Cardinals legend Jim Edmonds under fire for downplaying significance of renaming Indian-American team names

“This catch by Jim Edmonds remains one of the best ever.” – MLB Vault

In his first 50 games with the St. Louis Cardinals, Edmonds batted .371 with 16 home runs and 39 RBIs, a production that quickly gained him favor among the Cardinals fanbase. In 2006, he was part of the core group that delivered the first World Series championship to St. Louis since the 1986 season.

Now working as a color commentator for the Cardinals, Edmonds offered a controversial take during the broadcast of the Cardinals’ game against the Houston Astros on June 29.

“‘I always thought it was kind of a cool thing, not a bad thing, to have a team named after the Indians or vice versa, whatever, the Washington Redskins.’ Yep, Jim Edmonds went there.” – Awful Announcing

During the seventh innings of play, Edmonds discussed teams changing names that were deemed controversial. He referenced the Cleveland Guardians, formerly the Cleveland Indians, and the Washington Redskins, who announced a name change to the Washington Commanders earlier this year.

According to Edmonds, his wife is of partial first nations descent and does not find these monikers to be offensive. These name changes have sparked a rather divisive split within the wider sports world, with one camp seeing the names as harmful vestiges of an oppressive past, and others seeing nothing wrong with the team names.

Jim Edmonds brings up a good point about renaming teams

While the conversation is an uncomfortable one, it is worth bringing up. The St. Louis Cardinals icon is correct in thinking that some communities may indeed feel as though names such as “Indians” or “Redskins” are hurtful, but they are rarely meant to offend. An answer for a topic as controversial as this will be very difficult to find, but opening up and starting the conversation is the first step toward getting there.