In case anybody missed it, Chase posted a history of the Redskins name a couple years ago: http://www.footballperspective.com/the-origin-of-the-name-redskins/

(I thought this was posted about 6 months ago. Time flies.)

Good post. By my count, there were 18 NFL franchises in the 1930s. 8 of them had their names inspired by their baseball cohabitants: Boston Braves/Redskins, Brooklyn Dodgers, Chicago Bears, Cincinnati Reds, Cleveland Indians, Detroit Lions, New York Football Giants, and Pittsburgh Pirates/Steelers. In the 1920s, there was also an earlier Cleveland Indians team along with the New York Yankees and a Washington Senators.

I’ve seen an occasional list where someone’s tried to add the Cardinals to that list, but the Chicago/Racine/St Louis/Phoenix/Arizona Cardinals had nothing to do with the St Louis baseball team. They are the Cardinals because their original owner Chris O’Brien was too cheap to buy new uniforms for his squad (back in ~1901) and instead bought used/faded practice uniforms from the University of Chicago Maroons.

To add to the Braves/Redskins comment, the reason Marshall moved the team from Braves Field to Fenway Park was that he blamed the Braves baseball team for the team’s monetary losses in their inaugural year. I don’t remember the exact reason, I think it was something like Marshall believed their losses were because the Braves were taking too much of the gate as part of their landlord agreement. It was something along those lines although I don’t recall the exact reason. Fenway offered him a better tenant deal.

In 1936, the Boston Redskins won the East and were set to host the Packers in the NFL title game. Marshall announced near the end of the regular season that due to poor attendance and poor media coverage (he claimed Boston newspapers featured high school football more prominently than his professional team) that he was moving the team to Washington. He also petitioned the NFL to move the title game to the Polo Grounds in New York, which they did.

As a Washington (and yes that is hard to be w/Snyder in charge) fan, I’ve heard the Dietz argument so many times. Stating your point about the name change occurring before Dietz was hired never seems to register with the people using that argument, granted using a 2×4 in these discussions probably would register as much effect. Plus I’ve read that Marshall in the 50s and 60s would make the Dietz claim, which doesn’t help dissuade the unenlightened. A couple years ago when the name controversy started up again, someone for the Washington Post found a 1933 article from the Hartford Courant(?) that quotes Marshall (before Dietz was hired) stating that he was changing the name so the football club, in its new setting, wouldn’t be confused with the baseball club.