The Cincinnati Bengals football team has a very enthusiastic and passionate fan base. They are extremely proud of their team and support their players with all their hearts. In the middle of all the fan following is their lucky mascot the Bengal Tiger called Who Dey.
Interestingly, at the time of the Cincinnati Bengals team formation, the Cincinnati Zoo had a rare type of white Bengal Tiger. Furthermore, there also used to be another football club earlier in Cincinnati whose name was the Bengals. As a result of these two historical facts, the owner of the Bengals decided upon the team name which we all know today. And as the team began to get ready for their first games, talk about a mascot also began surfacing.
Bengals First Mascot
In those days having a mascot for professional sports teams was not that common. Most college teams were using mascots but several of them were live animals. The Bengals also chose to walk the same path and introduced their very first mascot around 1968 called Benzoo. He was a live tiger cub and his name was derived from the Bengals and the fact that he was born in the Cincinnati Zoo.
He started appearing at the games initially in a small cage, followed by a leash and then in a full-sized circus wagon with Bengals colors and decoration. After 1974, the organization decided that the original Benzoo was getting a little too old and there were potential safety risks involved so they looked for a new Benzoo who was a cub. Many more tiger cubs became the Benzoo mascot over the years even including some white tiger cubs during the 80s. By 1989 the Bengals decided to completely do away with using live tigers as one of their mascots.
Bengals costumed mascots
According to the Bengals, they started using costumed mascots as well in 1972 to give the fans exposure to some entertainment as well. Since 1972, there have been various costumes of a tiger that have been used over the years. While most of the initial ones were not so noteworthy they did start getting better and better.
Some of the costumed suits were used very rarely for a season or so. In fact, there may have been a few that were one-game wonders also.
Birth of Who Dey
It was during the early to mid 90’s when most of the teams in the league started taking mascots more seriously and on a higher level. The Bengals were also one of those teams and they rolled out their latest mascot Who Dey at the start of the 1993-94 NFL season.
At the time the Bengals fans had a great cheer going around which goes like this:
“Who Dey! Who Dey! Who Dey think gonna beat them Bengals!”
So, the organization decided to name the new mascot after the famous chant and thus it gave rise to Who Dey the Bengal Tiger. It has now been more than 30 years since Who Dey is the official mascot of the team.
Of course, over the past years, there have been several iterations of the Who Dey mascot as the suits have seen upgrades every now and then. The current iteration though seems to be the best version as it is more cartoonish looking than the earlier ones.
FAQs
A. The Cincinnati Bengals’ have a Bengal Tiger costumed mascot whose name is Who Dey.
A. Who Dey the Bengals mascot is an Orange tiger with black stripes who looks more realistic than cartoonish.
A. The Bengals mascot got his name ‘Who Dey’ from the team slogan by the same chant.
A. The Cincinnati Bengals first introduced Who Dey as their mascot in the 1993-94 season. As of now, he has been the mascot for around thirty years.
