WASHINGTON -- Christopher Rehling never expected to get this far in his quest to name the new Washington, D.C. baseball team the "Grays," after the Homestead Grays of Negro League fame.

	Bill Wade, Post-Gazette Scrapbook memories of the Homestead Grays. Click photo for larger image.

When he started his online "rememberthegrays.org" movement several months ago, the nation's capital didn't even have a baseball team. Besides that, few people here knew much about the Homestead Grays, who split their home between Washington and Pittsburgh in the 1940s.

"Honestly, my mission then was just finding a way to have people remember the history of the Grays," Rehling said in an interview.

Since then, however, the idea of naming a D.C. baseball team after the Grays has begun to take on a life of its own.

Mayor Anthony Williams expressed a definite preference for naming the new team the Grays when he announced last week that Washington was the new home of the Montreal Expos.

Williams' statement startled many business leaders and others who had worked to bring baseball back to the nation's capital. They had quietly assumed that the team would take the name of the last baseball team to play here -- the Washington Senators.

But Williams was openly disdainful of that name, given the fact the city doesn't have representation in the U.S. Senate -- a sore subject.

"Give us two senators and I'll be happy to call it the Senators," he said at the announcement ceremony last week.

In fact, neither Williams nor the city's business leaders have the power to christen the team, which will be named by its new owners. Currently, the team is owned by Major League Baseball, and there are several groups interested in taking it over. Many expect that the new owners will run some sort of contest asking fans to vote for their favorite name. Williams' comments, combined with the great public interest in naming the team, seemed to have ensured that Grays is at least on the list of potential names. That thrills Rehling.

"The national news coverage that we've gotten means it will be talked about," said Rehling, who first learned of the Grays' playing days in Washington when he saw the "Baseball As America" exhibit at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History in June.

"It's not only a way to remember the history and legacy of these great baseball players, but it's also a way to reach out to some of the communities that have fallen away from the sport," he added. "The idea is to bring people back to baseball in Washington, not just to bring baseball back to Washington."

Public interest is high right now in what the team will be named. Unscientific polls taken by The Washington Post and local radio and television stations late last week have shown that the name Senators is preferred by a majority of those who voted. But the name Grays appears to be holding its own in a solid second place.

In the Washington Post online poll Friday, for example, the Senators had 2,317 votes -- or 39.3 percent -- compared to 1,232 votes, or 21.2 percent, for the Grays. The 11 other names, plus a "Keep Trying" category, split the rest of the more than 5,000 votes registered so far.

In fact, all kinds of names, both silly and serious, have been suggested for the new team. Some, like the Senators, highlight Washington's status as the nation's capital: the Federals, the Monuments, the Eagles, the Generals, the Patriots, and the Potomacs.

Others suggestions, like the Blue Sox or the Red, White and Blue Sox, have a baseball connection. Still other names like the River Rats or River Dogs, reflect the Anacostia River location of the still-to-built baseball stadium.

Some potential names seem designed purely for laughs: Bandits or Beltway Bandits, the Filibusters, the Gridlocks, the ex-Expos, the Exposes, the Red Tape, the Lobbyists, the Rhetoric, and the Cicadas (because, as WTOP-News noted in its online poll, "like the Wizards, they'll make the playoffs every 17 years").

Oscar Charleston played outfield and first base during his 40-year career with teams that included the Pittsburgh Crawfords, Homestead Grays and Harrisburg Giants. Click photo for larger image.

Naming a baseball team "is an incredibly important process," said Mike Berry, vice president of marketing and sales for the Pittsburgh Pirates.

"It definitely is a really important symbolic event in the history of any sports franchise," Berry said. "You want to make sure you pick a name that connects with your fan base and your city and your region. You want a name that gets your fan base excited, but also speaks to the history and heritage of the region."

Charlie Brotman, who was the "voice" of the Senators when they played in D.C., said he prefers the Senators, adding that he was "chagrined" by Williams' statement of support for the Grays.

Brotman, who now heads a public relations firm, said that polls he has seen have shown the Senators as the clear favorite for the new team. He also recalled that the original Senators were known by two names -- the Nationals and the Senators -- until he and other team officials decided to end the confusion in the mid-1950s.

"We needed to think about who we were," Brotman said. "I thought about the name the Nationals, and how headline writers shortened it to the 'Nats.' And I thought about how we had a great caricature for the name the Senators. So I decided on the Senators."

Brotman cautions people who suggest names like the "Diplomats" and the "Congressionals," noting that newspaper headline writers are likely to shorten those to "the Dips" and "the Congs."

Don Hinchey, vice president of communications for the Bonham Group, a Denver-based sports marketing firm, agrees that "a lot goes into" choosing the name for a team.

"Number one is tradition. Is there a prominent name that sticks out in the community?" Hinchey asked. "There are dangers with this approach as well. You don't want to be too closely aligned with something that happened in the past, especially if you're trying to carve out a new identity in the market and trying to connect with a new generation."

Another major factor in choosing a name is what kind of symbol can represent it. Fred Bowen, who writes a weekly sports column for the KidsPost page in the Washington Post, pointed to the Pirates as a good example of an easily recognizable team symbol.

Berry, the Pirates' marketing official, agreed that "there are a lot of dollars to be made based on logos and the color scheme for the team."

Any name should be have a "marketable symbol" that can "connect to the imagination of the fans," Hinchey said. "You want some kind of emotional connection that you can parlay into merchandise sales and promotions," he said.

That, for some people, is the trouble with the name Grays. It's not a flashy name, and it doesn't come with a ready-to-market symbol. Brad Snyder, who has written a history of the Grays, differs, noting that marketers could take advantage of the nostalgia value of the original team's cap: gray with a white W emblazoned on the front.

Others note that the Grays were by far a better -- and more winning -- team than the Senators. The Grays won nine straight Negro National League pennants, while the Senators were known as the team that was "first in war, first in peace, and last in the American League."

Grays supporters, who include Washington Post sports columnist Michael Wilbon, contend that the historical legacy could be used as an effective marketing tool. In addition, it could boost interest in baseball for African-Americans and other minorities.

"You want a flying start with jersey sales and nostalgic remembrances, and a city-wide feeling of inclusion," Wilbon said.

While welcoming Wilbon's support, Rehling emphasizes that "this is more than just about bringing African-Americans back to baseball. It's about remembering a piece of history which is not just black history, it's American history.

"If we look at this as remembering a piece of black history, then we'll still be segregating our history the same way we segregated our baseball players when the Grays were playing."