The Mightiest Team Nickname, MLB Edition

I did this back in June for the NFL, now I'm going to turn my attention towards baseball.

AL East

Not a lot of mighty nicknames here at all. The Red Sox might be the weakest in all of sports save the White Sox, for at least Red Sox camouflage blood. Then we have two birds, the Yankees, and the Rays.

As with the NFL, I think you have take these things at first blush, rather than the most powerful you can imagine said thing. That is to say, a sun ray will kill anything if you're, you know, 100 yards out from the sun, but is that what the Rays, as in Tampa Bay, really means? Their logo is one of the most clever in sports but it clearly depicts just a regular ol' sun ray beaming into the window. A Yankee is an average Northerner. Still, it's the most powerful logo in this division: some guy.

AL Central

At least here we have a tiger. Most of the rest of the division, save the White Sox, is tough to quantify. A king, as in Royals, isn't particularly powerful by himself; I can justify giving an Indian, as in Cleveland, a tomahawk, but what of the Twins? Twins are just ... twins, but it would be fair to consider them giant Twins based on this logo? My judgment is "no," because it's no longer a logo in use, except as a throwback. Tigers take it.

AL West

More confusion. How do you quantify an Athletic or an Astro? It's tempting to give Houston some sort of powerful celestial connotation, but realistically it's named after its former stadium, which is huge, but doesn't move and can't fight (at least other inanimate objects, like Jets, can be assumed to have a human at the controls to maneuver it). So it comes down to Mariners (has a trident), Rangers (has a gun), or Angels (is already dead and generally considered imbued with Godly power and immortality). Advantage: Angels.

NL East

"Who would win in a fight between a Metropolitan and a National?" is a question that makes my brain bleed. "Phillies" was originally "Philadelphias," so I guess they have a whole city behind them. Does that mean that Nationals gets the whole country? I feel like a "national" is more of one person, e.g., "I'm a German national." So I guess I have to give this to the Phillies. Braves and Marlins would make a good scrap depending on the venue and how pointy the Marlin's nose is, but neither of them can beat a city.

NL Central

Finally, a straightforward division! Pirates win easily here. They would have no problems taking out a beer maker, a baby bear, a bird, or a color.

NL West

Like with the NFL, the tough part here is deciding how giant the Giant is. I can say, "Okay, well, no matter how big he is, he's probably susceptible to snake venom," but the two problems with that are 1) even non-giant humans almost always survive snakebites, and 2) what of the Dodgers, who can ... dodge the snake? Rockies, like Astros, are inanimate, but they are so very vast that it's tempting to give them more credence, particularly since I'm granting the Phillies all the power of the people and weapons of Philadelphia. Okay, yes, I'm giving this division to the Rockies...

... and the MLB as a whole to the Angels, who again can, in typical angel narratives, alter fates and cannot be killed. But whew. This was far harder than the NFL.

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