew up near RFK Stadium.
“You still have the Atlanta Braves and the Chiefs in the NFL,” he said, pointing to other professional teams with Native American-themed names. “It just seems like a bias when it comes to Washington. The Commanders are fine, but they don't reflect the historical value or anything of a rich program or team. The Commanders is a name, but it's not an identity. The Washington Redskins were an identity.”
Washington's old name has also been a source of contention for decades and an obstacle to the team's return to Washington. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (Democrat), who has long lobbied for an NFL franchise to return to Washington and play on the federally owned grounds of RFK Stadium, has made it clear that the team must first change its name.
“People tend to forget that one of the main reasons I stopped using the name was pressure from sponsors,” Perry said. “All the other sponsors were like, 'Change the name or we're not going to give you money.' That didn't necessarily change. … If it were me, I don't think it would have been a priority.” [to change the name] Because we would be starting from scratch again.”
When Harris' group bought the team, they didn't rule out a future name change, but they were quick to rule out reverting to the team's previous name.
“That ship has sailed,” Mitch Rales, a top partner in Harris' ownership group, said in September. “We're not looking to revisit the past. We're looking at the future, building for the future and not having a divisive culture that we're involved in. We'll look at everything by the end of the year, think about different things, do a lot of testing, see what people think. And we'll learn. The great thing is we have time to look at all of this intelligently and make a decision based on our fans.”
A person with knowledge of the owners' plans reiterated this month that there are no immediate plans to change the name. The group has repeatedly stressed that it has other priorities. This offseason, the Commanders revamped their front office, coaching staff and roster. The owners also invested more than $75 million in upgrades to their stadium in Landover and their practice facility in Ashburn. Also They are seeking a new naming rights partner for the current stadium and are awaiting the outcome of a bill that would allow the RFK site to be used for new facilities and associated development.
Though the name (and logo) remains a contentious issue for some, the new ownership has become a source of optimism for many Commanders fans.
A majority of Commanders fans (and DC-area residents overall) at 77 percent have a positive view of Harris' leadership. Among Commanders fans in the district, 83 percent are optimistic about Harris.
“I like what he's done,” Ravenscroft said, “and although he hasn't had any major success yet, he's done a lot better than Dan Snyder.”
Washington's NFL team was once the center of DC sports, but its popularity has declined in recent years. Nearly one in 10 D.C.-area sports fans say they root for the Commanders, lower than the Nationals (59%) or Capitals (50%). Fewer than four in 10 sports fans in the area say they are Wizards fans (37%).
Price, like Ravenscroft and Navinet, is hopeful that Harris can return the franchise to its former glory.
“It's embarrassing to have such a terrible owner and it's really embarrassing to have such a racist name,” Price said, “so with the new owners, I feel like I can be a huge fan again.”
The poll was conducted by The Washington Post and George Mason University's Schar School of Government between April 19-29 among a random sample of 1,683 adults in the Washington, DC area, including 1,295 sports fans and 640 Commanders fans. The overall margin of error is plus or minus 3.2 percentage points, 3.6 points among sports fans and 5.1 points among Commanders fans, and smaller for each subset.
Scott Clement contributed to this report.
