What's In a Name?

Juliet:"What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet." Romeo and Juliet - Act II, Scene 2

After my oldest son finished an hour of reading and emptied the dishwasher for me, I let him watch a baseball game on television, The Cleveland Indians versus the Oakland A's.

As I entered the room, my son asked, " Where is Progressive Field?". I looked at the screen and could see that it was cold and sleeting on the ball field. This has to be Cleveland, I brilliantly deduced. I doubted that it would be snowing in Oakland, California this time of year. I thought my son must be mistaken about the name until I heard it for myself. When did this happen? While I'm not a sports nut, I can't believe that I missed that memo.

So I did some research on the internet and this happened in January of this year. Progressive Insurance bought the naming rights for 16 years at roughly $3.6 mil a year!

http://cleveland.indians.mlb.com/news/
http://clevelandsports.wordpress.com/2008/01/11/rip-jacobs-field-1994-2007/

I grew up going to games in Cleveland Stadium. It took a while to get used to "Jacob's Field " or "The Jake ". The name was changed in 1994 when a new stadium was built. Now I need to get adjusted to "Progressive Field". Suggested new nicknames are the "Prog" ( sounds too much like Prague for my liking) or the "Pro" ( not feeling it). I guess nothing is sacred. Everything is up for sale at the right price.

I wonder what the value of naming rights to my children are? I may have to test that out on E-Bay or Craig's List. For the right price, I am willing to change my children's names. "Target", "Nationwide" and "McDonalds" have a nice ring to it.


Vanity, thy name is a Baseball Field!