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Dodgers’ Web doings: Brooklyn burger joint being sued over Dodgers’ trademark infringement

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A sub-.500 team, ownership in the courts, team executives getting canned … that doesn’t mean the Dodgers can’t somehow get involved in the trivial.

Such as a trademark suit filed against Brooklyn Burger for using the team’s familiar cursive style ‘Brooklyn’ in the company’s logo.

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[Updated at 1:04 p.m. The Dodgers said they did not actually file the complaint, but that it came from Major League Baseball, which typically monitors when another entity is using a team’s trademarked property.

MLB spokesman Matt Bourne confirmed the trademark violation was not filed by the Dodgers, as the New York Daily News had reported.

‘We filed the complaint on behalf of the Dodgers,’’ Bourne said. ‘As MLB, we are obligated by law to protect our trademarks or we are at risk of losing them. We filed the notice of opposition with the trademark office in order to keep our options open. We are continuing to examine the situation.’’]

You can probably imagine, however, how all this has gone over in Brooklyn, which holds to a long and painful memory of the Dodgers exiting the New York borough for Los Angeles over 50 years ago.

Brooklynites can’t curse the O’Malley family for this one, but they’ll make do. Brooklyn Burger owner Alex Buxbaum is what you might call furious.

‘There is no Brooklyn Dodgers. They don’t exist anymore. They left Brooklyn,’ fumed the 56-year-old Buxbaum to the New York Daily News. ‘You can’t keep everything forever.’

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Buxbaux said he was approved for a trademark in April. And was going swell until the complaint was filed last week with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

‘People who see [Buxbaum’s logo] in Brooklyn aren’t going to think the Brooklyn Dodgers are selling hamburgers,’ said lawyer Robert Maldonado. ‘It’s crazy for the Los Angeles Dodgers to claim exclusive rights to the word `Brooklyn’ when they left Brooklyn 50 years ago.’

Maldonado said the Dodgers’ trademark covers apparel not food.

If the Dodgers really want to stop every company from using their stylized Brooklyn, they’ll have to get busy. Several other establishments also use the cursive Brooklyn.

Lindi’s Pork Store has been family run since 1958, manager John Lindi Jr. told The Daily News there’s no way he would change the store’s design, which also invokes the classic cursive ‘Brooklyn.’

‘Oh, [the heck with] them! What do they have to do with Brooklyn?’ said Lindi, 41. ‘They left Brooklyn years ago. We don’t let nobody push us around. Change our logo? Oh, fuhgeddaboudit. Tell them to come down here, we’ll straighten it all out.’

Thanks to VinScullyismyhomeboy.com for picking up the story.

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Also on the Web:

-- What’s happened to Jamie Enterprises, the company founded by Jamie McCourt that had something vague to do with sports?

If you click on its website, Jamieenterprises.net, you get a message saying it is currently unavailable due to problems with the account.

Maybe those $637,000 a month alimony payments don’t go as far as they used to.

-- Manny Ramirez told ESPN.com’s Enrique Rojas he had hernia surgery two weeks ago, was never 100% last season and would love to play for new Blue Jays Manager John Farrell. The story is in Spanish.

-- Truebluela.com’s Brandon Lennox offers an update on Dodgers players participating in fall and winter league ball.

-- ESPN/LA.com’s Jon Weisman
talks to shortstop prospect Dee Gordon about his hot start in Puerto Rico.

-- MikeSciosciastragicillness.com’s Mike Petriello makes a case for the Dodgers giving Ivan DeJesus a real opportunity to win the everyday second base job next season.

-- If Carl Crawford is on the Dodgers’ free agent radar, here’s a small bit of encouraging news from ESPN.com’s Buster Olney. He said Crawford’s years of playing in Tampa Bay and developing a competitive animosity against the Yankees and Red Sox will make it more difficult for the two cash-rich northeast clubs to sign him.

-- Steve Dilbeck

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