East Kentucky Miners & Indiana Ice Miners

The Sports Logo Pundit would like to welcome two of the latest teams to enter the minor league sports landscape: The East Kentucky Miners of the the Continental Basketball Association and the Indiana Ice Miners of the Mid-Atlantic Hockey League.

While it doesn't appear that anything is official, according to this article, former Miami Dolphins quarterback Jay Fiedler - an Ivy League graduate for what it's worth - and his business partner are planning on relocating the Florida Pit Bulls, a failed ABA team, to Pikeville, Kentucky to become the East Kentucky Miners of the CBA. This will be the second CBA team that Fielder's ownership group operates. The Indiana Alley Cats (who it doesn't appear have paid their web hosting bill lately) joined the CBA last season.

I'd be willing to bet that you have no idea what the MAHL is. Don't worry, I didn't either. The MAHL is a startup hockey league hoping to get off the ground in the fall. The Ice Miners of Indiana, Pennsylvania join the Mon Valley Thunder and the Wooster Warriors as the first three teams to be announced for the inaugural season.

When I first heard about the MAHL, I thought that it might be either a fake or a fantasy league, something seemed fishy about it. But after doing a little bit of research it appears that it's on the up-and-up. Operated by Andrew Haines, who also either runs or ran the American Indoor Football Association and the National Profesional Basketball League (two leagues with varying success. The AIFA just completed a relatively successful first season while the NPFL tried to have a season but crowned a champion in April after only six games), the MAHL will at the very least give it a go, but I wouldn't expect a high quality product on the ice. Minor league hockey is a tough nut to crack, just ask the UHL.

Now that we know the teams, there are so many questions that come to mind...

1. "What are the odds that two of the newest professional teams have the Miners nickname?"
2. "How is it possible that they could release such similar logos simultaneously?"
3. "Which Miners logo is better?"
4. "How will global climate change affect the mining of ice? "
5. "Which team has the better chance of survival?"
6. "Is Miners the most overused nickname in all of minor league sports?"

Here are the answers...

1. 500-1
2. Lack of creativity
3. Doesn't matter, they are both ripoffs of many other logos. Maybe a slight edge to the Ice Miners because their wordmark is pretty cool.
4. It has gotten so bad in the ice mining industry that they had to retrain them to play hockey.
5. The CBA is on iffy ground, but Jay Fiedler signed some pretty hefty contracts as a football player and probably has more money to waste. Plus I still have my doubts that the MAHL will ever play a game.
6. Now it is.

Team: East Kentucky Miners - "COMING SOOON"
League: Continental Basketball Association
Location: Pikeville, Kentucky
Arena: Eastern Kentucky Exposition Center

Team: Indiana Ice Miners
League: Mid-Atlantic Hockey League
Location: Indiana, Pennsylvania
Arena: S&T Bank Arena