He’s been likened to a Toys R’ Us reject and lambasted as a mockery of the sport’s fan base, but the Toronto Wolfpack is standing by its new mascot Gordo, and insists he’s still “pretty lovable.”

Gordo, the mascot, is a saxophone-wielding wolf with stringy, matted black hair and a grey striped shirt who wears both a red-checkered plaid shirt and denim jorts with all of the sleeves rolled up.

If introducing a new mascot was meant to drum up interest, Gordo has the internet, well, howling.

“We never had any idea this was going to blow up so much,” said Elliott Devine, the Wolfpack’s entertainment director, adding Gordo turned into a meme within an hour of the Wolfpack posting images of the mascot online.

The Toronto Wolfpack is a third-year transatlantic rugby league team. Games are played in the U.K., Toronto and France. The team’s first home game of the season is on Sunday at 2 p.m. They have a typical attendance of 7,000 to 8,000 fans at Lamport Stadium, Devine said.

Devine said the team’s need for a new mascot arose earlier last year, when the team discovered that the costume for its original mascot, Jefferson, had been stolen, along with DJ equipment, following its final game of the season.

Jefferson’s fluffy grey fur, big blue eyes and a permanent smile on his face made him a hit with young Wolfpack fans, and he’s a decidedly tamer beast than his successor.

Focus groups were used to determine whether Jefferson would make for a likeable mascot, but when it came to Gordo, Devine said “unfortunately, time was against us.”

The Wolfpack flies in teams to play from the U.K. each season, which requires a lot of planning, time and money. Devine said the Wolfpack turned to Craigslist and Kijiji to enlist the help of someone to create a new mascot.

“He’s no Jefferson, that’s for sure, but we think he’s got his own warmth, and people will come around and when he’s there on Sunday I guess it’ll just come down to the peanut gallery and what they decide.”

The “peanut gallery” has already started. Online. On social media, @cynic_mike said the new mascot “combined a low end furry fetish suit, Brian May hairstyle and Rob Lowe St. Elmo’s Fire costume.”

Another said he looked like parody artist Weird Al Yankovic.

One Twitter user even likened Gordo to a “sex offender from the 1980s.”

With their new mascot, Devine said the Wolfpack wanted to represent their fanbase from smaller towns better than their previous mascot.

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“Gordo’s a little bit more small-town Ontario, he’s a little bit Letterkenny in a way. A lot of our fans come from way out, so we thought it was a way to give them a character that could represent them a little better,” he said.

The saxophone, Devine admits, was his idea.

“When Gordo appears, you don’t see Gordo. You hear a saxophone solo,” he said. “I had mine lying around at home, I just thought, ‘I haven’t used this in years, let’s give it a go.’”

Ordering a new mascot is no simple task. According to Devine, it took a local company three to four months to create Jefferson, and cost the team $5,000, and an extra $500 for his outfit.

But Gordo was created in “about two weeks,” which was important to the team, which needed a mascot there for the kids by Day 1, and cost a fraction of the price.

“We just wanted to put someone there for the kids, for the families … ,” said Devine.

“We know our fans are passionate and we wanted to give them a mascot that we thought would, hopefully, tide them over until we could get a new Jefferson, but it’s gone in a totally different direction that nobody could’ve expected.”

Devine said he’s reached out to Toronto’s furry community, and they are keeping their eyes out for Jefferson.

Richard Powers, an associate professor at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management, praised the Wolfpack’s marketing strategy “up until now.”

“They’ve set a benchmark in how to introduce both a new sport and a new team to a market that in many ways is already saturated,” he said. “They’re still building their brand. This will be a hiccup at most.”

Powers is also the president of the Commonwealth Games of Canada and a former member of the Rugby Canada board of directors. He said mascots have to have a connection to their target audience.

“I sort of get the plaid shirt. I get the wolf idea obviously. I don’t get the saxophone. That’s gonna need a bit of explaining,” he said.

Despite the social media reaction, Devine said the team is proud of Gordo.

“He’s our new mascot because we don’t have the old one anymore, and if whoever stole the mascot wants to give it back, that would be fantastic,” said Devine.

Correction - April 26, 2019: This article was edited from a previous version that misspelled Elliott Devine’s given name.

Emerald Bensadoun is a breaking news reporter, working out of the Star's radio room in Toronto. Follow her on Twitter: @twerk_vonnegut Sherina Harris is a breaking news reporter, working out of the Star's radio room in Toronto. Follow her on Twitter: @sherinaharris