Zampa defeats Stamford

Earlier, Mascot Hijinks reported about Stamford the Lion's sterling efforts for a good cause in the London Marathon. According to Yahoo, it turns out that Milwall's Zampa the Lion was not only the fastest feline mascot, but the fastest mascot overall!

Sadly, not quite fast enough for the Guiness World Record, but for some of the other smashing (ha!) records, click here.

Mascot Hijinks is also happy to report that Zampa was also raising money for a good cause too; more info here.

Bango powers to victory

Top-scoring with 2 points in a 2-0 victory, Bango lead his team of mascots from the front. This is despite blatant fouls by one of the Miller sausages and Bernie the Brewer going uncalled as Bango shapes for the layup:

Shani Davis and Sparky

Local pride.

Bango reminds Atlanta Hawks fans to "Fear the deer"

This could almost be a WWE audition:

High-wire dunk by Bango

Thanks to Deadspin for bringing our attention to Bango's athleticism:

Benny the politician

Benny gets down and dirty in the fight for office:

Baxter's not messing around

He always seemed like such a nice boy, but as Mr. Met found out, appearances can be deceiving:

Stamford Runs London Marathon

Mascot Hijinks is no fan of Chelsea but big up to Stamford for running the London Marathon. He finished in an impressive six hours and 25 minutes, while also raising more than £10,000 for Help a London Child. No doubt Fred the Red would have finished with a quicker time.

Video of Stamford training:

Raymond gets rocked by (one of) the Nasty Boyz

Having fun at other people's expense is totally justifiable. However make sure that one of them isn't former professional wrestler Nasty Knobbs:



Addendum: according to their Wikipedia article, fellow pro-wrestler Mick Foley described the Nasty Boys as "sloppy as hell, and more than a little dangerous, but they knew how to brawl."

Raymond goes fishing with his dad

And he catches some NL East fish:

The dangers of moonwalking

If they weren't apparent to Wolfie before, they are now:

A conversation with the Suns' Gorilla

Thanks to ESPN for this great interview with the Suns' Gorilla.

What is the best and worst part of being "Go"?
The best part is the games, the excitement, the wild and crazy stunts, and let's not forget the kids. The worst part is running out of bananas!

How important is the trampoline to your routine?
It's my trademark. Michael Jordan had his tongue, Dennis Rodman had his crazy hair, Kurt Rambis had his glasses, and I have my trampoline.

When did you start using a trampoline?
In 1988 I dusted off my old round Nissen trampoline and was the first NBA mascot to dunk during a game. I like Nissen used my enginuity and creativity to take mascots to a new level in entertaining. This started a trend world wide, and the rest is history.

Did you know that trampoline is an Olympic sport?
Yes, I've been involved in and followed the sport since the early 70s and witnessed it in action at the AAU Junior Olympics in Lincoln, Neb. This was the early pathway for trampoline to be a part of the Olympic Games.

How do you think you would do in this sport?
C'mon. … What do you think?

Utah Jazz Bear expresses his disgust

At the presence of a Phoenix Suns fan:

Orioles Bird serves Raymond and then gets owned

The Orioles Bird is reduced to shoe-kissing in awe:

Bailey knows how to deal with opposing fans

Like this Nashville Predators' supporter:

Oregon Duck maintains bete noire status

Why is it so hard for him to stay out of trouble? Here he is mixing it up with Benny Beaver:

Will Teddy ever win?

A quick search of "Teddy" on Mascot Hijinks will reveal many futile attempts at winning the presidents' race at Nationals' Park. Here's the latest controversial episode, where an unknown feline decides to play dirty. As ever, Screech is forced to nullify the victory:

Filbert Fox leaves Leicester City

Don't worry, it's just an Onion-esque joke article from the Gaffer, but entertaining nonetheless.

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VETERAN MASCOT Filbert Fox has broken his silence about his split from Leicester City, blaming creative differences between him and the club’s staff for his departure.

After 15 years with City the talented mascot plans to embark on a solo career, which will free him up for artistically satisfying engagements such as school summer fetes and Comic Relief photo opportunities.

“By the end we were coming at mascotting from different worlds,” said Filbert. “I wanted to push it in new and exciting directions having spent a lot of time in India over the summer studying Eastern mascot philosophy and its application on the kabaddi pitch.

“To come back to the Walkers Stadium and be reduced to another season of waving, double thumbs ups and the odd scuffed penalty was gutting.”

Filbert claimed there was no resentment between him and the club. In a statement to fans he said: “The club may no longer have its original line-up but this doesn’t mean it’s going to split up completely. Leicester City are not just about Filbert Fox.”

The mascot plans to take some time out before beginning the next chapter in his career, amid growing rumours that he will join a supergroup with Preston’s Deepdale Duck, Oxford City’s Otter and Torquay Talkie, who famously dresses as talkie film star Al Jolson.

Meanwhile Leicester City have set up a helpline for young supporters upset about Filbert’s defection from the club.

Last night a group of hardcore fans held a candlelight vigil outside the ground and replicated some of the mascot’s most memorable moments including ‘extravagant running celebration after last minute equaliser against Peterborough’ and ‘playful fist shake towards rival Derby mascot’.

Leicester have said they are in no rush to replace Filbert, although bookies are not ruling out a surprise return for the club’s original mascot Crispin Crisp.

The embodiment of Mascot Hijinks

About 50 seconds into this clip, you'll see the LA Clippers' mascot trying to distract Larry Bird from his free-throws in a truly innovative way:

Stanford Tree in rare interview

Superb punnage in this interview:

Q gets busted for steriod abuse

A moving piece that explores the heartfelt disappointment felt by so many San Jose Earthquake players when they found out that their mascot Q was juicing:

NCAA win %age by mascot group

Superb investigation by the WSJ's David Biderman, who taxonimized division I mascots and calculated their win percentages. This is harder than you might think; here's an excerpt:

"The 'Birds' category would have benefited from the Kansas Jayhawks, but a Jayhawk is a fictional combination of a blue jay and a sparrow hawk, so they land in the 'Mythical Figures' group. Bearcats (Cincinnati and Binghamton) are definitely animals, but they're neither bears nor cats—they're binturongs, Asian animals that join our 'Miscellaneous Mammals' subset. The Georgetown Hoyas join colors and inanimate objects in our catch-all 'Things That Don't Breathe' group since they're named after part of a Latin and Greek chant, not a rare breed of bulldog as some people think."