I have to make an admission: The name of Amarillo’s new AA baseball team has grown on me.
Yes, even more than it did before the city’s minor-league baseball team had actually chosen the name “Sod Poodles.”
I find myself saying it out loud with hardly a hint of self-consciousness. I saw a story today in the online version of the Amarillo Globe-News that the Sod Poodles had unveiled the team bus, which they’ll take as they travel from city to city to play baseball in the Texas League.
Certainly, the name had a steep hill to climb when it emerged on a list of five finalist name under consideration. My initial reaction to Sod Poodles was “Huh? What the hell is that? What are Sod Poodles, for crying out loud?”
We learned that Sod Poodles supposedly is an Old West term to describe prairie dogs. I have yet to hear anyone say they knew that.
But . . . the name is growing on me. It becomes the team’s identity around the Texas League.
I’m pretty sure baseball fans in all the cities in the league are going to be, um, talking about the Sod Poodles. I just hope they do so with no more than a smile on their faces.
It’s grown on me too…….like I really had a choice. I can’t really accept that it’s an old term for a prairie dog. I’ve never read a book, fiction or fact about the old west that mentioned “Sod Poodles” Prairie Dogs and varmits , yes, but no mention of a varmit with a fancy hair-do. Even the internet doesn’t shed any light on “Sod” Poodles until the team chose that name.