Will Congress make us buy New Orleans a new sports franchise?

I don't know about that Paul, but I would be shocked if the NFL discovers that New Orleans "needs a new stadium" for the team to stick around. A taxpayer-funded stadium, of course.

that's "wouldn't be shocked"

Los santos de la ciudad de los angeles? Lo entiendo, aunque todas las palabras son mentiras.

(Yes, I intentionalized left those uncapitalized. I'm not using them as proper nouns.)

Estefan, tienes que recordar que el nombre vero de la ciudad es "El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles de la Porciúncula." Ni los conquistadores ni los inhabitantes de hoy creen que angeles vivan en la ciudad; todos comprenden que viven en el cielo. Y la ciudad no es como el cielo...mas como el infierno. Por eso, ellos oran a la reina del cielo.

Well, from what I can tell from the Spanish-language comments above (linguistics, particularly the romantic languages, has never been my strong suit), they have pretty much made my point for me.

Los Angeles football has a bad reputation only due to those damned Raiders' tradition of smashmouth football and kill-'em-all-and-let-the-refs-sort-it-out attitude towards penalties. The Rams, which also played under the L.A. name, didn't have nearly the same reputation and, indeed, were the respectable team among the two. (Of course, they also were the worst team of the two more often than not, so that might have some other negative connotations.)

And the name Saints fits will with the original City of Angels concept. After all, they already have the Angels (formerly of Anaheim) and the Kings, so why not move the Saints there? A religious trifecta in the making.

At the bottom of it, the Saints are a team without a home, and LA is a home without a team. Why not simply give the Saints a temporary move to the land of eternal smog and see how the trial run works out?

Y la reina del cielo los oye, y Ella los da los santos para intercesión. O algo como esto. :)

(Si, si, yo lo recordo, pero quise continuar el chiste.)

Another dumb one: the Minnesota Lakers, named for that state's 10,000 lakes, didn't change its name when it moved to Los Angeles.

Another dumb one is the Arizona Cardinals, transported from Saint Louis, where the name had a tradition.

It's interesting to note though, that two teams named "Browns" changed their names when they moved to Baltimore, each taking the monikers of birds. The Saint Louis Browns became the Baltimore Orioles. The Cleveland Browns became the Baltimore Ravens.

The Athletics have kept the same name in Philadelphia, Kansas City, and Oakland. The Braves have also been the Braves in Boston, Milwaukee, and Atlanta. Of course, these names, as is true of the former Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants, transported to LA and San Francisco, respectively, are fairly generic labels.

But the Jazz in Utah has never made sense.

Mark Daniels

The Angels Saints... has a nice ring to it.

The name "Dodgers" isn't "generic"! It's short for "Trolley Dodgers," as Brooklynites back in the day had to do a fair amount of trolley-dodging. Los Angelenos in the 1950s, not so much!

Although Los Angelenos in the Thirties would have done more than their fare share of trolley-avoiding.

Paul...so you're telling me that if I stay out here for 5 more years, I can expect to be randomly chased by trolley cars? Huh?

In the Thirties, not their thirties. L.A. had a great trolley car network about seventy years ago; it's one of the plot points in Who Framed Roger Rabbit?

One might reasonably conclude from all this that the NFL approves of team-name changes to accompany their movements, while MLB and the NBA do not.

Incidentally, New Orleans' NBA team is spending the season in Oklahoma City; they're still the Hornets, which is what they were in New Orleans, which is what they were when they started the franchise in Charlotte. (The current Charlotte NBA team is the Bobcats.) Speculation is rampant that the Hornets will remain in Oklahoma City, after averaging greater attendance in pre-season than they did last year in the regular season in the Big Easy.