The Brevard County Manatees' 'Hitting Rehearsal' Now BP-Free

However you feel about sports teams making symbolic gestures regarding contentious news events or political policies, it's hard to argue that it hasn't become a thing lately. Last month, the Phoenix Suns donned "Los Suns" jerseys to show the organization's disapproval of the new controversial immigration law in Arizona.

Of late, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill has eclipsed the Arizona immigration law as the focus of the public's outrage. Accordingly, there is now a sports team willing to take action, however hollow and passive-aggressive that action might be. And so, The Brevard County Manatees of the Florida State League will no longer prepare for games by taking "BP", as in batting practice; they will instead be performing a "hitting rehearsal", so as not to sully their proud minor league baseball organization with a faint association to the company responsible for one of the largest oil spills in history.

Is this the ultimate indignity from which British Petroleum will never recover? I imagine there will be other, more damaging and memorable gestures made against the company, but it's doubtful that there will be a more random one.

And while the team's mascot, the manatee, has an obvious aquatic link that leads one to believe that maybe the team is more environmentally conscious than others, the Brewers' single-A affiliate actually plays on Florida's Atlantic coast, away from the spill in the Gulf.