The Washington football team has come up with a new name to replace the the old one, at least temporarily: The Washington Football Team, or just "Washington" for short.  

It is what many have been calling the team already rather than use the old name.

The move gives the team and owner Dan Snyder more time to figure out what the new name and branding will be. 

While the web site is still redskins.com, the link leads to a new Washington Football Team branded site. 

Saying it was for "updated brand clarity and consistency purposes," the team announced that pending adoption of a new name and logo, the "redskins" name will be officially retired before the start of the new season, which is currently a home opener against Philadelphia Sept. 13, and the team will encourage fans and the media to use "Washington Football Team" starting immediately.

That will give the team more time to undertake an "in-depth" branding process, the team said. 

In the meantime Washington Football Team gear will be available in the NFL Shop. 

Snyder had been under extreme pressure, including from advertisers and sponsors, to change the name, something he has strongly resisted.

In the wake of the George Floyd killing and a national referendum on race and discrimination, the team launched a review of the name July 3, and announced July 13 a change was coming.  

Broadcasters in the U.S. have pretty much left whether to use the team name up to their analysts and sports anchors, though the hometown newspaper, the Washington Post, had decided not to use the name on its editorial page, which has urged a name change, while continuing to use it on the news pages. 

"This process allows the team to take into account not only the proud tradition and history of the franchise but also input from our alumni, the organization's sponsors, the National Football League and the local community," said Snyder back when the review was launched.  

That history also includes being the last team in the league to integrate. The statue of its former owner George Preston Marshall, who resisted integration until the early 1960s, was removed from in front of the team's former home, RFK Stadium in Washington, earlier this month.  

Back in 2014, the FCC's Media Bureau rejected a petition to deny the renewal of Snyder's Washington radio station, WWXX-FM, over its use of the term "Redskins" on-air to refer to the team. Challenges to several TV station licenses were also lodged on the grounds the term was profane, but the FCC did not see it that way.  

Numerous members of Congress have also called for the name change, including threatening to eliminate the NFL's tax-exempt status because the league hasn't taken action to get the team owner to change its name. 

Snyder has said the name honors a proud heritage and points to some Native Americans who do not oppose it. For example, back in 2016, the Washington Postreleased a poll of more than 500 Native Americans that found that nine in 10 did not find the team name offensive. But a February 2020 UC Berkley study--conducted even before Floyd's death and the protests--found that half of 1,000 Native Americans polled were offended by the name. 

But a columnist for British newspaper The Independent, who argued several years ago that the BBC should not use the name when reporting about a game between the team and the Cincinnati Bengals played in London, cited Oneida leader Ray Halbritter, who in turn pointed to a newspaper clipping from 1863 referring to "red-skins" as the bloody scalps for which a $200 bounty was being paid.

A new Supreme Court decision in Matal V. Tam, could restore federal protections to trademarks of the Redskins NFL team, but would not shield it if the FCC concluded the name was a racial slur.

That is according to public interest attorney John Banzhaf.

The case involved an appeals court decision—regarding an Asian-American band trying to trademark the name "Slants"—that the disparagement provision in law that prohibits trademarks that "disparage persons, institutions, beliefs, or national symbols" is an unconstitutional abridgment of free speech. It is usually the most controversial speech that is most in need of protecting.

The Supreme Court upheld that decision 8-0.

The government had defended the clause, saying it only affected government speech. But the High Court said trademarks are private speech protected by the First Amendment. "This Court exercises great caution in extending its government-speech precedents, for if private speech could be passed off as government speech by simply affixing a government seal of approval, government could silence or muffle the expression of disfavored viewpoints," the court said. "The [disparagement clause] thus reflects the government’s disapproval of a subset of messages it finds offensive, the essence of viewpoint discrimination.

RELATED: Redskins Say Canceling Trademark Was Unconstitutional

Banzhaf filed a petition to deny the renewal of Washington Redskins owner Dan Snyder's Washington radio station, WWXX-FM, over its use of the term "Redskins" on-air to refer to the team. He also targeted KNBC-TV and other stations over use of the name on air.

The Supreme Court actually declined to hear the appeal of the Patent & Trademark Office decision to cancel federal protection of the Redskins name, but that was because a lower court had yet to rule. So the decision was more about the timing of the filing, which the court signaled was premature.

The Washington Redskins were hoping the court would combine their case with the case of the band name the court just decided, but the decision is a victory for the team even if it was not included on the title page.

"The decision has an immediate impact on closely watched efforts to cancel the federal trademark registrations for the NFL’s Washington Redskins," said Christopher Larus, partner and chair of the Minneapolis IP and Technology Litigation Group at Robins Kaplan LLP, in following the ruling. "With this decision, those longstanding registrations will stay in place."

"The Washington Redskins, who have been fighting disparagement challenges to their Redskins trademarks for more than twenty-five years, will surely benefit from this decision," said Catherine Farrelly of the New York media and entertainment law firm Frankfurt Kurnit Klein + Selz. "The Trademark Trial and Appeal Board’s 2014 decision cancelling six Redskins trademark registrations on the basis that they are disparaging will not be able to be upheld, and the registrations should be reinstated in due course."

“The government defends free speech around the world because it knows when free speech is threatened, religious minorities suffer,” said Hannah Smith, senior counsel at Becket, a non-profit religious liberty law firm that says it has teamed with the government in the past to fight laws banning insulting or defaming religious speech. “Whether politically correct or not, speech should be protected here at home as well as abroad,” Becket said.

The National Congress of American Indians and the Change the Mascot campaign clearly recognized the importance of the decision that federal trademarks, even offensive ones, can be registered, but called on the NFL to change the name. “If the NFL wants to live up to its statements about placing importance on equality, then it shouldn’t hide behind these rulings, but should act to end this hateful and degrading slur.”

Coverage of the New York Giants-Washington game drove CBS to its most-watched premiere week Thursday since 2007.

CBS and NFL Network’s presentation of the Giants' 45-14 trouncing of the Redskins earned a 10.2 rating and 16.3 million viewers, a 92% jump from the 5.3 mark and 8.3 million watchers for the Sept. 26, 2013 matchup between San Francisco-St. Louis on pro football league’s in-house service and the over-the-air station in the participating teams DMAs. The audience was most likely reduced by the 1.25 million in the New York DMA who watched Derek Jeter's final game at Yankee Stadium on YES.

In primetime, CBS/NFLN’s broadcast gave Black Rock its most-watched and highest-rated premiere week Thursday since 2007 -- Survivor China, CSI, Without a Trace.  Compared to premiere Thursday last year, CBS/NFL Network was up 6% in viewers (15.4 million vs. 14.5 million); 9% in household rating (9.6 vs. 8.8); 47% among adults 18 to 49 (5.6 vs. 3.8); and 20% among adults 25 to 54 (6.1 vs. 5.1). (CBS and NFL Network are reporting audience data for the game and related programming, the way it was sold to advertisers, as a gross rating from CBS and NFL Network.)

Despite three blowouts, CBS/NFL Network has averaged a  10 rating/17 share, 56% above last year’s 6.4/11, and 16.1 million viewers, 59% more than last year’s 10.1 million, when the games only appeared on the cable network and broadcast affiliates in the participating clubs’ DMAs.