Froma Harrop / Syndicated columnist
A Super Bowl between two teams from nowhere

E-mail this article Print this article Search archive

The Carolina Panthers: same problem. Name doesn't specify which Carolina — North or South. Their stadium happens to be in Charlotte, N.C., but no sportscaster calls them "Charlotte," the way they call the Denver Broncos "Denver," or the Seattle Seahawks "Seattle." They're just "Carolina."

Super Bowl XXXVIII will be a match between two teams from nowhere. And that's too bad. As many Americans move away from urban centers with distinctive personalities, sports teams offer a last chance to identify with a city.

The Pittsburgh Steelers: Now that is a name anchored to earth. Both "Pittsburgh" and "Steelers" tell you where the team is from. The same goes for the Houston Texans and the Miami Dolphins. When they win a big game, their fans know which downtown to wreck.

By fudging the team's location, the owners can appeal to a wider base of fans. The Panthers, for example, are the only team between North Carolina and Atlanta. That's a potentially big market for Panther sweatshirts, coffee mugs and key chains.

But how deep runs the public's passion for a team that won't commit to one Carolina or the other, much less a city? Teams that claim a wide geographic base may attract fans, but not many fanatics.

Case in point: the New England Patriots. Local sportswriters noted that until they seemed destined for the Super Bowl, the Pats had stirred little mania. They were winning game after game, but the fans continued to obsess on every little drama percolating through the Boston Red Sox front office — and long after the baseball season ended. Some writers attributed the lopsided interest in the Sox to the team's long history and the fans' sick masochism.

But perhaps the names had something to do with it. Boston is a hometown. New England is a six-state region.

Sure, when the Patriots won the Super Bowl two years ago, people throughout New England got excited. The team carted the trophy from city to city, and fans did show up to pay their respects. There was some vandalism in Boston. The police had to roll an overturned car back on its wheels. But emotions didn't boil over. If the Sox ever won the World Series, they'd have to call in the Marines.

The most geographically disoriented team has to be the New York Giants. In 1976, the Giants moved to the Meadowlands in New Jersey. The Meadowlands are just a few long-bomb throws from New York City. The Giants' owner didn't want to lose the enormous New York market by naming his team the "New Jersey Giants." So he called it simply the "Giants."

Reporters covering the first Meadowlands game referred to the visiting team as the "Dallas Cowboys" but the home team as the no-place "Giants." The team eventually decided to call itself the "New York Giants," which made no one happy. The New Jersey crowd felt slighted. And after the Giants won the Super Bowl in 1987, New York City Mayor Ed Koch refused to throw them a ticker-tape parade. He said that the Giants were a Jersey team.

The most dramatic story of hometown loyalty belongs to the Cleveland Browns. The team moved to Baltimore in 1996 and tried to bring the name along. Clevelanders went ballistic. (The team had been named after the legendary Cleveland coach Paul Brown.) The National Football League ruled the "Browns" name was to remain the rights of Cleveland, and in 1999 the Browns franchise was revived, in Cleveland.

Baltimore, meanwhile, came up with a great name: the Ravens. This referred to the famous poem "The Raven," by Edgar Allan Poe, who had lived in Baltimore. Now how many football teams are named after a poem — especially one with local significance?

But identifying with a municipality is not the trend. We may someday see the Heartland Horizons playing the Tri-State Gorillas. Not names to get the blood up, are they?

Providence Journal columnist Froma Harrop's e-mail address is fharrop@projo.com

Copyright 2004, The Providence Journal Co.