Let it go

The phrase in the title of this post is helpful. I'm thinking of having it tattooed backwards on my forehead. Well, that won't work because I don't cast a reflection in a mirror.

Maybe, I'll just write it down somewhere. Much like Reggie Hayes of the Fort Wayne News-Sentinel did in the column he titled...

Let it go: TinCaps name is staying
Excessive whining won't change quirky, creative moniker

Jason Freier, one of the owners of the Fort Wayne TinCaps, hears your whining about the baseball team's new name.

I mean, he hears your opinion.

Whining is my word, not his. I listen to complaints about TinCaps and how ridiculous the name is and how it reflects poorly on Fort Wayne (as if others care one iota about our minor-league nicknames) and I hear whining.

Freier, you'll be glad to know, doesn't think you're a bunch of whiners, and he respects your opinion.

He also believes you'll calm down over time. On that, I have to agree. Outrage over “Wizards” was palpable when that name was first introduced, then evaporated. Indignation over the TinCaps will subside, too. We might even come to appreciate TinCaps and return to complaining about where policemen park their cars at night.

I suggested to Freier in a conversation last week that the negative reaction to TinCaps is a byproduct of people who are still ticked off about Harrison Square in general. He says that analysis is flawed.

“There are definitely people who are very supportive of the (Harrison Square) project who say, ‘Why couldn't you have gone with Generals or Cannons or something that sounds like Fort Wayne?'” Freier said. “There is a significant segment of folks who are very supportive who just don't get what we're trying to do here. They don't see what we think we see.”

There is reference to a internet poll at milb.com and I'll get to that one a little later. But, here is the end of this column.

One of the men the TinCaps owners talked extensively with during the name-selection process was Tom Dickson, who owned and spearheaded the names of the Lansing Lugnuts and the Montgomery Biscuits. Say what you will about TinCaps - and you'll say it - this wasn't a name picked on a whim.

“Bear with us, trust us, and give it a chance,” Freier said. “At the end of the year, will there be people who still don't like it? Probably. I'm sure in Montgomery there are people who still say, ‘I can't believe our name is the Biscuits.' You're never going to please everyone, but I think this is something that's going to resonate with a lot of people in the community as the seasons go on.”

Keep grumbling for now, if you must, about how the name doesn't capture the essence of our city. But do you really want to switch to the more immediately descriptive Fort Wayne Whiners?

Fort Wayne Whiners...I'd love to see the logo for that team.