COLUMBUS, Ohio – A state Senator from the Cincinnati area wants the Cleveland Indians to scrap their nickname and their Chief Wahoo mascot and he’s asking lawmakers to go on the record in support of idea.
Calling the name and the logo “an affront to Native Americans,” Eric Kearney (D-North Avondale) introduced a resolution in the Statehouse Wednesday encouraging the team to retire their name and mascot “and to adopt a new nickname and a new mascot free of racial insensitivity.”
Team president Mark Shapiro says Chief Wahoo represents the team’s heritage and will remain in place.
Like many sports teams, the Indians have come under periodic criticism for their use of the Indians nickname and for their smiling Native American mascot, Chief Wahoo.
Kearney says, in the resolution, that an “evolving sense of decency and respect” demand the changes.
In his resolution, Kearney enumerates a number of cases where the Cleveland franchise has broken racial barriers, including fielding the American League’s first African-American player, Larry Doby, and hiring Frank Robinson as baseball’s first black manager.
Kearney also says that Louis Sockalexis, who played for the Cleveland Spiders in the late 1800’s, may have been the first Native American major league baseball player.
Kearney also points out that, while the Indians tradition does date back nearly 100 years, prior to 1915, the team was known variously as the Lake Shores, Spiders, Bluebirds and Naps (in honor of star second baseman Napoleon “Nap” Lajoie and chosen via a newspaper contest).