When the Warriors move out of Oracle Arena and into the brand new Chase Center before the 2019–20 NBA season, they'll still be known as the Golden State Warriors.
There was apparently some speculation about whether the team would rebrand itself after moving from Oakland to San Francisco, but that speculation was quieted on Wednesday when team president Rick Welts made it official.
Rick Welts with a news drop on our show today:
— Brian Murphy (@knbrmurph) April 4, 2018
The Golden State Warriors will keep the name Golden State Warriors when they move to San Francisco. "Let's make it official," Welts said.
The team was previously known as the San Francisco Warriors from 1962-1971, but has held the Golden State moniker ever since. They'll be moving back to the San Fran area with their new $500 million waterfront arena in the Mission Bay neighborhood, but it doesn't come as much of a shock that a name change isn't in the plans.
The Warriors currently have one of the strongest brands not only in basketball, but in all of sports. It just wouldn't make a whole lot of sense to toy with that while they're thriving as an organization, especially if it presents the possibility of alienating their existing fanbase in Oakland.
Anyone who is in possession of Golden State gear can rest easy from this point on.
