Triple-A Oklahoma City adopts Dodger nickname

By Jon Weisman

The Dodgers’ new Triple-A team in Oklahoma City has adopted the franchise’s nickname.

“Today marks a new chapter in Oklahoma City’s baseball history, and we are proud to say we are now the Oklahoma City Dodgers,” said Oklahoma City Dodgers president/general manager Michael Byrnes. “Soon after the ownership change took place, there was a dialogue as to how we could rebrand the team. Ultimately, ownership, team leadership, and key stakeholders felt there was no bigger statement for the Los Angeles Dodgers to plant their flag in Oklahoma City than by renaming their Triple-A team the Dodgers as well.”

The Oklahoma City Dodgers are jointly owned by the Los Angeles Dodgers and Mandalay Baseball (an investor group led by Mandalay Entertainment chairman and CEO Peter Guber, one of the Dodgers’ co-owners), Los Angeles is the fifth Major League team to call Oklahoma City its Triple-A home and “Dodgers” will be the third nickname used, following 89ers and RedHawks.

“Using the Dodgers’ name is a privilege,” Guber said. “It’s one of the three or four most iconic brands in sports all over the world, and we are thrilled we have the opportunity to share it and shine with it.”

As seen at okcdodgers.com, the new logos and jerseys mix historical elements of the parent club and the Triple-A team. All of the new elements were developed by the Los Angeles Dodgers’ graphic design team.

“We didn’t just want to slap ‘Oklahoma City’ over an existing Dodgers logo and call it a day,” said Dodger director of graphic design Ross Yoshida. “We wanted to tailor the Dodger brand to something that people in Oklahoma City could take pride in, hence elements like the homage to Bricktown on the primary logo and the Skydance Bridge patch on the home uniforms.”