Chiefs Might Win Third Title in a Row but They Can’t Own the Phrase ‘Three-Peat’

The Kansas City Chiefs are aiming to win their third consecutive Super Bowl on Sunday and become the first team to pull off a Super Bowl “three-peat.”

They need to defeat the Philadelphia Eagles, of course. If they do, and they want to celebrate with caps and T-shirts emblazoned with “three-peat,” they need to come to an agreement with Pat Riley, the person who owns the trademark to that expression.

That’s because Riley, once the head coach of the N.B.A.’s Los Angeles Lakers, strongly believed that his team would win three consecutive championships in 1987, 1988 and 1989.

His team won two consecutive championships before he registered various forms of “three-peat” with the United States Patent and Trademark Office. His applications were approved, but then the Lakers lost in the 1989 N.B.A. Finals.

He had another chance for his own “three-peat” when he coached the Miami Heat to championships in 2012 and 2013, but the Heat lost in the N.B.A. Finals in 2014.

While he never got to personally use “three-peat,” Riley still owns the commercial rights to the phrase. According to the patent and trademark office, his registrations cover the use of “three-peat” on hats, jackets, shirts, energy drinks, flavored waters, computer bags, sunglasses, backpacks, bumper stickers, decals, posters, mugs and more.

To qualify as trademarks, the words must be found to be distinctive. The registrations give their owners protection against others who want to stamp, sew or print those words on merchandise and profit from it.

Riley earned licensing fees when another N.B.A. team, the Chicago Bulls, completed two three-peats in the 1990s; when the New York Yankees won three straight World Series in 1998, 1999 and 2000; and when the Lakers won N.B.A. championships in 2000, 2001 and 2002.

Most of the money — modest sums that are calculated on the wholesale price of an item — has been given to charities, Riley has said.

Here are some other catchphrases from the world of sports, familiar and forgotten, that were approved for federal trademark protection.

‘Going for the Gold’

Many Americans get swept up in the Olympic spirit. but they need to be careful about trying to profit from the Games.

The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee owns many federal trademark registrations for phrases, including: “Team USA,” “Future Olympian,” “Go for the Gold,” “Going for the Gold,” and “Let the Games Begin.”

They also have a jump start on the 2028 Summer Olympics, with “Road to Los Angeles,” “Road to LA” and “Los Angeles 2028” already registered.

‘Refuse to lose’

Like Riley, another supremely confident basketball coach envisioned a championship season and moved to legally protect a catchphrase that he believed would gain traction.

John Calipari, the head coach of the University of Massachusetts men’s basketball team from 1988-96, blurted out “refuse to lose” during a postgame news conference and then registered it with the federal government in 1993 for use on T-shirts and sweatshirts.

Other coaches and teams had used the rhyming phrase, but Calipari’s teams largely followed the motto, losing sparingly after he registered it. It became the title of one of his books. After he left Massachusetts, he allowed the university free usage of the phrase but collected outside licensing fees for himself.

‘You cannot be serious’

“That ball was out. You can’t be serious, man. You cannot be serious!”

John McEnroe yelled all this as part of a tirade at a chair umpire at the Wimbledon tennis championships in 1981. He also called the umpire “the pits of the world.”

While he won seven Grand Slam singles titles, he had a reputation for a tempestuous demeanor on the court. When McEnroe published his memoir in 2002, the title was, of course, “You Cannot Be Serious.” He filed for the trademark shortly after. (There was no exclamation point at the end, but there probably should have been one.)

‘They are who we thought they were’

After the N.F.L.’s Arizona Cardinals gave up a 20-point lead in a game to lose to the Chicago Bears on “Monday Night Football” (which itself is trademarked by the N.F.L.), the Cardinals’ head coach lashed out during a fist-pounding, profanity-laced rant in a postgame news conference on Oct. 16, 2006.

“But they are who we thought they were! And we let ’em off the hook!” said a usually mild-mannered Dennis Green, before storming out.

Though he was livid at the time, he found a sense of humor about it, registering for a trademark and allowing video of it to be used in a beer commercial. Green, a pioneering Black coach, died in 2016.

‘Let’s get ready to rumble’

The boxing announcer Michael Buffer needed an introduction that would pump up the fight audience, and he looked no further than one of the greatest boxers, Muhammad Ali, to find it.

He recalled how Ali and his trainer Drew Bundini Brown had their famous “float like a butterfly, sting like a bee” routine that ended with “rumble, young man, rumble.”

“Let’s get ready to rumble” was born and trademarked. Buffer has even received credits in films for it. No one say those five words quite the way he does.

‘That’s a clown question, bro’

Bryce Harper was a 19-year-old baseball phenom in June 2012 when he and his team, the Washington Nationals, defeated the Toronto Blue Jays in a game in Ontario, where the legal drinking age is 19.

Harper, a practicing Mormon, was asked by a reporter whether he was going to celebrate the win with a beer. He replied: “I’m not answering that. That’s a clown question, bro.”

The phrase started a meme, with online retailers selling T-shirts. Harper quickly registered the trademark, and partnered with Under Armour to make his own T-shirts.

Days later, Senator Harry Reid of Nevada was asked a question about immigration and he responded: “I don’t want to answer that question. That’s a clown question, bro.” It was a hip response at the time.

But when Josh Earnest, a White House press secretary jokingly used it during his daily media briefing two and a half years later, many of the reporters in the room groaned.

Sports catchphrases, like the T-shirts that they adorn, fade over time. Many trademarks lapse, but if the Chiefs win, an enterprising person has already filed to register various forms of “four-peat.”

Their application is pending.