Indians/Guardians and the Topps History Police

[JustinD]

Originally Posted by packs

Changing the team listing has happened before. Take a look at the Joe Morgan cards from 2015 or 2016 Topps Archives. The backs list the “Houston Colts” and not the Colt 45’s. I don’t remember a lot of complaints and maybe people didn’t even notice for the most part.

I don’t think I ever saw a airbrushed logo coverup, nor were the .45s told to change the name. It was just to honor the space program with the Astrodome. As for Topps archives treatment, I’m sure they likely are doing it for PC reasons but the Colts was an acceptable designation as it just rolled off the tongue better. The jerseys did not have .45, just the hat. They also played at Colt Stadium.

[G1911]

Originally Posted by JustinD

I don’t think I ever saw a airbrushed logo coverup, nor were the .45s told to change the name. It was just to honor the space program with the Astrodome. As for Topps archives treatment, I’m sure they likely are doing it for PC reasons but the Colts was an acceptable designation as it just rolled off the tongue better. The jerseys did not have .45, just the hat. They also played at Colt Stadium.

The story I've always heard is that it was largely due to problems with Colt and merchandise. Colt gave permission to use the name, named after the 1873 Colt Single Action Army revolver, but argued with the Astros after a couple years over merchandise revenue. They may well have been cutting into Colt's own revenue of branded material, though Colt wasn't exactly suffering at this time. Colt is still around and typically is pretty responsive, if slow, to people about inquiries into their archive. Probably worth an interesting look into the primary source material at some point here. Most clubs early histories are a fun dive of forgotten material.

The Colt .45's were definitely often referred to at the time as the Colts or sometimes the .45's. I suspect this has nothing to do with people being offended, but just the tendency to shorten names whenever it flows off the tongue fine to do that.

It's a shame Joe Morgan never had a full career contemporary card in a .45's uniform, just the half rookie with the cap. Series 1 of 1965 has them as the .45's, series 2 until the end as the Astros without any logo. An Astros logo only appears in the final series with the Astro's Rookie Stars card that has 3 of the new hats.

[JustinD]

I do remember the 50th anniversary game in 2012 the Astros wore the full Unis. The League originally asked to nix the revolver but acquiesced.

That was a cool game to see,