Presidential Election Bobble Heads Part Of Hockey Promotions of The Past
It used to be a minor league hockey tradition to give out bobble heads of presidential candidates. Those give aways are seemingly absent from the 2024-2025 hockey calendar.
In case you have not been paying attention (or maybe you live in Canada) - there’s an election going on in the United States this Tuesday. It’s so important the NBA decided to take the night off so players, team, personnel, fans, etc. could vote.
But fear not hockey fans - the NHL is still in action with eleven games on November 5th.
One news station mentioned the 2008 Presidential election between Barack Obama and John McCain, a reminder to all of us that the then Phoenix Coyotes once had a John McCain bobblehead night.
The giveaway was for a 2011 game between the Coyotes and Montreal Canadiens aspart of the Coyotes Veterans Day festivities. The box clearly says the promotion was for “Military Heroes Night” and featured the long-serving Senator in a red Coyotes jersey sporting the logo they wore from 2003-2021.
Remember that Wile E. Coyote-looking coyote head that was always inferior to the kachina style logo? Yeah, that one.
For those who fell asleep in history class, McCain was a Vietnam veteran who served as a naval aviator and was taken as a prisoner of war by the Vietcong. He served in congress, both as a member of the House of Representatives and the Senate, from 1980 until he died in 2018.
A very popular figure in the Grand Canyon state McCain was a diehard supporter of their sports teams and forged close friendships with many area athletes. Among them was former Coyotes captain Shane Doan who served as a pallbearer at the late Senators' funeral and spoke of their friendship throughout the years.
The bobblehead night took place a few years after McCain’s unsuccessful run for the White House.
Obama might have won, but has his hometown team the Blackhawks ever held a “president Obama Bobble Head Night”? Nope, so obvious point for McCain.
Obama did welcome the Blackhawks as Stanley Cup champions three times to the White House during his presidency and made sure his Canadian counterpart, Justin Trudeau, was aware of it.
A 2008 Rockford IceHogs game held a “mock election” by letting fans chose between an Obama or McCain bobblehead.
In 2020 the Milwaukee Admirals did something similar by allowing fans to purchase a ticket voucher and bobblehead package of either President Trump or President Biden (the nominees from that year’s election) with whosever bobble head selling out first being declared the “winner”.
That seemed to be a tradition for both Milwaukee and Rockford who repeated it in 2016 with both Trump and Hillary Clinton in bobblehead form. President Obama has seemingly had a number of bobbleheads made for the Rockford IceHogs over the years and that would make sense considering Rockford is a Chicago suburb. The Admirals and IceHogs have election bobbleheads missing from this year’s promotional calendar. After seeing what happened to a Minnesota minor league baseball team who had already made their Biden bobbleheads before the candidate switch, it might have been for the better.