Baseball Shorts: How The Albuquerque Isotopes Got Their Name

In this episode of “Baseball Shorts,” we pay attention to the Albuquerque Isotopes and how they got their name. No doubt, several will know this already, but this is for those who don’t know.

After the Albuquerque Dukes left town after the 2000 season, it took three seasons before the Duke City got another Pacific Coast League franchise. The Calgary Cannons moved to Albuquerque in 2003.

In a name-the-team contest ithe name Isotopes received 67% of the votes. At first glance, one may think “What do Isotopes have to do with the Duke City?” But the name is rather appropriate since New Mexico has a number of well-known scientific/military facilities dealing with nuclear technology, such as Los Alamos National Laboratory, Sandia National Laboratories, and the Waste Isolation Pilot Project (WIPP), as well as hosting the Trinity test.

But despite the appropriateness of the name, the main reason for it lies in an episode of the Simpsons. In the episode “Hungry, Hungry Homer” (the fifteenth episode of the twelfth season), main character Homer Simpson stumbles on the owner’s plot to discreetly move the Springfield Isotopes to…. yes indeed, Albuquerque. Homer tries to thwart the move by going on hunger strike.