Vinny, Swish & Mo [No, Not "The" Mo] Have Their Shirts In A Bunch
Via Josh Alper with a h/t to BBTF -
Vinny Milano, aka Bald Vinny, runs a website selling t-shirts designed to celebrate particular Yankee players and/or denigrate the opposition. One of his shirts honors Swisher’s habit of saluting the bleachers during the roll call that the bleacher denizens sing out to welcome each Yankee starter during the top of the first inning. Milano got one of the shirts to Swisher earlier this season, so he was dismayed to learn recently that Swisher had trademarked the phrase and that Modell’s was now selling the shirts.
On his Twitter account, Milano vented some anger toward Swisher for swiping his idea and profting from it.
“I just couldn’t believe he’d stab me in the back like that, because Swisher has been so cool to us,” Milano told the New York Post. “He’s such a fan favorite. I just couldn’t believe he’d betray me like that.”
As it turns out, though, Swisher isn’t worthy of a one-finger salute. While Swisher did trademark the phrase, the t-shirts on sale at Modell’s are produced by the Major League Baseball Players Association and, according to Swisher on Twitter, are being made without his consent. Per their agreement with the MLBPA, Swisher and all players get a share of total licensing monies from merchandise without particular attention paid to whose name is pushing the merch.
Makes we wonder why this never happened with those “Aaron Got Guiel!” shirts that I once had made…
…yes, I’m kidding…there are no such shirts…
HAHAHA, Aaron Guiel. Forgot about him…
This could get interesting. It would be nice if Swisher would cut a check, but on the flip side, he could ask Vinny to pony up for using his likeness? Or MLB decides they want to send out a “cease and desist” order?
Off days are terrible. Has the game started yet?
Raf wrote:
Whatever happens, I sincerely doubt Swisher would decide to go after the little guy and ask Vinny for a check, talk about bad PR for the Yankee franchise (a player making multi-millions trying to profit from a fan who can only afford cheap bleacher seats).
So, I believe if anything happens here, Vinny will be told to stop manufacturing and selling those tshirts, or the cease and desist Raf was talking about.
Sine the MLBPA controls the “likeness and name of a player,” they have the say in what goes on with Nick Swisher tshirts.