Poll results: What fans think about Columbus Double-A Braves baseball team’s new name
The overwhelming majority of Ledger-Enquirer readers who participated in an online poll about the new name of the minor league baseball team in Columbus don’t like the decision to name them the Columbus Clingstones.
The Clingstones name was announced Sept. 6 for the Atlanta Braves’ Double-A franchise moving from Mississippi to Columbus. Two days after that announcement, two online petitions were posted on Change.org, calling for Diamond Baseball Holdings to reconsider the team’s name. A petition David Gilmore started has more than 1,790 signatures as of Tuesday A petition by Alan Phillips has more than 1,300 signatures as of Tuesday.
But there are advocates for the name too, such as Phenix City resident George Ratley, who didn’t like the name at first but told the Ledger-Enquirer he warmed up to it and bought apparel.
New York-based Diamond Baseball Holdings, which owns and operates 34 minor league baseball teams, explained in a news release that the clingstone peach is “one of the most popular varieties of peaches, named for its flesh that stubbornly clings to the pit, signifying the grit and determination the team will display on the field as well as an unyielding commitment to the community. Both the name and the logo embrace the peach as an iconic representation of the state of Georgia.”
Critics of the decision say the name doesn’t represent Columbus. It’s the second-largest city in the Peach State, but Georgia peaches grow mostly in Middle Georgia, near Macon, not so much in and around Columbus in west-central Georgia. And the clingstone varieties of peaches grow primarily in California.
So the Ledger-Enquirer sought to find out what its readers think about this controversy. On Sept. 24, we posted our online poll asking readers, “Should the Columbus Clingstones change their name?”
They had three options to choose for their answer, and they could submit only one response during the voting period, which ran for a week until Sept. 30. Here are the results from the 363 readers who participated:
- Yes, and name them the Columbus Braves because they are the Double-A affiliate of the Braves, which 49% chose.
- Yes, and name them something that’s more about Columbus, which 41% chose.
- No, keep Clingstones as the name, which 10% chose.
Alternative suggestions for Columbus Clingstones
Thirty-two of the poll’s participants submitted suggestions for different names, and some offered multiple names.
Six suggestions for:
- Braves, which the team was called in Mississippi
Four suggestions for:
- Rapids, which the Columbus minor league indoor soccer team was called in 2021-23
- Scrambled Dogs
Three suggestions for:
- Catfish
Two suggestions for:
- Foxes, which the Columbus minor league baseball team was named in 1909-17, 1926-30, 1932 and 1956-57
- Mudcats, which the Columbus team was called in 1989-90.
One suggestion for:
- Cavalry
- Champions
- Conductors
- Contenders
- Copperheads
- Cottonmouths, the Columbus minor league hockey team’s name in 1996-2017
- Creeks
- Rangers
- Riverdogs
- River Ducks
- Shoalies
- Swamp Donkeys
This story was originally published September 24, 2024 at 10:26 AM.
