A few days ago I posted an article about how guys in professional sports pay each other loads of money for uniform numbers. Well apparently you now have to be pretty careful about what your last name is when ordering official jerseys from Major League Baseball or the National Football League. According to ESPN, you can no longer purchase jersey’s with custom names on the back that the league deems inappropriate. Now I can appreciate not wanting to have kids walking around with the last name Fu%k on a jersey, and I don’t really have a problem with it (though I wonder if there is a Freedom of Speech or Expression issue?), but now MLB and the NFL are banning words like “steroids”. The NFL even went so far as to ban the last name Mexico when it was learned that Michael Vick used that last name on the road.

I’m not a lawyer (yet) and I certainly don’t know enough about the US Constitution to make any respectable legal arguments, but it would seem to me that there might be a case for a Freedom of Expression issue here. I mean two years ago (heck 6 months ago) if I would have tried to order an MLB jersey with the name Steroids on the back I bet nobody would have thought twice, but now that it is such a sensitive issue for MLB, they have the right to ban it? What about the fact that the NFL had banned the word Gay for the back of jersey’s? Certainly you guys South of the border aren’t that homophobic that Gay should be considered amongst ‘cuss’ words.

Though Major League Baseball wouldn’t let ESPN order a Montreal Expos jersey with the last name “I hate Selig”, MLB’s president and CEO had the audacity to say

“I’m not sure what would have happened if you ordered a jersey with ‘No steroids’ or ‘I love Selig’ on the back.”

Update - If you want to express your displeasure, head over to “Steroid AllStars” (I have no affiliation so if they are great awesome and if they suck, well sorry) which is selling some hilarious shirts.