Washington Football Team's New Name May Have Leaked Early

By Brian Jones

Washington Football Team is set to announce its new team name next week. However, one fan on social media may have already figured it out. A Twitter user discovered that the domain Commanders.com had been transferred to MarkMonitor which is the company NFL uses to handle most of its domain names for its teams and brand, per Sporting News. 

All but six teams in the NFL use MarkMonitor. Washington Football Team is one of the six as it uses GoDaddy. The Cowboys, Patriots, Ravens, Raiders, Texans all use Network Solutions. Washington has not reacted to the leak and has not confirmed or denied that Commanders is the new team name. 

"There's two reasons you acquire a name. One is you acquire it for pure speculation, and you hold onto it. And two is you acquire it because you want to use it," technology expert Shawn DuBravac told TV station Fox 5 DC. "And typically when you acquire it and you want to use it, you're going to move it to where you're going to deploy it."

Earlier this month, Washington's president Jason Wright announced in a column on the team's website that new name and logo will be revealed on Feb. 2. "We are confident that this identity is one that our team and our fans across D.C., Maryland, Virginia and beyond can rally behind for another 90 years and more as we continue to cheer on the Burgundy & Gold in this next chapter," Wright wrote. "What comes next is exciting and fast-approaching – and here's my second update: we can't wait to reveal our team name to the world on Feb. 2, 2022! Mark your calendars, Washington Family. This is not a day you'll want to miss!" 

Before the start of the 2020 season, Washington dropped the "Redskins" nickname and logo. They have gone by the Washington Football team for the last two seasons and asked the fans for help when it comes to coming up with a new name and logo. Fans loved the names Wolves and RedWolves, but Wright said, "We put Wolves on a list of options to explore fully. Once we began looking into Wolves, however, we became aware of a notable challenge: trademarks held by other teams would limit our ability to make the name our own. And without Wolves, variations like RedWolves wouldn't have been viable either for these and other reasons."

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