Why Baxter the Bobcat is the Arizona Diamondbacks Mascot, Not a Snake?
52-110. That was the Arizona Diamondbacks’ record in the 2021 season. They barely tied with the Baltimore Orioles for the worst in the Major League. Now, two years later, this same team will be joining the Texas Rangers in Arlington for the fall classic. It’s quite a turn-around, isn’t it? Earlier this week, the spirited D-Backs outfit defeated the mighty Philadelphia Phillies 4-2 in Game 7 of the championship series to book their tickets to the last dance.
The win can be attributed to a number of factors, including the players, management, and fans. The truth is that the D-Backs have done the unexpected and now have the eyes of the entire baseball world on them. But with this attention, a peculiar fact about the D-Backs has come to light that has left fans scratching their heads.
What’s with the bobcat?
Why are diamondbacks called snakes? Well, because they take their name from a venomous snake native to the southwestern US, the diamondback rattlesnake. Both the name and logo of the team pay homage to the very same. Pretty simple, right? But if that’s the case, then why is their mascot a cat? Quite a head-scratcher, isn’t it?
The story behind the bobcat being the Arizona Diamondbacks’ mascot is both interesting and endearing. Previously known as Bank One Ballpark, the stadium was commonly referred to as “The BOB.”. Since starting out in 1998, the team had no mascot for the first two years. Until Brantley, the 6-year-old son of Jay Bell, a second baseman for the D-Backs, came up with the idea of having a bobcat as the Diamondbacks’ mascot in 2000. Jay Bell brought his son’s suggestion for a mascot to the attention of team president Rich Dozer, which was approved. June 23, 2000, saw the mascot being unveiled as D. Baxter Bobcat. D-Baxter alludes to the D-Backs, the team’s unofficial moniker.
Thus, the Diamondbacks’ renowned bobcat mascot was originally designed to honor Bank One Ballpark, which was renamed Chase Field in 2005. Prior to that, the team had a hard time coming up with a snake mascot. Mostly because snakes don’t have legs, and how feasible would a mascot who can’t walk be? Although there is still another piece to this entire puzzle.
The Forgotten Birthday
Bank One Ballpark. BOB. Bob Cat. A logical progression of thoughts, right? But there is something more to it, and it is the story behind the reason why it had to be a cat, and that story unexpectedly begins with a forgotten birthday.
It turns out that right before the 1997 expansion draft, Jay Bell had forgotten his wife’s birthday. According to MLB.com, he recalled, “I wasn’t making any money at the time, and I forgot about her birthday,” Bell said. “And on the way to pick her up that night, I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, I forgot her birthday!’ Now we had been at the mall the night before and stopped by the pet store, and she liked the cats. And I had to do something. So I stopped at the mall on the way to pick her up and bought a cat for $20, and that was the start of us having cats around the house.”
That was all it took; within a short amount of time, the presence of cats had turned his then-little son Brantley into a cat lover. As a lover who finds his beloved even in the most obscure of things, Brantley associated a bobcat with the BOB, and that gave birth to what we recognize today as the Serpientes’ mascot. Quite a neat little story. But since we’re talking about naming, who named this team on a snake, to begin with?
The naming of the Arizona Diamondbacks
Phoenix had gone from being the 99th most populous city in the US in the 1940s to the 9th in the 1990s. Due to such a rapid rise, it was clear that an MLB franchise was not too far into the future. Before they were officially awarded an MLB franchise in 1995, majority owner Jerry Colangelo and an investor group conducted a state-wide contest to determine the team’s name. The contest, held via The Arizona Republic, offered participants a chance to win a pair of lifetime tickets.
After receiving thousands of submissions, the name “Diamondbacks” was selected. In addition to paying homage to the rattlesnake, the name cleverly alludes to the baseball diamond. The team’s logo has a snake pattern inside an italicized block letter ‘A’. On closer observation, the inside of the ‘A’ looks like a snake’s head with a tongue. Additionally, they selected Arizona instead of Phoenix to give the team a state-wide appeal.
This year, the Diamondbacks have been just as dangerous as their namesakes. Torey Lovullo’s boys have exceeded pre-season expectations and now find themselves on the cusp of history. With the World Series on the horizon, the possibility for the D-Backs’ second-ever World Title and the first in two decades is ever stronger, and so is the curiosity surrounding them. Do you think the D-Backs will emerge victorious? Let us know!
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