EVERETT — The Night Howlers? The Werewolves? The Wolfpack? The Cascades?
Those are your four options for the team name of Everett’s next arena football team. The nascent franchise announced it was opening voting for one week starting Monday. You can vote on the Google form here or at shorturl.at/nvBEX.
The voting will close at 6 p.m. Oct. 16.
“We’re only one step away from announcing the official name of the newest AFL team, and we want you to be a part of that history!” the form reads.
But those hoping to bring glory to Everett with the team’s mascot may be disappointed. All options are named with Washington, broadly, not the city that will serve as its home.
After months of questions surrounding basic details of the franchise, the team announced who would own and coach the team last month. Mike Thomas, the founder and coach of the semi-professional Everett Royals, will lead the team’s ownership group.
In an interview Monday, he said he wanted to base the team name on something related to Everett, which Thomas previously called the “perfect sports city.” Thomas couldn’t pick a favorite of the four, saying they all “represent Washington.”
For the record, werewolves are studied as folklore and are not real in Washington or elsewhere — as far as we know. However, the “Twilight” films, starring Taylor Lautner as a werewolf named Jacob, were set in Forks, about a four-hour drive from Everett.
These options signal the franchise won’t directly carry on the legacy of past arena football teams in Everett. After just a few years in the AFL’s development league, the Everett Hawks folded in 2007. The Everett Destroyers were proposed for the inaugural season of the Indoor Football League in 2009, but the team never played. And the Everett Raptors played just one season in 2012.
Other new AFL teams have already picked their mascots. Teams include the Albany Firebirds, Wichita Regulators, Orlando Predators and Rapid City Marshals.
JR Wells, who played wide receiver for a previous arena football team in Everett, will coach. For the past year, he served as offensive coordinator for the Royals. He is also a local real estate agent.
“I’m ready to rock and roll,” Wells said last month. “I’m ready to turn this community out.”
The team will play at Angel of the Winds Arena in downtown Everett.
Major League Pizza, Tony V’s Garage and Buzz Inn Steakhouse are among the sponsors for the new franchise, Thomas noted.
The league has said the season will start in April. The AFL is hosting a combine in Dallas with players who didn’t qualify for the NFL’s pre-draft combine, Wells said. The coach also plans to host combines across the West Coast to find players for the new franchise.
Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated that the “Twilight” movies were filmed in Forks. The movies were set in Forks but filmed in other locations.
Jake Goldstein-Street: 425-339-3439; jake.goldstein-street@heraldnet.com; Twitter: @GoldsteinStreet.
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