The Caleb Williams Iceman trademark fight has a third player, and it is not another quarterback or an NBA legend. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office initially refused Williams’ application because LaCrosse Footwear already owns an “Iceman” registration for insulated boots and boot liners, according to ESPN.
Williams, the Chicago Bears quarterback, has been using “Iceman” as a nickname, including in connection with his appearance on the cover of this year’s Madden video game. He applied for several trademarks tied to the name, including stylized logos and a plain word mark.
George Gervin, the Hall of Fame basketball player long known as “Iceman,” then filed his own applications after learning of Williams’ filings, according to the account reported by ESPN and discussed by trademark attorney Josh Gerben. Gervin’s nickname dates to his playing career in the 1970s and 1980s, when his calm style became part of his public identity.
Who owns the Iceman trademark?
For now, the cleanest answer is: LaCrosse Footwear owns a registered “Iceman” mark for a narrow set of boot products, while Williams and Gervin are trying to register related marks for other uses. A trademark does not give its owner control over a word in every context; the fight turns on whether consumers could think the goods or services come from the same source.
The USPTO’s initial refusal of Williams’ application cited LaCrosse’s registration because Williams sought protection in multiple categories, including clothing, ESPN reported. The office said the marks were identical in appearance, sound and meaning, and likely to create the same commercial impression when considered with the listed goods and services.
The same boot problem also hit Gervin. ESPN reported that the USPTO issued an initial refusal to Gervin’s “Iceman 44” application because of the LaCrosse line.
Initial refusals are not final defeats. Applicants can respond to the USPTO and argue that consumers would not confuse the proposed mark with the existing registration. That matters here because insulated boots, NFL-branded clothing or athlete-related merchandise are not the same product, even if the office’s first pass treats similar wording broadly.
Why George Gervin’s older nickname may not settle it
Gervin’s claim has an obvious emotional pull: he was “Iceman” decades before Williams reached the NFL. Trademark law, however, cares about commercial use, not just cultural association.
Gerben told ESPN that LaCrosse’s registration covers a limited product line, “literally insulated boots,” and said Williams might still be able to secure protection for parts of his application outside that conflict. He also said a separate dispute between Williams and Gervin could follow if both applicants overcome the boot-related refusals.
The reason is filing order and use. The USPTO examiner warned in Gervin’s refusal that, if both athletes appeal successfully, Gervin could still face a problem because Williams filed first, ESPN reported. In the U.S., prior commercial use can beat an earlier filing, but the older user must prove the mark has been used continuously in commerce for the relevant goods or services.
Gerben Law wrote that Gervin’s visible current use of “Iceman” appears limited, and that his applications indicate no active use of the “Iceman” brand for clothing in some categories. The firm added that Gervin may have other evidence outside the filings, but based on the applications, Williams may have room to resist Gervin’s priority argument.
That leaves three separate issues, which are easy to blur and lawyers love to invoice separately:
- LaCrosse has the existing “Iceman” registration for insulated boots and boot liners.
- Williams filed first for several “Iceman” marks tied to his own branding.
- Gervin may argue earlier use, but would need evidence of ongoing commercial use in the relevant categories.
The USPTO has not finally awarded the athlete branding prize to anyone. For now, “Iceman” belongs most concretely to a boot line, which is exactly the kind of procedural outcome trademark law was built to produce and sports fans were built to hate.
This story draws on original reporting from Techdirt.
