NEW YORK — The accounting scandals and the bursting of the dot-com bubble earlier this decade forced ballparks and arenas around the country to change their names.
Enron Field became Minute Maid Park, and names like PSINet Stadium and CMGI Field vanished.
Now, the Wall Street meltdown is creating its own identity crisis for arenas and teams that bear the names of financial companies that are suddenly disappearing or in distress.
The Wachovia Center arena in Philadelphia and WaMu theaters at Madison Square Garden and in Seattle are among the venues whose names face an uncertain future.
Similarly, players on England’s storied Manchester United soccer team wear the AIG name on their jerseys, advertising a company that fell so deep into financial trouble that the U.S. government took control of it.
Some corporate names — Washington Mutual, for one, after its failure and purchase by JPMorgan Chase — could vanish from Wall Street altogether. In other cases, the public and stockholders could begin to wonder why these struggling companies are tying up scarce funds on multimillion-dollar sports- sponsorship deals.
As a result, some arenas might see a name change.
“I would think that would be the top order of the day to get that switched over,” said Rob Vogel, president of the Bonham Group, which helps broker sponsorship and naming-rights deals. “It’s in everyone’s best interests to get that rebranded as quickly as possible.”
When Enron collapsed in a spectacular case of accounting fraud, the Houston Astros were quick to scrub the company’s name from the team’s ballpark, Enron Field. It was rechristened Minute Maid Park within months.
Most naming-rights contracts provide for such a switch. Although each agreement is different, the details — and cost — are usually left to whoever acquires the sponsoring company, said Dick Sherwood, president of Front Row Marketing Services, which helps negotiate such deals.
If Citigroup, which agreed to buy Wachovia’s banking operations Monday, were to change the name of the Wachovia Center, home of the Philadelphia Flyers hockey team and 76ers basketball team, it could cost around $1 million to install new signs, issue employees new uniforms and design new logos, Sherwood said.
Any new name on the Wachovia Center would be the fourth since 1994, following a series of bank mergers.
“We’ve been going through this for years, because banks have been sold and bought at a pretty rapid pace anyway,” said Sherwood, whose office is in the building.
A Citigroup spokeswoman said it was too early to speculate what might happen to the Philadelphia arena.
And for now, it appears that the players of Manchester United will keep the American International Group name on their uniforms. AIG spokesman Joe Norton said “nothing has changed” with the sponsorship deal.
What’s in a name?
• The Houston Astros changed the name of their ballpark, Enron Field, after the energy giant collapsed in an accounting scandal. Minute Maid Park, a.k.a. the Juicebox, was born within months. •After cable-television company Adelphia filed for bankruptcy in a corruption scandal, the Tennessee Titans’ Adelphia Coliseum in Nashville became the Coliseum. Later, it was named LP Field after a deal with Louisiana-Pacific Corp.
• The Baltimore Ravens had to change the name of their stadium — PSINet Stadium — after the Internet company filed for bankruptcy. The stadium is now named after M&T Bank.
• The San Francisco Giants’ AT&T Park began life in 2000 as Pacific Bell Park, but its name was changed to SBC Park and then AT&T after a series of acquisitions.
• The high-profile Manchester United soccer team, with star Cristiano Ronaldo, advertises AIG on its jerseys.
• Wachovia’s name is on the arena in Philadelphia where the 76ers and Flyers play. Citigroup is likely to put its own name on the building after acquiring the failed bank.
• Ditto for JPMorgan Chase, which snapped up failed Washington Mutual, whose name is on venues in New York and Seattle.
Associated Press file photos
