By Alexandra Savage
Every team needs a mascot. Not only do mascots interact with the fans, but they provide a symbol of team identity. The perfect mascot should be approachable, have a strong personality, and tie into the city they represent. Here in Washington, we aren’t so creative: according to each team’s website, the Capitals, Nationals, and DC United (soccer team, I didn’t know we had one either!) are all eagles. However, there are a lot of mascots out there, and in honor of the MLB season coming to a close, I’ve decided to rank some of the MLB mascots.
Ground Rules
For the sake of fairness and time, I’m only ranking the main, official mascots for each team. I’ve grouped them into categories for a tier-list system. Also, I am not a perfect person. I recognize my own biases. Therefore, Screech (Washington Nationals), Wally, the Green Monster, and his beloved sister Tessie (Boston Red Sox) will not make an appearance on this list. Just know that Wally would be number one.
Lowest Tier- Teams With No Mascot
This tier is the hall of shame. The sad truth is that the New York Yankees, the Los Angeles Dodgers, and the Los Angeles Angels do not have official mascots. While doing research for this article, I stumbled upon a disturbing story. At one point, the Yankees did have a mascot named Dandy, who served in that capacity for three years. According to an interview with his creators Bonnie Erickson and Wayde Harrison, the Yankees owner at the time, George Steinbremmer, publicly denounced Dandy and heavily restricted where he could go inside the ballpark. After three years, the Yankees franchise did not want to keep Dandy as a mascot. Since he was copyrighted, his creators were forced to throw his body into a shredder where he was torn into tiny, fluffy pieces. Truly a dark world we inhabit.
The Mascot is Also the Name
In this tier, I’ve put all of the situations where the mascot is the same as the team name. This includes Ace the Blue Jay (Toronto Blue Jays), Billy the Marlin (Miami Marlins), and The Oriole Bird (Baltimore Orioles). I have nothing against these gentlemen. They just aren’t unique ideas.
The Mascot is an Unrelated Animal
This category gets a few more points for being unique, but they still aren’t my favorite mascots. For instance, the Texas Rangers mascot is a horse named Captain. That’s certainly original, but he doesn’t have that ‘huggable’ quality that makes a great mascot.
Another example that stands out to me is Slugerrr for the Kansas City Royals (pictured above). The fact that his eyes melt into his crown upsets me. Where is his skull?
Lou Seal
Lou Seal (San Francisco Giants) gets a special mention because he’s a seal who wears sunglasses. This picture from his Twitter account conveys the message better than I ever could.
Random Men
As a society, there’s nothing we love more than a random guy. That’s why the following mascots have achieved a high ranking in the “random men” category. Bernie Brewer (Milwaukee Brewers) is certainly just some guy, and he even goes down a little slide every time the Brewers score a home run or win a game, as he tells us in his Twitter bio. Below is a picture from that same account in reference to an infamous incident where Dodgers reporter David Vessegh broke his wrist on that same slide:
Also included in this list is Mr. Met (New York Mets). Not only is he a man, but he’s also a baseball! He’s pictured here with his lovely wife Mrs. Met. Love story for the ages.
Big Fluffy Creature
Finally, we’ve reached the best of the best. The top tier of MLB mascots is reserved for imaginary creatures who are large and fluffy. It doesn’t get better than that. This list includes Raymond (Tampa Bay Rays), Slider (Cleveland Guardians), and of course the The Phillie Phanatic (Philadelphia Phillies). Seriously, he’s so cute.
This concludes the ranking of MLB mascots. I couldn’t get to everyone, but I tried to include the most notorious of the bunch. If anyone has information on how to get Screech to visit campus, please let me know.
