Great scoop by Empire of Soccer on Wednesday, who found two new trademarks filed by Major League Soccer last week related to expansion team Los Angeles Football Club.

The trademarks are for "LAFC Wings" and "The Wings" with a visual logo that includes the wing-like design that is coming off the 'A' in LAFC's crest, as revealed in January.

Of course, the Empire of Soccer report and countless others on the internet have speculated as to what that could mean. Is LAFC planning to protect a possible nickname for the new team? Move to establish a brand for an eventual USL team? Looking for tasks to keep copyright lawyers on retainer occupied?

The truth is it's unknown at this time why the wings moniker has been copyrighted, and it's not necessarily guaranteed to be used in any official capacity. MLS, like any business, will sometimes register trademarks as a protective measure against competitors, and may end up not using them down the line. We saw this in part with LAFC being registered back in 2014 with an ugly crest that was fortunately dropped.

So we'll see what this means. Maybe we'll get lots of wings merchandise and references in the years to come, and maybe not. Time will tell if this is a peek behind the curtain of LAFC's branding in the future.

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