Editorial: Cleveland baseball team should retire 'Chief' mascot

When the Cleveland Indians break training camp in March for the start of the Major League Baseball season, they should do so without one of their veterans.

Chief Wahoo.

That will understandably disappoint many Tribe fans given the emotional hold the smiling, big-toothed, big-nosed cartoon Indian has had on them for more than 60 years. But it's time to acknowledge once and for all that the caricature represents a racially insensitive stereotype of Native Americans.

The Indians -- the baseball variety -- defend the smiling Wahoo as a benign symbol of the great American pastime, yet they have tacitly acknowledged its offensive characteristics by reducing Wahoo's role in team marketing over the years.

It's time for a clean break.