It’s official, the New Orleans Zephyrs are no more. The city’s Triple-A baseball team has been renamed to the New Orleans Baby Cakes, the team announced Tuesday afternoon at a ceremony at Zephyr Field.
Baby Cakes was selected from a group of seven finalists following an online contest, during which more than 3,000 submissions were turned in by fans to replace the Zephyrs nickname, which carried over with the franchise when the team arrived from Denver in 1993.
“Our goal was to give the baseball fans of New Orleans a team and identity they can call their own,” said Baby Cakes President Lou Schwechheimer. “New Orleans is full of traditions woven into the fabric of the city, and this new tradition will be something local and iconic and celebrate what makes New Orleans and Minor League Baseball so great: family and fun.”
The new identity has many Mardi Gras themes, starting with the team colors of mixing the Zephyrs’ dark navy blue with purple, green and gold. The primary logo is a baby, wearing a crown, emerging from a king cake while swinging a baseball bat.
“We wanted to create a name and a brand that allowed the heart of this city to shine through it,” said Senior Vice President and General Manager Cookie Rojas. “While we take our responsibility to provide affordable family entertainment very seriously, we also want to embrace the fun which permeates through New Orleans. We will continue to create a festive atmosphere with great partners in a clean, immaculate environment where you can bring your family.”
In celebration of the new name, Schwechheimer has pledged lifetime passes to Baby Cakes games for each child born in the state of Louisiana in 2017. One of the babies, who will be registered by their parents through the hospital in which they were born, will be the recipient of a full, four-year tuition to the Louisiana university of their choosing when they turn 18.
“We are proud to proclaim 2017 the ‘Year of the Baby Cake,'” Schwechheimer said. “We are instituting ‘Baby Cake Nation’ and making each child born in Louisiana over the course of the year a card-carrying member so they can create their own treasured memories at the ballpark for a lifetime.”
The Baby Cakes take the field for the first time on April 6, 2017 against the Memphis Redbirds.
