why would a rough Canadian hockey player be named back-stop? I associate the name with a baseball term.

Anyone have any ideas?

Same idea as a baseball backstop. I guess he protects people?

From an advert:

EZGoal Hockey backstop rebounder. Protects doors and windows from stray pucks and balls. Perfect to use as a hockey training net because it allows you to shoot hard in corners without the worry of chasing your pucks and balls

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The term used in hockey for this role is "enforcer".



That is just a piece of hockey equipment. It would be equivalent to calling a character "Shin Pad". I agree, "Back Stop" is an odd name for a Canadian character when so many choices are available. Look what the Canadian JoeCon guys did with their characters. They dished out a bunch of great character names that have Canadian flair to them.

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In hockey, a backstop is slang for the goaltender.

OB

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I only first heard that backstop was a sports term years after I heard of the Joe. I assumed it was a driving term, since the Persuader is a high speed tank.

I take OreoBuilder's word for it that it is a hockey term, but it meaning goalie still doesn't jive with Back-Stop's file card. Back-Stop was kicked out of junior hockey and basically run out of Canada for injuring too many players. I'm no hockey buff, but I've never heard of a hockey good. Everything about his file card indicates he is physically aggressive, nothing defensive.

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This doesn't really help, but there is also a Transformer named that. And he's from Cybertron, not Canada.

Backstop

A zen master of combat, Backstop (Saidos) trained the weaker fighters of Jungle Planet, but at the same time, advocated the values of fighting only when necessary, and striving for peace, rather than fighting for fighting's sake. These were values that his student Scourge could not accept, and he left Backstop's tutelage; when the Autobot Overhaul arrived on the planet, Backstop and his last remaining student Snarl trained him, and sided with Optimus Prime's forces in the battle to save the galaxy. He transforms into a rhinoceros, and his Cyber Key extends his horn into a bladed battering-ram (Bloody Horn).

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Wrong. Backstop is a native of Animatron, the Jungle Planet.

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Yep, and a later redeco of that same character is said to have been a wrestler before the Cybertron civil war. Both of those characters give nods to the traditional definition of back-stop: defense or support.

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I've never even heard of Animatron. I don't know much about Transformers. I thought they all came from Cybertron. My bad.

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Backstop is from the Cybertron series where some transformers came from other planets in addition to Cybertron. Jungle Planet had TFs with animal modes. Velocitron had TFs that had racing modes. Gigantion had TFs that were huge.

Well that explains it. I've seen G1, Beast Wars, some Animated, and Prime. but none of the Cybertron series. Oh, and I did see one episode of a dubbed over series.....Blaster's name was like Bill, or Rob, or something. it was hilarious.

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Yeah, his code name, to be more Canadian, should be "Back Stop, eh?" Maybe "Backstop, you hoser." Or perhaps, "Back Stop, beauty, eh?"
Sorry, all I know of Canada I learned from Bod and Doug MacKenzie.

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i was going to suggest a past as a janitor.

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You forgot Backstop, take off!

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Backstop, I have heard, is a term for supporting a combat action from range or patch up a breakthrough in a combat line - which I assumed at the time was because the Persuader was artillery and his job was to support or fill in gaps.

I don't think it has anything to do with Hockey - But you should ask Pete the Greek about that, as I know nothing of hockey.

If they wanted to make a hockey themed vehicle driver they should have called him Zamboni.

- R

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