Fifteen Sports Team Logos with Hidden Symbols

Sports-Logos

Have you ever really taken a good look at your favorite sports team’s logo? Or, maybe you’ve spent far too much time glaring angrily at your least favorite sports team’s logo as you jab at its effigy with voodoo pins. Either way, it should come as no surprise that many of the sports teams out there have some form of hidden message or symbolism that represents part of the heritage of either the city, the owner, or any other piece of its history.

This topic has been covered in the past, with other sites pointing out some of the more obvious hidden imagery in popular sports team logos. However our research department has dug much deeper, and found fifteen additional logos (past and present) with hidden symbols that you never even knew were there. We guarantee you’ll come away just a little smarter for it.

The Detroit Red Wings

Detroit_Red_Wings_logo.svgFor a logo that’s been around since the “Original Six” back when hockey was played with a whale’s shin bone and hunks of maple switches, not too much has changed. This particular symbol of the once-thriving city of Detroit is also referred to as “The Feathered Firestone” for obvious reasons, but did you know that each piece of the plume on this Winged Wheel has a very special meaning? Well they do and there are seventeen of them which represent the number of players killed during the 1916 season when hockey players tried to skate on sharpened shovel blades.

The Ottawa Senators

x8dxgo0eh0zensmq7icpAn ice hockey team from the days when teams could only play in Canada because most of the correct-sized bodies of water in America would never stay frozen long enough for a regulation game, the Ottawa Senators chose a logo representative of their heritage. You see, long before Eskimos settled the area now known as Ottawa, it was colonized by a group of very lost Spartan Warriors who were looking for a faster route to Persia. They failed miserably but their teachings and fighting ways live on in Canadian lore.

The Memphis Grizzlies

Memphis_Grizzlies.svgThough this might look like the stylized image of a bear, it is actually a caricature of G.M. Chris Wallace after a night goofing around at a local pub. If you look closely, you’ll see that one side of the picture’s face is in shadow? This represents the two sides of the General Manager, one being light-hearted and goofy, while the other is the dark side where it is not uncommon for Mr. Wallace to throw tantrums and take his ball and go home. During the fateful night at the pub, he supposedly dressed as a Furry.

The Tennessee Titans

Tennessee_Titans_logo.svgThe Titans of Tennessee play American Football for the NFL and call the same state home as the previous team on this list. Coincidence? 50-50. Anyway, this logo is steeped in odd symbolism and bizarre history. First of all the three red stars represent the Old God, Soth Golgoth whom the team prays to in a series of secret chants and gyrations before each game. Some day soon he will rise from the twilight fog and reclaim what was once his in a torrent of lamentations and blood. Now the T that looks like an inverted Sword is to convey complete subservience to Soth Golgoth showing a laying down of arms. The blue fire is just for looks, like on your Mustang.

The San Jose EarthQuakes

san-jose-earthquakes-logoThe San Jose EarthQuake is a “soccer” team, which in America (the only country that actually uses that name by the way) is synonymous with “futbol” which in turn means “football” which does not mean “football” as in American Football, in which one’s foot rarely touches the ball at all. So you can see the confusion when we, as a country, are invited to Futbol meetings and are readily laughed at for calling it soccer. Anyway, this logo features a seven-pointed design erupting from a soccer ball, itself representing the number of times in the thousands we’ve been laughed at for calling it soccer.

The Utah Jazz

Utah_Jazz_logo,_(2010_'new_look').svgFunny story here: there is very little Jazz in Utah. In fact, Jazz might even be illegal in nearly all of Utah. It is a very backward state, Utah. So why is the team called “Jazz”? Oddly it’s because in 1979 there was a resurgence of “Jazz Hands” in much of the nation’s dance troupes. In fact, “Jazz Hands” were so popular it wasn’t uncommon to see the team take the floor swaying to a jaunty Bob Fosse number.

The Oakland Raiders

oakland-raiders-logoMost people believe that the NFL Football Raiders logo is a pirate, or some type of sea fairing buccaneer. Those people would be wrong. The symbol of one of football’s most “dirty” teams is actually a picture of former NRA president, Charlton Heston wearing an eye patch because he was recently attacked by a flying Piranha. Some folks believe this to be myth, and argue that it was most likely a catapulted hammerhead shark.

The New York Islanders

Logo_New_York_Islanders.svgThough we can easily see the hidden hockey stick emerging from the Y in NY (for New York, duh), what most people get confused by is the red “stain” that sort of looks like Long Island. In reality, this design shows a spreading pool of blood that implies the Islanders murderous ways on the ice. According to NHL records, Islanders players stabbed, bludgeoned, and whacked a total of twelve players in their first four months. The ice ran red with blood often.

The Wichita Wings

26-7-Major-Indoor-Soccer-League-Team-Logos6We are told that Wichita is a city in Kansas. Or possibly Connecticut. It’s Kansas? Okay, Wichita is a city in Kansas and this is one of their soccer teams. The six-winged Phoenix is an age-old symbol that means rebirth and regeneration. However, on this teams logo, it just means that the owner really liked Pontiac Firebird cars. He was a greaser.

The Carolina Panthers

newlogoHUGEEveryone knows that there isn’t a state just called Carolina… or is there? It turns out that there is a small band of Literati-type people who very much want to see the Carolinas merged into one, giant, all-powerful state capable of turning the tides on elections and the very government itself. This group has chosen the area’s illusive panther as its mascot, though a real big cat hasn’t been spotted for over a hundred years. If you look closely at the negative space in the panther’s teeth, you’ll see the right half of a capital M. This means nothing and you’re really seeing too much into this, ya freak.

The Toronto Blue Jays

Toronto_Blue_Jays_logo.svgThere is little doubt that the red Maple Leaf is a well-known symbol of Canada, but did you know it is also the one tree that Blue Jays choose over all as their place to build a nest? It’s probably true! Oddly, if you turn the logo sideways to the right, you can almost make out a bong shape from the eye to the upper beak. This actually does mean that many of the teams fans must be high to think they have a chance against the Tigers! Detroit nation, bitches!

The Seattle Mariners

Seattle_Mariners_logo.svgLook closely behind the star shape on the Seattle Mariners logo and you will see what could only be a baseball, which stands to reason considering this team is a baseball team. But guess what, smarty pants? Not a baseball. Nope, but I will get to that in a minute. First off, what looks like a compass is, actually, a compass. However, it does point to an astral body discovered in 1977, the same year as the team’s first. The astral body to which North points on the compass is a planet roughly six light years past Pluto called Seattletonia, named after Professor Seattle who discovered it. Years later, it turns out the professor was actually looking at a lightning bug, and was also not a professor but a very smart monkey… but the logo stuck. Oh, and yeah, probably a baseball.

The Atlanta Hawks

Atlanta_Hawks.svgThe Atlanta Hawks are a basketball team in the NBA, hence its depiction of a gray basketball being grasped by a hawk’s rather sharp talons. Speaking of talons, it is those very feet themselves that become the focal point of this logo. Why so big, you ask? Well, as it turns out, I have no idea. Maybe the team thought the looked good. I don’t, but I wasn’t asked. The Hawks haven’t won an NBA Championship since 1958, largely because they’re always playing with deflated balls, punctured by that damn logo.

The Baltimore Orioles

orioles2In 1954 the Orioles opened for business in Baltimore, Maryland and the team was named for the state bird. That, in itself, isn’t particularly interesting, but what is interesting is the way the shapes in the bird’s head each represent something very important and unusual. The hat brim is a very stylized capital A that means “apples”, the owner’s favorite food. The white shapes on the back of the hat and the eyeballs together look like an L and a C and another C, which stand for ” let’s collect caps” a tradition that began way back in 1901 when the team played in Milwaukee and the players used to collect the caps of the crowd because caps were pricey and the team was broke. The black part of the cartoon bird’s face looks like a raptor claw, doesn’t it? That’s cool.

The Deutscher Fuss-Ball Bund

Germany_Team_logo_2013This is a German soccer team. In Germany they take their Fuss-Ball very seriously and have a good time at matches rooting for their favorite squad. The eagle-like creature on this logo is actually a Gryphon, a mystical creature that probably never existed, but I guess it might have in Germany. I don’t speak German and thus am just speculating. It’s kinda neat though, right?