Washington Senators

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This article is about the professional baseball clubs. For the 1921 National Football League club, see Washington Senators (NFL). See also a List of United States Senators from Washington state.

Washington Senators may refer to

• an American League baseball team based in Washington, D.C. from 1901 to 1960, mostly at Griffith Stadium, that moved to Minneapolis-St. Paul in 1961 and became the Minnesota Twins. The club was officially named the Washington Nationals from 1905 to 1956 (the team dropped the "Nationals" reference after 1956, mainly because an American League team so named would, and often did, cause great confusion), but was commonly referred to as the Senators or Sens for much of that time. This franchise is sometimes referred to as "the first Washington Senators." Space-saving newspaper writers continued to refer to the Senators/Twins as the "Nats" until they left for Minnesota at the end of the 1960 season.

• another American League baseball team, this time officially named the Washington Senators, that played from 1961 to 1971. The expansion franchise was awarded immediately to the area upon the Twins' departure. The team played at Griffith Stadium for one season, then moved to the newly constructed D.C. Stadium, which later became RFK Stadium. The franchise moved to Dallas-Fort Worth for the 1972 season and became the Texas Rangers. Colloquial references to "the second Washington Senators" generally are intended to mean this team, not the little-known NFL club. Even though the second team was never officially called the Washington Nationals, the Senators/Rangers were also called the "Nats" as a short form in newspaper articles.

Note: Because the original Senators' relocation to Minnesota and the expansion Senators' arrival occurred in the same year (1961), and both had the same name, it is a very common mistake to confuse or combine the two baseball franchises. In photographs of unknown date from the 1950-1970 timeframe, the following guidelines may be helpful to identify which franchise is pictured:

• The original Senators club used dark blue as its primary color, with a thick, sans-serif, red or white block "W" on caps.
• The expansion Senators club mainly used caps with a stylized cursive "W," first in blue with a red letter (1963-1967), then in red with a white letter (1968-1971). In 1961-1962, the expansion Senators wore dark blue caps with a sans-serif block "W" outlined in white, nearly identical to the caps of the original Senators save for a red button at the top of the cap.

Varying shades of the Senators' red, white and blue colors are still used by their successor teams (Minnesota and Texas), and the Washington Nationals adopted these colors with gold accents upon their 2005 move from Montreal. For their caps, the new Nats adopted a tilted version of the second Senators' cursive W logo, and used both franchises' base colors, wearing red at home and blue on the road.

[edit] 19th century baseball in Washington

• Numerous major league teams played in Washington in the 19th century.
  • The National Association Washington Olympics played in 1871 and 1872.
  • The National Association Washington Nationals (NA) played in 1872.
  • The National Association Washington Blue Legs played in 1873.
  • The National Association Washington Nationals (NA) (a new incarnation) played in 1875.
  • The Union Association Washington Nationals (UA) played in 1884.
  • The American Association Washington Nationals played in 1884.
  • The National League Washington Nationals (1886-89).
  • Washington Senators (1891-1899): the American Association Washington Statesmen of 1891 and National League Washington Senators of 1892-1899. The American Association was incorporated in the NL after 1891 and its Washington club continued operation in the combined League.

See also: Washington Nationals (disambiguation)