I’d like to have a team hat for USA. However, Team USA hats are always so lame, because they spell out the name of the team on the hat: USA. It’s like having a Cubs hat with the word spelled out “Cubs” on the hat.
What is every country had their own team name? For USA, it would most likely be the Eagles. Then there could be a cool USA hat for every Olympics with an eagle on it. (Although other countries have the eagle: Germany, Indonesia, Mexico, Panama, Philippines, Poland, and Serbia)
Wikipedia has a list of national animals.
- Algeria would be the Fennec Foxes.
- Anguilla would be the Doves.
- Australia could be either the Red Kangaroos or the Emus.
- Estonia would be the Wolves.
If USA wanted to be really unique, they would go with the Bison. In addition to the bald eagle, the American bison is our national animal. No other country has a bison as a national animal.
A group of bison is called an obstinacy. The American Obstinacy. (Thank you to Marco for pointing this out on my Facebook post). A group of bison is also called a herd or gang.
- The American Herd sounds like what Democrats would call Republicans.
- The American Gang sounds like what Republicans would call Democrats.
- The American Obstinancy sounds like what both parties call each other.
Since all these various forms of Bison describe what we call each other in America, that makes it the perfect national team name.
Instead of baseball hats, people could wear these Furry Bison Lodge hats.
With a team name, that really begs to have a team mascot. America’s Bison might look like one of these:
Imagine if every country in the Olympics had their own mascot. All these various mascots would be running around at different events. There would be a rule stating that each country can only have one mascot at the Olympics. Each country would have to choose where their mascot could be at any time. Thus, if a mascot is at a particular event, you really know that event has the most importance for a country.
If mascots from multiple countries show up at the same event, then hilarity ensues. What entertainment value! We all know the Olympics are all about entertainment.
One of my favorite Olympic moments all-time was when Usain Bolt won the 100-meter gold in the 2016 Rio Olympics. While Bolt was waving to the crowd in celebration, the Rio mascot named Vinicius skipped up to Bolt. Literally, Vinicius was skipping along the track. The six-foot-tall mascot congratulated Bolt and handed him a a three-foot-tall Vinicius plush toy. Bolt didn’t ditch the plushie. Instead, he walked around the track with the giant plushie in hand, celebrating his incredible third gold medal in the 100-meter.
Mascots are just great. That was just one mascot for one mascots. A mascot for every country would amp up this fun to a whole new level.
In the opening ceremony, the mascots for every country would would out with the athletes. It would be the grand unveiling of how each country designed their mascot for this year’s games. The bigger countries would have your typical highly designed with sculpted foam.
Some of the smaller countries would probably be walking out a mascot’s costume that was hand-sewn by one of their citizen.
How their mascot is designed and created would be a chance for each country to further demonstrate their unique artistry and culture.
Footnote: Take this up a notch by having each mascot wear the uniform designed according to the warrior outfit of their native country. Read my blog post about how the warrior outfit would be determined by the first result of a Google image search for COUNTRY NAME and WARRIOR.