Gents,
I've searched around with no success, really would like to get to the bottom of this...
Why does the name Ottawa REDBLACKS appear in capital letters? This is consistent throughout their press releases, website, and all other media representation.
please excuse me for posting non-ticat related stuff
Closing in on a hundred views and no one else seems to know the answer.
NSA investigation warranted!
The name of the company I work for is all caps as well. In their case it is an acronym. I wonder what REDBLACKS could be an acronym for? All you creative types get your thinking caps (or is that CAPS?) on. 8)
Not sure but some ideas from this on the net:
[i]All caps are typically used for either of two reasons:
Visual Style
Capital letters are often used on covers of magazines, in logos and artsy-typography, usually to emphasise the visual style of the letters themselves, rather than the word. (Example Image)
Contextual emphasis:
Capital letters can be considered a third form of emphasis, among Italics and Bold text. They are used to denote a louder, almost shouting (and in many cases actually shouting) pronunciation.
This is done by tabloid newspapers, for example:
Political Correctness Gone MAD!
(in this example, the exclamation mark is used, erroneously, to add even more volume)
Legal documents sometimes use capital letters to denote areas of special importance. They are, presumably, trying to avoid the area being overlooked by the reader, by making it stand out from the rest of the text.
This product comes with NO WARRANTY.
There are also technical reasons for using capital letters. Here are just some examples of this:
Typesetting systems (old computers, stencils, …) that don’t allow for italics or bold text may encourage some to use capital letters instead
Capital letters to denote a SURNAME as opposed to a first name (according to wikipedia, this is done in francophone countries)
There are suggestions, some call it a consensus, that upper case text is harder to read than correctly capitalised text. This, to my knowledge, first manifested itself in public policy when British road signs were changed in 1957. The Worboys Committee proposed a new type face called Transport, using lower case letters for the first time. This is based on the idea that one reads the shape of the word rather than each individual letter. The All caps article on Wikipedia summarises the evidence for this.
It’s not even always a good idea to capitalise acronyms and initialisms, as illustrated by this ridiculous example:
Have they turned on the LASER yet?
Rhodri rightly says that this is uncommon and only happens to de-facto words.
As Jimi pointed out, ALL CAPS in email and instant messaging conversations is considered shouting, and people who use it extensively are considered trolls.[/i]
[url=http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/8672/what-do-all-capital-letters-typically-refer-to-in-writing]http://english.stackexchange.com/questi ... in-writing[/url]If they'd just chosen an original and creative name we wouldn't be having this conversation.
^This questions has no relation to any issue concerning the name itself, just the reasoning behind the nickname only/all capitalized.
"Ottawa REDBLACKS"
I even poised this question to an employee of the club, couldn't respond. Organization are built on tradition and the name of your club should be unique and meaningful..would love to better understand what's going on in the Ottawa name. I'm sure many of the 12,000 plus season ticket holders would like to too!
Apparently, the team sent an email to the media on June 10 stating that the team name should be written in all caps. I found a number of references to the email, but no one seems to have posted the email itself. Why they changed it I can't say. People just liked it better that way. (Credit to Jimmy Kennedy.)
Personally, I think it's ridiculous, and given that the team didn't send the email to me, I sometimes don't use all caps for the name. RedBlacks. There. Take that.
CHECKERBOARDS=REDBLACKS
I guess if the Ottawa team colors were BLUE instead of RED.....They could of been called the BLACK "n"BLUES !!!!!
As I've stated before many times,it's a silly name,therefore to me they will always be referred to as the Checkerboards.
Which is just as silly as being called the REDBLACKS!!! I mean really,just imagine if every team was as lazy and silly in
giving their team a nickname.....the league would look something like this.......
EASTERN DIVISION
Hamilton BLACKGOLDS
Toronto DOUBLEBLUES
Ottawa REDBLACKS
Montreal REDBLUES
WESTERN DIVISION
Calgary BLACKREDS
Saskatchewan GREENIES
B.C ORANGEBLACKS
Edmonton GOLDGREENS
Winnipeg BLUEGOLDS
As a Monty Python Skit used to say....STOP THAT!!!!! SILLY!!!! If they couldn't use the Rough Rider name anymore
than they should have just called the team the......Ottawa Rider Roughs.... :lol: Which is just as SILLY as the name
REDBLACKS......Hey!!!! Here's a name for them,how about the Ottawa SILLYRIDERS or perhaps the SILLYNAMES or
maybe the TWOCOLORS......I could go on and on with this....but hopefully you see my point...throwing two colors
together is a SILLY way to name your team. :lol: :lol: :cowboy:
It's a sports name! It doesn't have to make sense, it's like asking why a hockey team calls itself "Leafs" and not "leaves", that is just terrible English. Or in baseball with the Sox".
The name REDBLACKS stands out and the company that they contracted to design the Logo designed it that way.
The name is as silly as the "SOX" or "LEAFS" Lets just hope that the Ottawa franchise fares better this time around then
their two predecessors and hopefully becomes a successful franchise again,regardless of how silly their name is. 
I mean at least they didn't name the team THE MIGHTY REDBLACKS!!!!! The "Mighty Ducks" now that was the ultimate
silliest name ever for a pro franchise!!!! :cowboy:
Expos must have taken a lot of real thinking. :lol: And yet the Expos cap is a hot item so I've heard in Montreal and elsewhere, we see people wearing it. Most teams sports names are silly and really not all that ingenious. As bobo says, Sox or Leafs, wow, not exactly up there with novel thinking.
Yea, what were they thinking with Expos. No one thought about marketing back then. Name a team after the 67 Exposition? Blue Jays is a good baseball name and Raptors is a great marketing name.
http://cdn4.fishpond.com.au/0037/427/062/55516245/4.jpeg
http://photos.weddingbycolor-nocookie.com/p000008470-m149207-p-thumbnail-385625/name-game.jpg
When Vancouver joined the NBA they originally wanted to name the team The Mounties but decided against it as naming after police would not be 'cool' to inner city youth. They chose The Grizzlies instead.
Sure we would. It has nothing to do with the name, just the team's insistence that it always be written in capital letters. I can't think of any other team that has done this.
Dallas COWBOYS. New York GIANTS. Toronto MAPLE LEAFS. New York KNICKERBOCKERS. Washington CAPITALS. (Actually, that last one's not bad. 
)
Sure, it gets your team noticed in the papers, but really? Kind of ridiculous.
So that's all we could up with so far, eh?
I'm not buying it, there has to be a more significant reason behind the all caps of their name.
We , at the NSA are already on this file. By the way, steelcity, your car keys are in the bowl by the front door and your shower tap is dripping at the rate of a gallon/year. Your cleaning lady doesn't shave her legs. That is so hot! Glad we could be of service, here at the NSA. :lol:
I really hope the all CAPS thing goes away fast. RedBlacks
Is the way it should be, imo.
This is what the REDBLACKS Communication's Vice President gave as an answer when asked this question - and in some ways I can see why they've requested the all caps.
REDBLACK’s communications vice president Randy Burgess explained the issue was simply a matter of branding for the new franchise. “Whether it gets written that way by media members or not, I wanted those on our contact list to know what our official way of writing it is,? Burgess explained in a note to Metro. “RedBlacks, the most common way it’s been written, implies (two) words. It’s not two words. That’s all.?
Based on this, I'll start using "Redblacks" instead of "RedBlacks" so it appears to be one word.
Thanks for passing this along.