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Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Not Again!!!!

Name game back on; CFL: Roughriders vs. Rough Riders;
Kingston Whig-Standard (ON)
Page: A26 Section:
Sports Byline: DON BRENNAN, SUN MEDIA
Jim Hopson is excited about the prospect of having Ottawa back in the CFL -- just not so thrilled that the would-be franchise owners want to call the team the Rough Riders.
As one might guess, the president/ CEO of the Saskatchewan Roughriders is among those who believes each club in a league really should have its own nickname.
"The consensus here is that we would like to see only one Roughrider team in the league," Hopson said. "We are pretty proud of the name Roughriders and the success and history we've had with it."
Yet the Jeff Hunt-fronted consortium that this week moved closer to its goal of re-incarnating pro football in the nation's capital already has an agreement with former Ottawa Rough Rider owner Horn Chen to purchase the old team logo and name for a price that's believed to be in the $100,000 range.
To have stuff to stick both on, all the group needs now is a home.
While the team likely would not begin play until the 2011 season, the name game will assuredly start as soon as the stadium deal is signed and the "conditional" tag is lifted off the franchise.
"I played in the '70s and the Riders broke our hearts more than once," Hopson, a former Roughriders offensive lineman, said yesterday from Regina. "It was always the East Riders versus the West Riders, or Green Riders ... there was some ridicule made of that."

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is wrong!! The CFL can't allow Ottawa to come back as the RoughRiders. It is ours now. Cohon will not let this happen. Hopson will not let this happen. I have faith.

JN

Anonymous said...

If this happens, I say change all team names to Roughriders and make the league look very Mickey Mouse. If 32 teams in the NFL can all have different nicknames can 9 teams in the CFL not have different ones.

Brian H

Portuguese Sensation said...

I realize and understand the history behind the name in Ottawa. With that said, I think in the interest of what's right for this league there should be a rule that no two teams can have the same nickname.

It's time to create new history, a new chapter in what's been quite the Shakespearean tragedy in Ottawa, and one that will actually end with a happy ending.