Cleveland Guardians Merch Sales Suddenly Postponed

Cleveland Guardians merch was pulled from retail at the last minute on Monday morning (November 15) — and officials haven’t offered an explanation.

It wasn’t immediately clear when Cleveland Guardians gear would go on sale, now that the sales have been postponed, cleveland.com noted.

The postponement comes a few weeks after a Cleveland roller derby team of the same name filed a federal lawsuit against the professional baseball team, seeking to bar the Cleveland Indians from adopting “Guardians” as their new name. The court filing by the Cleveland Guardians roller derby team stated that “to be blunt,” the roller derby team claimed the name first. So, the team “is thus entitled to an injunction under both federal and Ohio law against Defendant changing its team name to ‘Cleveland Guardians,’ causing confusion, and destroying Plaintiff’s trademark rights.”

Officials announced in July that the Cleveland Indians would become the Cleveland Guardians, after narrowing down a list of about 1,200 name options. Officials explained that the process involved the input of 40,000 fans surveyed, and 140 hours of interviewing fans, local leaders and front office personnel. Owner Paul Dolan said in a statement at the time, in part: “While ‘Indians’ will always be a part of our history, our new name will help unify our fans and city as we are all Cleveland Guardians.”