Apparently before The Gorilla, our mascot was a sunflower for the first 11 seasons. Anyone have or know how to find images of that?

[u/DeathbyBambii]

Can’t find anything online for the life of me

[u/Glass_Shoulder4126]

Yeah, here:

[u/mrsir1987 → u/Glass_Shoulder4126]

Corn dogs Jackie, corn dogs for all these people

[u/DunngeonMaster]

Alternate timeline where the suns win all their draft coin flips but the mascot is a sunflower

[u/z_vulpes]

[u/azip13]

I’ve been searching for a pic of this for years, to no avail.

For whatever reason I have a vague memory of a b&w newspaper picture of a girl in a leotard and sunflower head/hat during a game at the coliseum, but I’ve never been able to find it online (and tbh not even 100% sure I didn’t just make it up)

Also just to clarify, I don’t think it was our mascot for 11 seasons, I think it was a mascot they tried out at some point during the first 11 seasons.

[u/JoBu777]

There was one attempt to create a Suns-related mascot, with a sunflower costume. The idea, however, never really caught on.

[u/Lucky1ex → u/JoBu777]

It did in stranger things.

[u/ImWicked39]

Wizards have their own lore like this with the elusive Genie mascot. I'm starting to think all teams do.

[u/Menkau-re → u/ImWicked39]

Why on Earth would the Wizards wanna do a Genie for their mascot? Just anything that can do magic will do, I guess, huh? Lol.

[u/Rosebud_Frozen_Peas → u/Menkau-re]

Have you seen the eldritch monstrosity the Wizards currently have as a mascot? A genie would be far less distressing than that shuffling nightmare.

[u/Menkau-re → u/Rosebud_Frozen_Peas]

I mean, fair, lol. 😂

[u/TimelyBeginning8334]

The gorilla was a pizza guy that delivered to a Suns game back at the Madhouse on McDowell. Fans cheered him as he delivered and the Suns ended up hiring him on.

[u/vomder → u/TimelyBeginning8334]

I thought he was delivering a telegram?

[u/azip13 → u/vomder]

Correct, a singing telegram

[u/fingnumb → u/azip13]

I was a kid in the 80s so I wouldn't quite know this, but like, were the 80s a time you could just walk up to an event entrance and say, "Hey, I really need to deliver a message to Ralph Fan, wanna let me in?" And then be immediately let inside?

Im sure being dressed as a gorilla landed credibility to the trade, but that story has always felt a little weird to me.

What was the telegram? Why was it purposely done during a sporting event? Seems like the office or workplace would be better and easier. That whole story just seems made up or fabricated or at the very least embellished.

[u/TimelyBeginning8334 → u/vomder]

You’re right. I went to see the guy speak as a teenager and could have sworn he said he was delivering pizza.

[u/DantifA]

https://giphy.com/gifs/damYQYlorArmfVOrg3

[u/Dull-Shower3563]

Really? Season ticket holding family since '74 and this is news to me. Colangelo started out in marketing but if this is a creation of his I missed it. Henry Rojas pretty much crashed the party on his own and the gorilla has been a fixture since the '76 run.

[u/TheLastTaco12]

Gonna get flamed for this but the gorilla just sucks as a mascot. Like I think it’s cool what they can do in the costume but the fact that the mascot is a… gorilla is just weak. And yes I know the back story but still, the gorilla sucks. If they were just a sun ball shaped like the Syracuse orange or something would be way cooler.

[u/WaRancidOly]

I Googled it and it said Gorilla was the first.

[u/azip13 → u/WaRancidOly]

“During the first 11 seasons of the Phoenix Suns' existence, the team did not have an official mascot. An early attempt at introducing a mascot involved a person wearing a sunflower costume, though it failed to catch on with fans.”

[u/Endrizzle]

No, but it should've been a Cactus Wren.

[u/Dense_Government9500 → u/Endrizzle]

^{^ ^} Down vote him! Down vote him everyone!

[u/Endrizzle → u/Dense_Government9500]

Likewise. Haha. Like that matters. Fly kites harder. It's windy enough.