Logos are geting worse

[Poupou Escobar]

Pirates? WTF? Reds was far, far better - with links to the Western Desert and the megafauna that are most asociated with it. The Reds link to the colour also has historical connotaions with other well established sporting nicknakes - Blues, Bluebags, Dirty Reds, Bluesox, Maroons, All Blacks etc.

They threw that out for a kiddies comic book charater. Pathetic.

Sadly. it's a sporting trend - pick the spastic name that has nothing to do with anything.

They are getting worse!

As for the poll, dont pick your own team - it's not a poll of who we support.

Actually Perth is on the Indian Ocean, hunting ground of the Somalian pirate. Maybe the Pirates logo should have a skinny black guy with an AK-47.

 

[Poupou Escobar]

The use of a badge featuring the mythical story of St George slaying a dragon pre-dates the use of the name "Dragons" for the team. Initially they were just known as St George and people started to call them the "Dragonslayers" because of the badge. Australians being the lazy speakers that we are, it became shortened to "Dragons".

Edit: Ninja'd

This is where the term 'androtrop' came from. Originally it was 'androtrop collector' (because someone collecting sticks would be continually bending over), but lazy merkins shortened it.

Edit: Obviously I don't mean 'androtrop'. I refer to the related term that starts with 'f' and rhymes with 'maggot'.

 

[Diesel]

Actually Perth is on the Indian Ocean, hunting ground of the Somalian pirate. Maybe the Pirates logo should have a skinny black guy with an AK-47.

I have to agree with Loudstrat but if they are going to go ahead with the Pirate logo your idea for the logo is pretty much spot on

 

[The Great Dane]

Not at all. The lime green jumper, the Viking and the Raiders name has become synonymous with the Canberra region. It is only the logo that needs fixing.

Actually the Lime Green comes from the colour of the first RL team in the ACT (Hall, I can't remember there mascot).

As you said before the name Raiders came from the idea of Canberra raiding Sydney.

Norse culture was already popular in Canberra at the time of choosing our logo and mascot (even a large part of Canberra is named after the Norse god Odin, Woden), but other then that at the time Canberra had no connections to Vikings and I agree that it was a strange choice to represent us, but Vikings do represent raiders, as they themselves were fond of raiding, so maybe that is why they chose to go with a Viking as our mascot.

Personally I really like our logo and don't understand why everybody thinks it's so bad, but to each his own I guess.

 

[Diesel]

Clubs should embrace their region when choosing a name. I didn't know the Raiders name actually had a link to Canberra with the Norse heritage and Canberra raiding Sydney, I really like it.

Any other names (doesn't have to be NRL) where the club has their mascot named after a region or has significance?

I'd also be interested to know how some NRL teams got their names

 

[The Great Dane]

What would you call the PNG team if they entered the comp?

I really think they should look into calling themselves the PNG Cannibals, it has history, it is original and is a kick ass, take no prisoners name, but some people might find it offensive.

If they can't go with Cannibals then they should definitely go with the PNG Vipers.

 

[_Johnsy]

Actually the Lime Green comes from the colour of the first RL team in the ACT (Hall, I can't remember there mascot).

As you said before the name Raiders came from the idea of Canberra raiding Sydney.

Norse culture was already popular in Canberra at the time of choosing our logo and mascot (even a large part of Canberra is named after the Norse god Odin, Woden), but other then that at the time Canberra had no connections to Vikings and I agree that it was a strange choice to represent us, but Vikings do represent raiders, as they themselves were fond of raiding, so maybe that is why they chose to go with a Viking as our mascot.

Personally I really like our logo and don't understand why everybody thinks it's so bad, but to each his own I guess.

My wife grew up in Canberra and says that there are a ferw streets around named from Viking/Nordic heritage. She remembers suburbs around/within Woden Valley - Phillip in particular.

Edited

Wikipedia says. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woden_Valley

Woden Valley is a district of Canberra, the capital city of Australia. Its name is taken from the name of a nearby homestead owned by Dr James Murray who named the homestead after the Old English god Woden in October 1837. He named it this as he was to spend his life in the pursuit of wisdom and Woden was amongst other things, the God of wisdom. In 1964 it was the first "satellite city" to be built, separate from the Central Canberra district. It has its own shopping centre, employment opportunities and accommodation with 12 suburbs arranged around the Woden Town Centre. Woden Valley has an approximate population of 31,991.

Woden - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woden

Woden or Wodan (Old English: Ƿōden, Old High German: Wôdan,[2] Old Saxon: Uuôden) is a major deity of Anglo-Saxon and Continental Germanic polytheism. Together with his Norse counterpart Odin, Woden represents a development of the Proto-Germanic god *Wōdanaz. Though less is known about the pre-Christian religion of Anglo-Saxon and continental Germanic peoples than is known about Norse paganism, Woden is attested in English, German, and Dutch toponyms as well as in various texts and pieces of archeological evidence from the Early Middle Ages.

 

[_Johnsy]

I'd also be interested to know how some NRL teams got their names

With some, nothing more than marketing I'd suggest.

 

[Lockyer4President!]

Slightly OT but the Qld teams have the worse nicknames and logos.

Instead of NQ going with the Cowboys name, and we all know what a cowboy is in Aussie slang, they should gone for something like Bushrangers.

The Broncos was decided by the consortium going to Denver to look at the Denver Broncos set up and were that impressed they named their team after that, if they wanted to go for a horse then why not the Brumbies? There are a lot of Queensland mascots that would've been better for Brisbane other than the Broncos.

And the Gold Coast, well they couldn't get their shit together and took a name that another club has and lost their first choice, the Dolphins which would've been a perfect fit so their second choice was to instead go with a name that has nothing to do with sun, surf and sand.

Everyone has 20/20 hindsight.

-Cowboys are part of Australian slang, not the same as the USA but it is used by people who ride and on stations.

-All of Brisbane's sports teams in the 80's started with B. Bulls, Bullets, Bears, Bandits, etc. Broncos might not be a locally significant name but I guess they had their reasons for choosing it, and compared to the rest it's really not bad.

-When the GC decided not to go with the Dolphins they setup a public vote website and iirc had Titans, Pirates and Stingrays (could be wrong)... So you can chalk that one up to the general public being morons.

By-the-by I'd love to see a re-imagined/modernised GC Giants logo for the Titans. Would be a great way to acknowledge the history of NSWRL/NRL teams on the GC.

 

[The Great Dane]

Clubs should embrace their region when choosing a name. I didn't know the Raiders name actually had a link to Canberra with the Norse heritage and Canberra raiding Sydney, I really like it.

Any other names (doesn't have to be NRL) where the club has their mascot named after a region or has significance?

I'd also be interested to know how some NRL teams got their names

I'm pretty sure that our name was chosen by the marketing guy, but I do know how we got our original jersey design and our colours.

There was a competition here in Canberra to see who could come up with the best design and the winner was Patricia Taylor. She came up with the design and the colours and gave a description of her reasoning behind why we should use those colours and the significance of the hoops around the arms design.

I can't remember her description word for word, but I do remember the gist of it, as I said before the lime green and white were chosen because they were the colours of the first rugby league team in Canberra, Hall, The blue and gold were chosen because they are the national colours of the ACT, and the hoops design was chosen because it represented the name Canberra which means meeting place and hoops always meet. The reason why she only went with hoops around the arms is because she thought that the hoops going around the whole body would look to much like a South Sydney jersey.

So that is the history behind our jersey and our colours, there's much more to it then meets the eye wouldn't you agree.

 

[The Great Dane]

My wife grew up in Canberra and says that there are a ferw streets around named from Viking/Nordic heritage. She remembers suburbs around/within Woden Valley - Phillip in particular.

Edited

Wikipedia says. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woden_Valley

Woden Valley is a district of Canberra, the capital city of Australia. Its name is taken from the name of a nearby homestead owned by Dr James Murray who named the homestead after the Old English god Woden in October 1837. He named it this as he was to spend his life in the pursuit of wisdom and Woden was amongst other things, the God of wisdom. In 1964 it was the first "satellite city" to be built, separate from the Central Canberra district. It has its own shopping centre, employment opportunities and accommodation with 12 suburbs arranged around the Woden Town Centre. Woden Valley has an approximate population of 31,991.

Woden - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woden

Woden or Wodan (Old English: Ƿōden, Old High German: Wôdan,[2] Old Saxon: Uuôden) is a major deity of Anglo-Saxon and Continental Germanic polytheism. Together with his Norse counterpart Odin, Woden represents a development of the Proto-Germanic god *Wōdanaz. Though less is known about the pre-Christian religion of Anglo-Saxon and continental Germanic peoples than is known about Norse paganism, Woden is attested in English, German, and Dutch toponyms as well as in various texts and pieces of archeological evidence from the Early Middle Ages.

Thanks for that.

 

[Loudstrat]

Clubs should embrace their region when choosing a name. I didn't know the Raiders name actually had a link to Canberra with the Norse heritage and Canberra raiding Sydney, I really like it.

Any other names (doesn't have to be NRL) where the club has their mascot named after a region or has significance?

I'd also be interested to know how some NRL teams got their names

All the original Sydney clubs got their colours from their district Union clubs from which they split. South Sydney represented all the areas south of the city, likewise North Sydney, Western Suburbs and Eastern Suburbs.

Souths became the Rabbitohs, after club officials would sell skinned rabbits door to door - calling out "Rabbitoh" to announce their presence. They did this to raise money.

Easts were the tricolours - from the french flag. In the 60's, they became the Roosters after sponsorship from Steggles.

Norths were the Shoremen - as in 'north shore'. Before the harbour bridge was built, some players used to work as wharfies to tend to ferries that crossed the harbour. IN the 60's they became the Bears, due to sponsorship from Bear Supermarket in Neutral Bay.

Wests were the fruitpickers because of lots of orchards in their area. Later, they became the Magpies because they were black and white.

Balmain were the Tigers because of their colours. That's why Newtown were the Bluebags. They later became the Jets because of the noise from the nearby airport.

St George took their district name. Hence the dragon from British mythology.

Canterbury - Bankstown were the "Cee Bees" then after the war "Berries". They became the Bulldogs in the late 1970's. Obviously bulldogs are more threatening than a berry, and it evolved from having Bullfrog as their boss.

Parramatta were also the Fruitpickers for the same reason Wests were. Later they became the Eels due to the council logo - which was the club logo - featuring an aboriginal man spear fishing. Parramatta means "place of many eels"

Many were first the seagulls, and became the sea eagles to appear tougher. It never worked.

Cronulla were the sharks because the area is bound on 3 sides by water.

Penrith are the panthers because of some stupid myth about a giant panther living in the Blue Mountains bush.

 

[Prometheus]

I'd also be interested to know how some NRL teams got their names

Most of the older teams existed without a mascot name for decades. In some cases a nickname developed naturally, while in other cases a name was chosen to match their long established colours. Balmain's 1908 logo featured a kangaroo and a tiger supporting a football in the style of a coat of arms. Wests, in their black and white, adopted the Magpie while they were still based around Ashfield as it matches their colours and is ubiquitous in the suburbs.

Most of the more modern teams held competitions to come up with their names, though most of them ended up adopting the names of American sports teams. The Raiders, Steelers, Broncos and Cowboys all copied their names from NFL teams, though in some cases there was a genuine reason why. The Steelers, for example, is as perfect a name for a team from the steel-producing city of Wollongong as it is for Pittsburgh. Canberra claimed they chose their name because they were going to "raid" Sydney, but in reality they just copied the Oakland Raiders name and then "raided" the Brisbane competition to fill out their playing roster. Some older teams that had not developed a mascot name also used this approach. Newtown copied the New York Jets, discarding the nickname "Bluebags" that fans had been using for decades.

Souths probably have the most interesting story. The South Sydney players during the great depression used to make ends meet by skinning and selling rabbits from carts in the streets of Darlinghurst, Surry Hills and Redfern. They would play in the blood-stained jerseys on the week-end and opposing players didn't want to tackle them. The South Sydney crowd would taunt the away team by chanting "Rabbitoh".

Sydney/Easts copied their "Roosters" name from a visiting French national side (who also wore the tricolour) and believe it is ideal because the Eastern Suburbs see the sunrise first.

Norths got "Bears" from a local shopping centre that sponsored them.

St George were sometimes called the "Illawarra-ites" and "Illawarra-men" in the 20's and 30's

I don't remember the origin of Penrith's name, but I imagine it comes from the urban myth that there is a panther roaming the Blue Mountains area. Sightings of the panther date back over a century.

The Bulldogs didn't call themselves that until the 70's and had been informally referred to as the "Berries" before that.

Parramatta means "where eels live" or something like that in the local Aboriginal dialect. So it seemed like the obvious choice when everyone was getting mascots in the 70's. Before that they had been known (like Cumberland before them) as the "fruitpickers".

I once read a new article that described how all the teams got their names, but that all I can remember now.





Edit: Dammit! Ninja'd again. I must learn to type faster.

 

[Prometheus]

Manly were first the seagulls, and became the sea eagles to appear tougher. It never worked.

Manly were never the Seagulls. One journalist mistakenly called them the Seagulls and other reporters copied his error. but they were always officially the Sea Eagles.

 

[Fire]

What a lot of people don't know is that Souths were originally called "The South Sydney Knickerbockers".

 

[WayneBennett]

 

[Diesel]

Thanks guys for that insight. I thought some were randomly chosen but obviously not. The Bears choice was really interesting, named after a supermarket and the Roosters after a touring French team. The Panthers one makes sense as I've heard about the giant cats in the Blue Mountains. I thought the Steelers may have been after the steelworks in the area that was probably partly due it but the 1980's US/Australia cross promotion makes a lot of sense with teams such as the Giants, Raiders, Broncos, Jets and Steelers names.

The Titans choosing their name due to a public vote seems a lot like the Brisbane Bombers, WC Pirates with their choice, as local fans are still scratching their heads how these were popular choices and mostly likely dreamt up by marketing companies

 

[Panfas]

Penrith Panthers - http://www.penrithpanthers.com.au/history

Although rugby league had been played in Penrith since 1912 it was not until the 1960s that serious consideration was given to promoting a local team to the elite division.
In 1967, the Penrith Panthers made it - being accepted along with Cronulla-Sutherland, into the Sydney 1st Division Premiership.
As late as 1966 Penrith had played in the 2nd Division wearing blue and white. But on elevation to the top grade they found that Cronulla-Sutherland had already registered blue, white and black.
At that time Newtown were also playing in royal blue and there was the well-known blue and white strip of Canterbury, as such a decision was made to change the club colours to brown and white.
The Panther had been chosen as the Penrith emblem in 1964 after a public competition was won by a graphic artist from Emu Plains named Deidre Copeland.

 

[bobmar28]

Thanks guys for that insight. I thought some were randomly chosen but obviously not. The Bears choice was really interesting, named after a supermarket and the Roosters after a touring French team. The Panthers one makes sense as I've heard about the giant cats in the Blue Mountains. I thought the Steelers may have been after the steelworks in the area that was probably partly due it but the 1980's US/Australia cross promotion makes a lot of sense with teams such as the Giants, Raiders, Broncos, Jets and Steelers names.

The Titans choosing their name due to a public vote seems a lot like the Brisbane Bombers, WC Pirates with their choice, as local fans are still scratching their heads how these were popular choices and mostly likely dreamt up by marketing companies

I voted for the Titans name although I would have preferred Dolphins. I have never been offered the chance to vote for or against the Bombers name.

 

[Prometheus]

I'd like to know who thought the next best thing to blue was brown.