The Los Angeles Lakers have gone through some big changes this season, starting with their roster, which suffered major alterations in the offseason. Moreover, they saw their iconic arena ‘Staples Center’ get a new name, finishing an era for the Purple and Gold.
After their deal with Staples was done, the building received a new name, ‘Crypto.com Arena.’ The cryptocurrency exchange app based in Singapore is making a lot of noise in the world sports, sponsoring the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), soccer competitions, while also trying to find their way to the NBA. Right now, the Philadelphia 76ers use Crypto.com as their jersey patch, so you know they aren’t stranger to this world.
Moreover, the Lakers fully embraced the brand and named their arena after the company. They are taking things pretty seriously, making sure that nobody comes up with a nickname for the venue.
John Ireland recently revealed the team is trying to avoid this at any cost, even sending memos to prevent broadcasters to use variations of the name. Talking on ESPN LA 710 (via Redditor “GenericBiddleMusic“), Ireland, a long-time Lakers KCAL broadcast sideline reporter, said that the team doesn’t want people to refer to the arena with a different name than the official.
“We (Lakers broadcasters) got an email from management to call it strictly the ‘Crypto.com Arena’. We were told not to use ‘The Crypt’ or any variation of it.”
To be fair, ‘The Crypt’ sounds incredibly good, but it seems that neither the Lakers nor Crypto.com is entertaining those ideas. They want their stadium to be called the name on the roof.
The first moments of the arena with the new name have been underwhelming. The Lakers can’t find their touch this season, which has set the alarms for Frank Vogel, LeBron James and co. They are struggling to get things going, being inconsistent, struggling to beat easy rivals and more.
Their fans hoped that the new name would bring some luck, but nothing has happened yet. The Lakers aren’t looking like the championship team they were in 2020 and that’s a big source of concern.
