I TOTALLY CALLED IT!!

As some of you might know, Mr. Nonny Nu is partly from Phoenix, AZ. That's why we are a Suns and Cardinals household. I am more a basketball fan than a football fan, so I only watch football sporadically. But, for a little over a year now, I have noticed a marked difference in the Cardinals' logo. The bird has lost something. It used to look like a righteously indignant bird, pushed past the point of no return by repeated unprovoked injustices. Its lips were pursed and the glint in its eyes told me that there was no way this bird was going to take it anymore. NO WAY. Now, the new logo looks, well, a bit less annoyed. More evil and more proactive, but something was missing.

Well, we are at halftime during the San Francisco Forty-Whiners v. Arizona (New) Cardinals, so I just looked up the logo change. SURE ENOUGH, this change has been documented (here):

Arizona brushes up logo of outdated bird
45-year-old Cardinal image gets first, meaner makeover

updated 4:09 a.m. ET Jan. 29, 2005

TEMPE, Ariz. - The Arizona Cardinals have given their old bird a makeover.

The Cardinal head that has served as the team’s logo since 1960 — when the franchise moved from Chicago to St. Louis — has been subtly transformed into a sleeker, meaner creature. The updated version was unveiled with great fanfare at Cardinals headquarters on Thursday.

“A tough bird,” team owner Bill Bidwill said. “Hopefully it will be worn by tougher and faster and meaner players.”

Yet to come is what Cardinals vice president Michael Bidwill called “a revolutionary” change in the team’s uniforms, to be shown this spring.

Defensive end Bertrand Berry will wear the new logo on his helmet in next month’s Pro Bowl.

The old Cardinal logo was a roundhead bird derisively referred to as a “parakeet.” The new version has decidedly more evil eyes and a menacing expression.

“The outline is in black,” Michael Bidwill said. “We’ve made the beak much more predatory and much more aggressive. The face is much more streamlined. It’s faster looking. The eye has been described as mean, we’ll say tough. We’ve taken tail feathers and given them speed, as well.”

The new beak is gold, while the old one was yellow.

“As they say, it’s not the size of the bird in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the bird,” coach Dennis Green said. “The cardinal is a small bird, but it can be a very aggressive bird. That’s the idea.”

Several prominent Cardinals — including Josh McCown, Larry Fitzgerald and Leonard Davis — modeled apparel with the new logo.

With his rural Texas background, McCown was asked if he was something of an expert on birds.

“The only birds I know about are the duck and the dove and the quail, birds that you shoot,” the Cardinals quarterback said. “You’re not really supposed to shoot cardinals. I don’t know if I’d shoot this bird. It looks pretty mean. This bird might pull a gun out and shoot right back at you.”

The changes are part of the team’s preparation for its move into a new stadium, set for completion by the 2006 season opener.

Okay, so do I know my dear Arizona Cardinals logo or what? Anyhow, here, take a look:The one on the left is the old one, the one I have known all these years. It has lost its pursed lips, and the "Why, you son-of-a-bitch!" look in its eye. It used to look like a bird who was trying to live in peace with the world, but the world just kept pushing and pushing, and now, it had finally had enough. It would not be talked out of its decision to fight back. There was an irrational but explained stubbornness in its eye. Now, the cardinal is just evil. It's like he's on the attack rather than righteously defending. In other words, he used to be John McClane, but now he's Hans Gruber. He used to be Aragorn, but now he's Saruman. He used to be Stan, but now he's Cartman. I guess that's fine if you are trying to be tough, but come one. There are all sorts of toughness, right? I like the righteous indignation, John McClane-style toughness more.

I mean, I get what the management is trying to do. I really get it. They're trying to make this little bird more dangerous and more aggressive. But, they've lost something along the way. They lost that inconsolable, crazy ass anger that the old bird used to have. Oh well, I guess that's "progress" for ya.