I’m still not convinced that this is the best sports mascot ever invented — not while Blowie is still around — but it has to be in the top five. Here are the Tijuana Zonkeys, a Mexican minor league pro basketball team named after that city’s tradition of painting donkeys to look like zebras for the amusement of tourists. (We’ll keep this between you and me and not tell PETA, okay?).
“It’s a crazy, cartoonish figure, and in a way, that’s what the city’s all about,” said Manuel Pasero, 32, a Tijuana attorney who is the team’s president. “It’s a crazy, cartoonish city where everything is possible.”
But the Zonkeys are unique in more ways than one. The team is backed by U.S. investors, has two players from the U.S., a management team from both sides of the border and is working mightily to develop a binational following. Unlike the painted donkeys on Tijuana’s Avenida Revolucion, the team is a true hybrid. From the San Diego Union Tribune:
The team is part of the Cibacopa, a Pacific Coast development league focused on nurturing local athletes such as Omar Bermudez, 20, a Tijuana native and engineering student at the Autonomous University of Baja California.
Whether Los Zonkeys will find a following in Tijuana depends on a range of factors: the skill of the management team, the sideshows and the team’s ability to connect with the public.
Juan Manuel Martinez, the dean of Tijuana sports journalists, said the critical factor is familiar to sports franchises and fans everywhere: victories.
“Mexicans are very difficult. What they need is a good team, a winning team,” said Martinez, who is celebrating his 48th year in radio. “The best promotion they can have is to win games.”
And that’s the type of promotion the city desperately needs: Tourism there is down 80 percent since 2001.
By the way, if you want an actual zonkey — not the painted kind — it will cost you about $4,000. But you can enter him in the Zonkey Nationals and win a fortune!
***
Tijuana’s Zonkeys hope to earn stripes [San Diego Union Tribune]
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- BC - Mar 23, 2010 at 12:25 PM
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Tossup between the UC-Irvine Anteaters and the UC-Santa Cruz Fighting Banana Slugs.
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- Todd - Mar 23, 2010 at 12:37 PM
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How about a High School in central Illnions known as the Cornjerkers! Hoopeston Area High School Cornjerkers!!
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- Tony Metler - Mar 23, 2010 at 12:47 PM
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>>Whether Los Zonkeys will find a following in Tijuana depends on a range of factors: the skill of the management team, the sideshows and the team’s ability to connect with the public.
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- john - Mar 23, 2010 at 1:50 PM
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Good to see someone who really know his teams. Definitely the best two mascots.
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- Zach - Mar 23, 2010 at 2:45 PM
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How about the Delta State U in Cleveland Mississippi unoffical Mascot Fighting Okra. I kid you not….
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- Mark - Mar 23, 2010 at 3:30 PM
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What about the minor league hockey team the Macon WHoopies?
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- Art Martins - Mar 23, 2010 at 4:36 PM
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Yes, anyone who crosses the border gets kidnapped immediately, and shot. Also mexicans still ride in horses everywhere and sleep siestas sitting with their backs against a cactus. The probabilities of this are 1 in a 1000.
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- Brian - Mar 23, 2010 at 8:37 PM
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1 in a 1000? Wow that’s worse than Ciudad Juarez. I don’t go to Mexico (Tijuana) anymore because I don’t enjoy being sold things left and right and constantly pestered. The fact that tourism is down because of fears over drug violence has only increased the desperation of street hawkers and beggars. Too bad the government and police are so corrupt. There is no hope for the ordinary Mexican when conditions like these exist.
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- Brian - Mar 24, 2010 at 11:48 AM
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Dude! i want a Zonkies shirt! i would love to see the games on youtube and see how good they are. Want to see something new for a change.
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- brewster - Mar 24, 2010 at 3:08 PM
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This is an awesome mascot. Who designed it? Where can I get a t-shirt?
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- Fast - Mar 25, 2010 at 2:09 AM
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What tha???are we undressing our neighbors down in TJ lets undress our self’s first to make this type of comments…how about the murders that are happening on our back yard where people go out to run a mile!!!!wake up people and stop living with fear shit happens everywhere….this guys at least are doing something different in there city…learn from it..
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- Tijuano - Mar 25, 2010 at 4:28 AM
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thank’s man your comment is the best way of understanding life not only Tijuana ………imagine if we would live with fear in Tijuana ,
bad guys don’t get with good guys ,so don’t believe every thing you hear ,Tijuana is also some of best as well
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- arturo diaz - Mar 25, 2010 at 7:53 PM
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ll3yihAMUik
you can see the baskeball zonkeys highlights
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- MAU - Mar 26, 2010 at 6:59 PM
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Thanx for the support, get in touch with me at mauricio@tijuanazonkeys.com for info on games and promos, the whole idea of the project is to build something positive and constructive to make change… change does not come, you need to make it happen.
Basketball can change the world, cheers!
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- Laura - Apr 3, 2010 at 6:18 PM
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Hi Guys
Its great idea tijuana zonKeys the best sports mascot
The new sports Culture.
Creative is the word
Congratulations
http://www.tijuanadentista.com/
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- david - Apr 26, 2010 at 9:41 PM
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My students are hounding me for these bloody t-shirts – I was told to watch for their website: http://www.tijuanazonkeys.com Apparently they are becoming really popular – when the site goes live – count me in for one!
