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The Washington Football Team will have a new name next month

By Anastasia Tsioulcas
Published January 4, 2022 at 10:33 AM EST
Washington Football Team fans cheer during a game against the Falcons in Atlanta in October 2021.
Kevin C. Cox
/
Getty Images
Washington Football Team fans cheer during a game against the Falcons in Atlanta in October 2021.

The Washington Football Team will have a new name as of Feb. 2, team president Jason Wright announced in a statement posted Tuesday to the team's website.

Wright made clear that one option is off the table: anything to do with "Wolves" or "Red Wolves." While that was a fan favorite, Wright noted, "trademarks held by other teams would limit our ability to make the name our own. And without Wolves, variations like RedWolves wouldn't have been viable either for these and other reasons."

After fending off years of criticism for employing offensive Native American stereotypes, the team dropped its former name and logo in July 2020.

Also in July, Wright nixed another possible choice of new name — the Warriors — "with the clear acknowledgement that it too closely aligns with Native American themes." In August, the team banned Native American-styled headdresses from its stadium.

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Corrected: January 4, 2022 at 12:00 AM EST
A previous version of this story said the Washington Football Team dropped its name last July. The team did so in July 2020.
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Anastasia Tsioulcas
Anastasia Tsioulcas is a reporter on NPR's Arts desk. She is intensely interested in the arts at the intersection of culture, politics, economics and identity, and primarily reports on music. Recently, she has extensively covered gender issues and #MeToo in the music industry, including backstage tumult and alleged secret deals in the wake of sexual misconduct allegations against megastar singer Plácido Domingo; gender inequity issues at the Grammy Awards and the myriad accusations of sexual misconduct against singer R. Kelly.
See stories by Anastasia Tsioulcas

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