Limited Edition Utah Utes 1944 NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship Bobblehead!

[Tony (admin)]

Just arrived! The limited edition Utah Utes Men’s Basektball 1944 NCAA Championship Bobblehead, which was just “inducted into the bobblehead Hall of Fame.”  Yes, 1944 pre-dated Swoop by 52 years.  I have set up a Ute Hub affiliate program, so if you wan to buy one, use the Ute Hub affiliate link so the site can get a percentage of sales. Then after selling about 1000 of them I could buy a cup of coffee.

 

[UteThunder]

Not a fan of Swoop, which brings to mind the question: Whose head should have been used instead?

Considering it is for the 1944 team, I think that eliminates any recent player or coach. Would anyone recognize someone from the ’44 team? Probably couldn’t use a Native American likeness. 

Who, or what, could we have used instead?

 

[Tony (admin)]

Yeah I agree on swoop.When I was at the Utah/Notre Dame game people were asking if a Ute was some kind of bird because of swoop.

[mokus]

I say, tell them yes. And that a Padre is a kind of chicken.

[UtahFanSir]

Besides no one dressed in shorts like that in 1944.

[zeous]

A block U

[Utahute72]

Maybe we should go back to the cartoon Indian someone was using as their Logo. That was from that era.

[loyter]

His name is Tommy Tom Tom.

[iamthepreacher]

Interlocking U’s would have been cool, and more appropriate for the era. Of course, back then we were the Redskins, not the Utes.

[PlainsUte]

Arnie Ferrin or Wat Misaka should have been the bobblehead.

This bobblehead is wrong on so many levels, embarrassingly stupid.   The people who care about Utah basketball history don’t like Swoop.  As others have pointed out Swoop and the “flash the U” didn’t exist until 50 years later, even the uniform style is wrong.

[User Suspended]

[Utah]

You can instantly tell the age of a Utah fan by their like/dislike of Swoop. 

I think the Swoop hate is the most overblown thing in Utah fandom…maybe. 

[bobbleheadhall]

Hi All!

Good to hear the different perspectives! I’m Phil, from the Bobblehead Hall of Fame, and just wanted to address a few of the questions and concerns:
– Whose head should have been used instead? Because of licensing issues, we couldn’t just pick a player from the 1944 team. We were basically constrained to using the current mascot or leaving the school out of the series. The only case like this was with Marquette, which was the Warriors in 1977 when they won the National Champion. We produced theirs as the Golden Eagle, the school’s current mascot.
– Correct that we couldn’t use a Native American likeness.
– “Besides no one dressed in shorts like that in 1944.” That would have been interesting to see the mascot in the 1944 uniform.
– “Even the uniform style is wrong.” He’s wearing the current uniform style provided by the University to licensing.
– “You can instantly tell the age of a Utah fan by their like/dislike of Swoop. I think the Swoop hate is the most overblown thing in Utah fandom…maybe.” The situation with Marquette described above seems similar to Utah where older generations don’t like the change and younger people like the mascot because they don’t realize there was ever anything different. Marquette tried to go back to the Warriors (an alum even offered $1 million for them to go back), but they declined.

[Tony (admin)]

Thanks for the awesome explanations @bobbleheadhall.  NCAA and college licensing is a nightmare and I’m sure you know way more about it than I do. 

Swoop is an interesting quandry. We are the Utes, but having a native american mascot was apparently too offensive to some so the U picked a bird.  Could have been worse, they could have picked a color or a tree.  Perhaps they should have just picked a pair of empty quotation marks.

[UteThunder]

I would gladly have our nickname be the “Reds” if we ever go away from Utes. I don’t know what the mascot would be for Reds, but that is one color I’d be fine with. 

[loyter]

Excellent explanation. Now I’m going to rush out and not buy this product.

[bobbleheadhall]

No worries! We realize not everyone will like it, but it’s actually been more popular than we expected. Didn’t sell out within 2 hours like Kentucky, but they’ve been selling pretty quickly.

[Tony (admin)]

Woa he dropped the K-bomb. That hurt.

[Daedalus]

When are you going to implement the Kentucky filter so you can be more like UF.n?  [tic] 

[Tony (admin)]

When are you going to implement the Kentucky filter so you can be more like UF.n? [tic]

I tried to be more like UFN with the “false” feature, but realized I could never achieve that level of web greatness, so I reverted it.