Throwback Week: The Old Names Ride Again

Sixteen franchises, nearly two decades of rebrands, and a commissioner who spent a weekend spelunking the Wayback Machine so none of it stays buried. Every season, for Week 4 only, the weekly pages — live scoring, the matchup scoreboard, and submit lineup — roll every team back to an old identity. Old name, old logo, old banner, and yes, old colors: the matchup washes and win-probability bars tint in each era's own palette, sampled from the era's own art. Thirty-seven eras made the cut, every one wearing genuine recovered artwork — Degenerates green, Sabertooths orange, the Barney Fife bullseye.

Each team defaults to a commissioner-picked former self — Heavy Chevy gives way to the Drunk Indians, the Computer Jocks take the floor as the Witch City Warlocks, and Maverick puckers up as the 2012 'smooch' Poker in the Rear. Rather choose your own ghost? Throwback Settings lets every owner browse their franchise's eligible eras — same-name eras get their own nicknames ('The razorback', 'The skull', 'Red graffiti era') so you always know which vintage you're buying. Hit Preview on any era to see it live on the scoreboard before committing, then save it right from the preview when it looks right. Your pick sticks for every future Throwback Week until you change it.

The rest of the site keeps its head: standings, rosters, and the trade builder stay on current identities, so nobody's wondering who the Sabertooths are in the middle of a trade negotiation. (Only one team can be the Sabertooths anyway — we checked. It's the Geeks.) Then Week 5 arrives, everyone snaps back to the present, and the archives go back to sleep for another year. See you next September, Warlocks.