Twitter Reacts To Rose Garden's "Moda Center" Name Change; Blazers President Chris McGowan Responds

The Portland Trail Blazers officially announced the name change of the Rose Garden to the "Moda Center at the Rose Quarter" on Tuesday. The name change, the first since the building opened in 1995, is effective immediately.

Aside from all things Raymond Felton, I can't remember seeing such concentrated venom in response to a Blazers news item on Twitter since word broke that the Blazers planned to amnesty Brandon Roy back in Nov. 2011.

Below is a lengthy sample of the responses, many of which are directed towards Blazers president Chris McGowan, who announced the name change and partnership with Moda Health at a Tuesday morning press conference.

I asked McGowan following the press conference what he makes of the negative feedback to the concept of the name change and the Moda Center name. His response...

"We just felt Moda Center was iconic, it's short, it's easy to remember, it rolls off the tongue really well. I think once people realize what these types of deals do for our organization in terms of taking us to another level, they'll adapt [to] it.

"We're conscious of [negative feelings towards name change]. We want to make sure they understand why we did the deal and we'll be monitoring it and talking to people if they are completely upset, but we don't anticipate it will be a large number of people."

Note: I edited out profanity and did my best to make this a representative sample. The responses below were all sent to the @Blazersedge handle in response to the following series of tweets from the press conference....

Rose Garden will be re-named "Moda Center at the Rose Quarter" effective immediately.

"I think [Moda Center] is the perfect name for an arena." -- Blazers president Chris McGowan

Chris McGowan says naming rights $ won't be used to add personnel following lay-offs. Instead, fan experience, facility improvements

Chris McGowan says Twitter critics of Moda Center name change will "adapt" after "they realize what these deals do for our organization."

Without further ado, the reaction...

Always gonna be the RG to me

Sucky name. Absolutely hate it. Thanks Chris McGowan.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

ugh

McGowan is a **** ***! Adapt to my *** ***** you ***** ***!!!!! #*******

4.2 mil is hardly a single player contract.... Not worth the loss of pride and cultural ID of our city. #thesuitfailed

He needs to go back to LA.

If The Suit thinks streamers & a clown walking the concourse of the ROSE GARDEN will make up for this travesty, he is mistaken

Chris a money hungry ***** ** ****.

alot of talk until fans see improvements/cheaper seats/cheaper drinks/better parking etc

Chris McGowan is a ********* idiot. Not the right market to ask to "adapt" to **** like this.

I hope there is an uptick in the amount of t-shirts they shot into the crowd. #totallyworthit

that's all we get for this awful name

$...$...$... for shame. Long live the #RoseGarden

hey McGowan **** ***

Chris McGowans first move as president: Fire People, His Second Move: Piss off the entire Fan Base.

Aside from make the owner richer, what exactly do these deals do to improve product on floor or improve game experience??

it's not that they sold the naming rights... the new name just sucks. :)

I'll start calling it the Moda Center when ticket prices go down and the Blazers win an NBA Championship.

Yuck! Screw naming rights.

Ha!

shows how small a market we are in. Moda what? I hope they overpaid for it!

Ugh

Terrible. There are no words. It's all about the $ with him. I guess that's what you get when you bring in an LA guy.

The name sucks, but you can't hate them for going after that paper.

The Blazers arena renamed after a medical group .. Hahaha!

All of their players are always injured anyway so it sounds about right.

I know those guys have to dish out corporate messaging, but my God...

that's the worst renaming ever

Portland Trailblazers to rename the Rose Garden, the Moda Center...after a medical group...lolwut?

gah

No one will or should call it this

**** that forever.

Fail.

seriously?

This is the worst name.

Ugly

worst name ever.

#foreverrosegarden

BOOOOOO

Better than the ODS (odious), but it is still god-awful.

the fans officially state we are never going to call it that or respond to it as such.

This is so wack

Photo via marshall.usc.edu

-- Ben Golliver | benjamin.golliver@gmail.com | Twitter