Speculation building that Washington Redskins could change name to Washington Bravehearts

By now, I’m sure you are all at least somewhat familiar with the controversy surrounding the Washington Redskins and their team name. There has been increasing pressure on the team and owner Dan Snyder to change the name, with many people feeling strongly about the word “Redskins” being a racist term. Snyder recently insisted that the team will never change its name, but could his stance be softening?

On Friday morning, TMZ published an interesting report about a wealthy patent investor named Aris Mardirossian and his recent trademark application. Mardirossian registered the name “WASHINGTON BRAVEHEARTS” on Oct. 17. A copy of the application, which can be seen here, shows that Aris plans to use the name for “Entertainment in the nature of football games.”

Here’s where it really gets interesting. According to TMZ, Mardirossian is one of Snyder’s neighbors. The Redskins told TMZ there is no connection between Mardiossian’s patent application and the team, claiming Snyder doesn’t even know who he is. When informed that they two wealthy middle-aged men live just a few doors down from one another, the team representative had no response.

In addition to the trademark application, Eye on Football discovered that the domain name www.WashingtonBravehearts.com was registered to Mardirossian last week. Obviously if you’re going to start some sort of enterprise involving the name Washington Bravehearts you would purchase the corresponding domain name, but this is all very suspicious to say the least.

Snyder can probably only hold out so long. The name issue isn’t going to go away. My guess is he has already started planning for the future. If he’s trying to have his buddy help him to keep things on the hush-hush, mission failed.