A growing faction of South Carolina fans want to rename their live mascot “Cock Commander.”
It’s a complicated story, so we should probably start from the top.
As detailed by the Post and Courier in Charleston, a married couple named Mary Snelling and Ron Albertelli (henceforth referred to as the Albertellis for brevity) have been shepherding the live gamecock mascot, Sir Big Spur to South Carolina sporting events since 1999, and football games since 2006.
Sir Big Spur’s current and former owners are in dispute over the state of Sir Big Spur’s comb. Icon Sportswire via Getty ImagesThe Albertellis are getting up there in age, so they wound up bequeathing the bird — Sir Big Spur VI — and the general responsibility of bringing it to events to another couple, Beth and Van Clark.
However, an intense disagreement has emerged.
On top of the rooster’s head is a red comb. The Albertellis would clip this comb to make the animal look more like a “Fighting Gamecock” — the animal that the team is named after.
After Sir Big Spur passed at the age of 12, the Clarks held tryouts for three different roosters to be the next mascot.
When the Albertellis saw pictures on social media of the new rooster, they were not happy about it, and they declined to renew an agreement with the university to allow them to continue using the Sir Big Spur name.
“If they’re truly going to fight, they take off the combs because that’s one more part that can bleed,” Ron Albertelli told the Post and Courier. “The comb always stands out in a picture of a barnyard rooster, but Sir Big Spur is a Fighting Gamecock.”
The Clarks felt that trimming the comb was inhumane.
“We raised these gamecocks to be mascots. The mascot needs to be, I feel, branded with the university,” Van Clark told the outlet. “We also want the birds to be as healthy as possible. When the combs are off, they can’t handle heat as well. These birds are raised to be mascots, and at many games, the heat is nearly unbearable. We want to keep the mascot healthy. That’s our job now.”
Sir Big Spur, the South Carolina Gamecocks mascot, is in need of a new name. APThe Albertellis see it differently.
“A chicken is a chicken but a fighting gamecock is something different. This is dumbing down the Gamecocks,” Ron Abertelli said.
So, South Carolina needs a new name for its live mascot.
The State, a newspaper based in Columbia, Sc., ran a poll with 10 names to see what Gamecocks fans would want for the next mascot name: Cock Commander, Cluck Norris, Coop, General, Cock-a-Doodle-Dude, Marco Pollo, Brooster, Capt. Cluck, Kirkin’ Chicken or Mr. Chicken Scratch.
Cock Commander is running away with the race. A whopping 79 percent of respondents are picking that as the new name for the live mascot.
Whether the university will acquiesce to the will of the people is a different matter, but it’s quite clear where the populism lies.
