Monday, the Philadelphia Flyers announced a new addition to their organization. It wasn’t a new player, or a new coach, or even a new front-office executive, but a mascot: Gritty, a giant, orange, Phanatic-shaped blob that has become a very polarizing figure around the internet—and within the Ringer offices. So we asked staffers: Are you in or are you out on all things Gritty? Here are their responses.
In on Gritty
Michael Baumann: As Gritty was being introduced Monday, I was overcome by a negative reaction to the name—”gritty” being a modifier most commonly used to elevate less-talented white athletes (or in a sport as white as hockey, Anglo-Canadian athletes) over people of color. It’s a tough thing to get over, particularly in a city with such a troubled sports history in this respect.
However, Gritty did not choose his own name, and within 12 hours of revealing his furry, googly-eyed visage to a terrified public, he won me over. In his first day on the job, Gritty fell on the ice more than once, shot a team employee in the back with a T-shirt cannon as he was running away, frightened the team captain’s wife, threatened the Pittsburgh Penguins’ mascot, insinuated that he’s the product of a carnal union between a spaniel and (I assume) Dave Schultz, and got weirdly sexual on the internet after dark. Gritty is weird, oddly menacing, bizarrely horny, and entirely unsuited for his purpose. He is, therefore, a perfect mascot for the Flyers, if not the entire Delaware Valley. As perhaps the biggest Flyers fan on staff, I not only approve of Gritty, I feel like I know him. On a spiritual level, at least, Gritty and I have gone paintballing, drunk Wawa iced tea by the half-gallon outside the Berlin Farmers Market, and picked fights with strangers on the Lindenwold PATCO platform. Gritty is my brother, and I love him as such.
Kate Knibbs: I’m ALL IN on Gritty. In fact, I’ve never been more in on a mascot. If you’re going to dream up an anthropomorphic creature to entertain sports fans, why not get absolutely weird with it? Gritty looks untrustworthy—in a good way. Gritty is fun, flirty, and terrifying, a pear-shaped party animal nightmare who could not be a more appropriate choice to represent Philly hockey fans. Sure, Gritty is a desperate bid for viral attention, but isn’t that the whole point of a mascot? Mascots are just memes for teams, and Gritty is a good meme.
Andrew Gruttadaro: More mascots should be existentially terrifying. More of them should look like if Yukon Cornelius had sex with an overgrown Muppet. Or like a life-size stuffed animal that took way too much MDMA. The most successful mascots in mascot history are:
What else are mascots for, but to be a grotesque representation of our feverish devotion to a team? If your mascot is even vaguely cute—and not a technicolor Where the Wild Things Are cast-off with giant hips—then get it out of my face. Gritty forever.
Austin Elias-de Jesus: I am all in on Gritty and his Twitter account. I don’t even think Gritty looks that scary when you put him up against Pierre the Pelican and the Sixers’ old mascot that looked like Frank the Rabbit from Donnie Darko. So Gritty is just fine, and, also, he sort of reminds me of Brendan Gleeson’s character in Braveheart.
Katie Baker: I respect a mascot so clearly designed to boost in-arena Instagram engagement, especially when it looks like a Jim Henson creation who went on a bender. I have high hopes that the name Gritty, which is great, will cause the sports world to finally interrogate its overuse of the word. I am thankful that this Philadelphia mascot shares more DNA with the phriendly Phanatic than the horrifying Hip-Hop, the departed jacked rabbit that will forever haunt my dreams. But I also would like to offer some cautionary advice: Sure, the internet loves Gritty now, but the internet also loved the Vegas Golden Knights’ Twitter account at the start. Less is more! Tread carefully, please, so that this shaken-up-can-of-orange-soda-lookin’-ass creature can thrive.
Donnie Kwak: I’m usually out on what I perceive as cynical marketing ploys, and I’m always out on Philly sports, but I’ll make an exception for Gritty. I can tell from the original artwork that Gritty started as an earnest attempt to make a cool, interesting NHL mascot (it’s a low bar) and not just low-hanging fodder for memes. It helps that nobody cares about the Flyers themselves, because they suck and will continue to suck. My only hope is that Gritty’s announcement will spur EA to make a downloadable update for NHL 19 so we can use him in the mascot matchups. The Rangers and Red Wings are now the only NHL teams left without official mascots.
Miles Surrey: I’m not sure what you’re talking about! I’ve been staring at Gritty photos all day, and I feel fine.
Obviously, I’m in!
Out on Gritty
Cory McConnell: Gritty is the first mascot conceived exclusively for #content. Monday’s reveal and ensuing social media frenzy was calculated, viral fun, but what’s Gritty’s shelf life? However strongly the internet feels that Gritty is “bae” or “daddy” today, that feeling will eventually fade, and the Flyers will be stuck with this unsettling, oversize muppet who looks like a mashup of the Babadook, a Goya painting, and the unspeakable animatronic terror from “Rooster in my Rari.” In the absence of a sensible mascot (since a “Flyer” is not a thing), Gritty at least embodies the void-staring, maniacal nihilism that Flyers fans must feel after a 43-year cup drought. Look deep in those unblinking googly eyes and you’ll see it.
Alyssa Bereznak: I suppose I am out on Gritty, in so much as I have been haunted by him ever since I saw his photo Monday. But I am “in” on him in so much as I really want to know more about the wacky, possibly disturbed corner of some Flyers marketing person’s brain from whence he came. The only real background we’ve been given is that his father was “a bully” (??) and he was driven out of his natural habitat because of recent construction at the Wells Fargo Center. (Tough life.) But that doesn’t answer my other questions, such as: (1) Why are his legs the color of Prego pasta sauce while his beard is the color of a viking’s mane? (2) What kind of severe astigmatism makes your eyes look like that? And (3) Where is his nose?
Megan Schuster: Gritty would have been frightening enough if he were just a large orange blob with a massive beard who smiled like a creep. The Flyers could have stopped there, and their mission of terrifying their fans (and the general populace) would have been accomplished. Instead, the organization decided to create a mascot truly capable of haunting your dreams by adding GOOGLY EYES that move as he jumps around.
I firmly believe that Gritty is one of those mythical monsters where if I say his name, or type his name, or even think his name too often he will burst into my home and drag me back to the hellfires from which he came. If you don’t agree, just watch this three-second clip of Kawhi Leonard’s laugh dubbed over a video of Gritty and tell me you don’t think he is the thing that goes “bump” in the night.
An earlier version of this story incorrectly noted that the Rangers are the only NHL team left without an official mascot. The Red Wings don’t have one, either.
