Latest name certainly has familiar ring
The Charlotte Hornets are coming back.
No, they aren’t moving back from New Orleans, where they relocated in 2002.
The Hornets were renamed the Pelicans this year, so the Charlotte Bobcats, who entered the NBA in 2004, are going to take over the name Hornets next year.
The team’s new logo was unveiled Saturday night by Bobcats owner Michael Jordan.
It features many of the same colors the Hornets had from their time in Charlotte - blue, purple and teal. In fact, the Bobcats brought back some of the players who played for the Hornets during in their early days in Charlotte, including Tyrone “Muggsy” Bogues, Rex Chapman, Dell Curry and Kelly Tripuka.
The team also announced that it’s bringing back its old mascot Hugo with an updated look.
In fact, fans seem to be enthusiastic about the return of the Hornets.
After the Bobcats won 21 games a year ago, Bobcats vice president and chief marketing officer Pete Guelli said the team had a 90 percent renewal rate on season tickets, plus 2,000 additional season tickets that were sold in the offseason. The team also landed new national sponsors in Mercedes-Benz and McDonald’s.
In a video presentation at halftime of Saturday’s 88-85 loss to the Utah Jazz, the voiceover began: “What once was lost has been willed by you to be found.
The legend is our new legacy.
Get ready for the buzz to return.
Our city. Our colors. Our name.
We’re all coming home.”
Whether it helps the on-court performance remains to be seen.
From 1988-2002, the Hornets made the playoffs seven times, losing in seven games to the Milwaukee Bucks in Eastern Conference semifinals in the 2001-2002 season.
Since the Bobcats arrived, they have made the playoffs one time, and their record is 85-188 since Michael Jordan became majority owner in March 2010.
Early wake-up call
If the Miami Dolphins miss the playoffs, they can blame an early-morning fire alarm at their hotel for their 19-0 loss to the 6-9 Buffalo Bills on Sunday.
A fire alarm went off at the Dolphins’ hotel at 3 a.m. Eastern time.
Andrew Abramson, a reporter for the Palm Beach Post who was staying at the hotel, said the alarm sounded for an extended period of time.
A fire truck arrived, and some guests were forced to evacuate their rooms.
It was the first known middle-of-the-night fire alarm at a visiting team’s hotel since 2009, when it happened to the New York Jets and Bills when they visited Foxboro, Mass., to take on the New England Patriots.
The Patriots defeated the Bills 25-24 and the Jets 31-14.
So this is what coaches mean when they talk about disrupting the offense.
They said it ...
Columnist Brad Dickson of the Omaha World in Nebraska on Mack Brown’s resignation from Texas with a record of 158-47, with eight of those losses coming against Nebraska: “It only seems like 144 of those wins came against Nebraska.”
An ESPN graphic on the needs of the Houston Astros, who finished 51-111: “Pitching, hitting, fielding.”Quote of the day
“We got a chance to bond a little bit more.” UAPB men’s basketball Coach George Ivory, after it took seven hours
to make the 250-mile trip from Omaha, Neb., to
Iowa City, Iowa, because of slick road conditions
Sports, Pages 16 on 12/23/2013