It's not like they invented the term, despite what they would have you believe - sixth man, 12th man - just another silly sports cliche. If other people used "clutch city" (which is protected) I really wouldn't give a damn.
I KNOW. There is a story behing the *Aggie* 12th man. But the idea of a fan base serving as an extra player is NOT unique to College Station. Duh. Football commentators use the term all the time. Is A&M going to whine about that, too? Do they already do so? Maybe the Aggie administration should work on making their school better academically, and then focus on bettering on their 5-6 football team so that maybe, just maybe, the *Aggie* 12th man can have some pride again. Meanwhile, it seems the only way they'll be mentioned on ESPN will continue to be because of lame crap like this.
If you've been around here long enough, you know that this site used to go by ClutchCity... can you guess why Clutch decided to change it? 12th man is generic. Clutch City is not. Next, you'll say that the thumbs-up sign is derivative of "Gig 'em" and thus owned by A&M copyright. Oy. How can you knock a pro sports team for attempting to establish a tradition? That's smart business, and that's (in a way) smart citizenship. And finally, "dime a dozen" doesn't mean that something is rare... it means the opposite.
Except, from what I understand, 12th man is *not* just another sports cliche. It is unique to being used at A&M for the past 80 years, and it originated there. A&M has a 12th Man Foundation and other related traditions. The name has inherent value to the school. A couple of other NFL teams tried to use it at various points, and were successfully stopped by A&M. I do think it's odd that it suddenly came up now, given that Seattle has been using it for a while, but while 6th man is used all over the place, 12th man simply isn't.
I knew it was only a matter of time before Longhorns starting piling on to this issue. The thing that's funny to me about this is that nobody outside of Seattle really even knew about this until the NFC championship game, and evidently the Seahawks have been doing it for a while. The NFC championship was the first Seahawks home game I've watched in possibly ever, and that 12th Man stuff was the first thing I noticed. I'm siding with A&M both because I like A&M and because I could care less about the Seahawks. Nothing's going to be done until after the Super Bowl, though.
Thank you. It's like the Aggie version of somebody ripping off the "Eyes of Texas" or somebody lighting their tower orange. There's plenty worse things in the world to get mad about, but you'd be pretty peeved if it was your school.
Well you guys should remember that the "Aggie" trademark only pertains to inter-collegiate sports/activities. Last time I checked, Seahawks were a pro team. By the way, Seattle's been using this 12th man thing since the 80's. A&M only trademarked it in the 90's. Besides, most of their gear just says "12" on it and not "12th Man." So, I really don't see the big deal at all.
this would be much cooler if the seahawks were saying, "hook 'em, hawks!" that way the University of Texas could sue and we would get to read posts in this thread by bigtexxx. alas, it's just poor aggy...
I thought this was helpful: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/12th_Man_(American_football) I remember the Bills having a 12th man sign during the early 1990s (damn that team). So A&M has been stopping all attempts. Eh.
To Aggies its not just another cliche, but to the rest of hte universe it clearly is (outside of texas, texas A&M doesn't exactly have a huge national following or generate much response one way or the other, at least not the same as the Longhorns do). They didn't invent the term any more so than I invented "6th man". Yes, I've heard the story - had they invented the term then and there - then why didn't they seek to register until 70 years later? I don't really care that they've invested time and money in a cliche, because the term is used ALL over the place - it's like Fox News claiming ownership of the phrase "fair and balanced". If they wanted to be unique, they should have picked a more unique slogan, or else not waited years and years to protect their supposed IP. It simply is. Non Texas A&M uses: ESPN 12th man challenge http://r.espn.go.com/espn/contests/ebay/index Buffalo Bills 12th Man Award: http://www.buffalobills.com/12thManAwards.jsp Bloomington High school 12th Man club http://www.mccsc.edu/~nor12man/index.html Cornell Alumni 12th man event: http://www.alumni.cornell.edu/orgs/clubs/ccgp/Nov192005.htm Kentucky AD challenges fans to be 12th man http://www.uky.edu/PR/News/Archives/2002/Oct2002/12th_man.htm Herdfans.com, home of the 12th man: http://www.theherdsportspage.com/links.htm It's even used in soccer/football: John Terry calls for Chelsea fans to become 12th man: http://msn.foxsports.com/soccer/story/5171226 It's also a commonly used cricket term and there's a comedian who goes by the nickname: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Twelfth_Man And there's a rap artist as well: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0008MGGY4/104-5547480-4265543?v=glance&n=5174
maybe the lawyers on the board can answer this... I thought there was something about.. .if you don't protect your trademark and it starts having everyday use... after a while you lose the right to enforce it... for example, the fact that kleenex has now become the everyday term for tissues etc.. takes some away from their ability to enforce it... but I have no idea if that is true... seattle has been using it since the 80s.. but it only comes up now that they are in the superbowl?
i remember watching something like this on tv about usc and their potential "3-peat." if anyone wanted to sell tshirts with that phrase they would have to pay royalties to pat riley who trademarked the term after the bulls did it. so when the yankees did it in 98-00 he cashed in big time. the story was about some usc student trying to trademark "3-pete" but the judge ended up ruling it synonymous. he ended up making the shirts anyways and riley had his lawyers call him and tell him that he had to destroy the shirts lol. crazy times we live in
Feyenoord, which is a Dutch soccer team, uses the 12th man idea as well. The fan organisation is called it I believe...? Not sure though.
When you act like a bunch of rubes over this, expect to get flayed in the media: http://www.tdn.com/articles/2006/01/29/seahawks/news09.txt#blogcomments
i hate people who trademark something NOT CREATIVE or INVENTIVE. a&m is acting as if the words "12th" and "man" didn't exist before they started using it as a slogan. kind of like trump and "you're fired" it's freakin' ridiculous.
They have a trademark for it so Seattle should not be allowed to use it regardless of whether you hate the aggies
