We have mostly avoided talking about the abomination of a nickname people have been trying to pass on to the young Sixers core, in part because most of us in the LB brain trust don’t want to give a bigger platform to the unspeakably corny and unimaginative acronym that is, “The FEDS.” Put simply, Markelle Fultz, Joel Embiid, Dario Saric, and Ben Simmons all deserve better than this.
But since Kevin Durant decided to weigh in on it, it’s time for us to discuss it. I’m not a fan of the move Durant made to Golden State and think he’s not even good at hiding his manufactured persona, but he is 100 percent correct about the premature nature of this sad excuse for a Sixers nickname.
If you look back at some of the best nicknames in sports history, all of them stem from how the team played together. Showtime, Phi Slamma Jamma, the Steel Curtain, the Broad Street Bullies, and so on all share that in common. When you hear those nicknames, you can recall visions of the type of team they were, and what they looked like when you watched them play.
Not only does “The FEDS” fail to achieve that goal, it is almost impossibly uncool to have your team compared directly to law enforcement. You know why most popular cop movies are about renegade cops with nothing to lose, or something that involves officers going beyond the law to achieve peace? Because the life of an average law enforcement officer or federal agent is boring as fuck.
Calling a group of basketball players “The FEDS” is, you guessed it, also boring as fuck. Let these kids play together before we start trying to force feed some of the other nonsense that has come down the pipeline. The Trust Fund? Oh yeah, what I want to think of when I watch Embiid dunking on someone is a phrase you’d sooner associate with some rich doofus who got into an Ivy League school because daddy greased the right palms.
If you want to run with the Embiid co-signed name, that’s your call, Lynn Doyle. But until this community—which has showed so much creativity in the past!—comes up with something better than this nonsense, I will be approaching “The FEDS” like the Sixers treated Wells Fargo as a building sponsor.
And oh yeah, get off my lawn, while you’re at it.
UPDATE: Durant is, however, a fan of the players that make up the Sixers’ core.
nickname= players=
— Kevin Durant (@KDTrey5) June 25, 2017