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I was thinking of surprising my family with a Jumbotron message at our next Blazer game, and I learned two disturbing facts: (1) The Portland Trail Blazers charge $50 to get your message on the screen at Moda Center, and (2) they don’t allow marriage proposals. Why do the Trail Blazers hate the patriarchy? —Josh
For the record, Sony discontinued the original JumboTron in 2001. Since then, the name has become a generic term for any super-sized, stadium-style screen, and thus (in my opinion) should no longer be capitalized. Unfortunately, I believe the Associated Press Stylebook disagrees, putting me on a collision course with WW’s copy editor and potentially setting up the nerdiest showdown since the epic “Ghostbusters vs. Mythbusters” rap battle of 2014.
In any case, Josh, asking why a Portland institution might be reluctant to carry water for the patriarchy is a bit like asking why Rachel Maddow never made a guest appearance on Duck Dynasty. While I’m sure Blazers leadership would be at pains to avoid politically freighted terms like “patriarchy,” it’s not hard to see why a forward-thinking organization might prefer to keep its head down and leave the jumbotron proposals to the Oklahoma City Thunders of the world.
Consider: The absolute best-case scenario for one of these proposals is that both parties are eager to wed, and their fellow fans are treated to a slightly cringey moment of big-screen schmaltz that’s quickly forgotten. From there it only gets worse—what if the proposee isn’t so enthusiastic? Now she’s under intense pressure to say yes, even if she’s reluctant. Maybe that was the proposer’s plan all along! Who wants to be an accessory to that?
On a more practical note, there’s also the fact that these massively public proposals go sideways all the time. I found dozens of cases where the victim said no—and those moments people remember. Sometimes they go viral, meaning your team’s name and logo will be propagating wildly around the internet as part of a bad-vibes moment that was almost certainly not part of your brand-development strategy.
The Blazers organization declined to comment for this story on the record, but a source close to the team confirmed that the reasons outlined above are indeed part of the rationale for the proposal ban. Why not propose the old-fashioned way, in a nice restaurant? They’ll probably even comp your dessert. Indeed, provided you keep finding new restaurants, you can propose dozens of times. Free cheesecake for life!
Questions? Send them to dr.know@wweek.com.
