Is it just me or do certain players just have "baseball names"?

[Jobu Voodoo]

Maybe it is just me, but often times it seems like a player just has a baseball name. It also seems like a player with a baseball name tends to perform above average. Now, I know there are definitely exceptions and it certainly isn't a guarantee. By no means am I saying that having a baseball name assures you will be a success or having an obscure name means you will be a failure, but in the last 10 years can you tell me that you didn't hear names like: Votto, Kemp, Lee, Trout, Harper, Kershaw, and Cano...and then just think to yourself, "That player is going to be good."?

I've also come to find that it is the same for football too (Manning, Irvin, Rice, Moss, Elway, Brady, etc.), but I haven't really been able to apply it for Basketball. Meaning I've never heard a player's name and thought, "That's a Basketball name."

Does anybody else happen to notice that or do you think it only registers that way once they become a star?

[Ben Grimm]

Mickey Morandini would have been a monster slugger in the Bronx.

[TexAg]

I named my son Easton.

[Cap78]

It begins and ends with mickey mantle

[ol' aches and pains]

It begins and ends with mickey mantle

And Duke Snider; and anybody named Willie.

[Jackaroo Dave]

Counterexample: Biff Pocoroba

[TexAg]

It begins and ends with mickey mantle

Babe Ruth? Ty Cobb?

[Nimrod]

3 examples of top notch hitters with LESS than first-rate baseball names:Rogers Hornsby,Todd Helton,and Wade Boggs.

[Honus Wagner Rules]

And Duke Snider; and anybody named Willie.

Well, not all Willie's.

Willie Collazo.jpg

[ipitch]

Does anybody else happen to notice that or do you think it only registers that way once they become a star?

I think the more we see and hear great players' names, the more they start to look and sound better, especially since they're associated with great players. If you switch the careers of Mickey Mantle and Mario Mendoza, I think Mario Mendoza would be a good baseball name, just like Mickey Mantle is now.

It's similar with logos, team names, and uniforms. If the Yankees were a struggling a 2010 expansion team, I'm not sure that "Yankees" would sound so good, or if their uniforms would look as good.

[Allie Fox]

Rocco Baldelli

[Jobu Voodoo]

3 examples of top notch hitters with LESS than first-rate baseball names:Rogers Hornsby,Todd Helton,and Wade Boggs.

Actually, Helton and Boggs sound like baseball names to me. Hornsby, definitely not.

[westsidegrounds]

ya got four basic categories:

poor player, poor baseball name - example, Foster Castleman

poor player, good baseball name - example, Duke Carmel

good player, poor baseball name - example, Christy Mathewson

good player, good baseball name - example, Ty Cobb

[Cap78]

I do not think duke and babe count as those are not their given names

[SteveJRogers]

I'm not one that really cares about "good sounding athletic names."

Guess it goes back to the 11 year old me taking it the wrong way when the Mets lost to a kid pitcher whom was making his MLB debut for the Atlanta Braves, and the WFAN host slams the Mets for losing to a guy with a funny sounding name. "How do you lose to a guy named _____"

Well, flash forward a few years, that kid was one of the keys to the Braves remarkable worst to first run in 1991.

Guess when all was said and done plenty of teams have lost games to a guy named John Smoltz.