{"id":17847,"date":"2014-10-13T15:51:22","date_gmt":"2014-10-13T19:51:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/?p=17847"},"modified":"2014-10-15T05:31:37","modified_gmt":"2014-10-15T09:31:37","slug":"when-adirondack-publicity-goes-horribly-hilariously-wong","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/2014\/10\/13\/when-adirondack-publicity-goes-horribly-hilariously-wong\/","title":{"rendered":"Adirondack Flames mascot “Scorch” gets benched."},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Penalty<\/a>

Penalty box for you, Scorchy! Photo: Glens Falls Post Star used with permission<\/p><\/div>\n

UPDATE:\u00a0 The Glens Falls Post Star is reporting this morning<\/a> that the Flames will officially replace “Scorch,” their controversial mascot.\u00a0 GFPS reporter Maury Thompson reports that Scorch has “benched” even before taking the ice.<\/p>\n

Why did the lovable, hockey-puck headed firebrand get doused?\u00a0 Read on.<\/p>\n

This is an actual, real thing.\u00a0 The brand new Adirondack Flames hockey team, based in Glens Falls<\/a>, went public last week with their new mascot:\u00a0 a bright-red fiery looking dude with a hockey-puck head named “Scorch.”\u00a0 So far, so good.<\/p>\n

But the new pro-team’s PR department came up with the whizzy idea of creating “background material” for the character, deciding that he would be known forever-more as the “remaining ember\u00a0 from the tragic fire that destroyed much of Glens Falls in 1864.”<\/p>\n

Now, we’re already on thin ice there.\u00a0 (Memo to creative team:\u00a0 Why exactly does kid-friendly Scorch need to be the love-child of a disastrous inferno that destroyed our new host city?)<\/p>\n

But it gets worse, or better.\u00a0 Here’s the press release from the team explaining what happened next:<\/p>\n

“We also crafted a skit that helped to launch the new mascot \u2013 with the help of the Glens Falls Fire Department. \u00a0While it seemed in good taste when it was on the drawing board, it is evident now that it was in poor taste.”<\/div>\n
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That skit, as per a blog, a Youtube video, and an unbelievable photo on the Glens Falls Post Star website that have all gone viral<\/a>, involved Scorch taking down a local firefighter.<\/div>\n
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In a Tweet reproduced on the popular national sports site Deadspin on Thursday<\/a>, Diana Nearhos observed, “In the telling of his story, Scorch overpowered a firefighter.\u00a0 That happened.”<\/div>\n
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“On behalf of our entire organization we want to apologize for our thoughtlessness today,” the team said.<\/div>\n
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“We have obviously turned something good, the launch of a mascot which we will use to entertain and encourage young fans, into something that is in poor taste,” said Brian Petrovek, president of the Flames.<\/div>\n
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“That was not our intention and again we apologize.\u00a0 We would like to emphasize that we as an organization take seriously the dangers associated with fire, understand its potentially devastating effects and acknowledge that those in our nation who are called upon to face and fight fires on a daily basis are truly heroes. “<\/div>\n

I’m guessing Scorch will bounce back from the bad publicity.\u00a0 Any creature with a Hostess Ding-Dong for a head is bound to have a long shelf life.<\/p>\n

But the Flames skated into more tough publicity over the weekend, dropping their two opening games by lopsided margins (like, a total of 11 goals to 2), with Flames player Trevor Gillies drawing headlines for slamming an opposing player’s head into the ice<\/a>.\u00a0 From the video, it looks like Gillies is taking fight advice from Scorch<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UPDATE:\u00a0 The Glens Falls Post Star is reporting this morning that the Flames will officially […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[44,4868],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17847"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17847"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17847\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17849,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17847\/revisions\/17849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.northcountrypublicradio.org\/inbox\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}