The Name Game
The other day I made a post about Jalen Brunson and the Minnesota Timberwolves defensive unit, giving them both new nicknames. Stone Cold and the Wolf pack respectively. Love me a good sports nickname.
So let's play the name game. Give me your favourite nickname or nicknames if you can't choose one from each major sport. I will go first.
MLB- Frank Thomas "The Big Hurt"
NFL- William "Refrigerator" Perry
NBA- "The Black Mamba" Kobe Bryant
NHL- Maurice "Rocket" Richard
So who you got? Extra zaps for awesome ones I forgot about.
I am going to be offline for a bit to attend an appointment but I will be back on this afternoon to exchange some sats for some nicknames.
Sats for all,
GR
MLB -- tie between "Spaceman" Bill Lee and "Big Sexy" Bartolo Colon
NFL -- “The Minister of Defense” Reggie White (though if we count Bermanisms, Eric "Sleeping with" Bienemy)
NBA -- Either "Chocolate Thunder" Darryl Dawkins, or "The Round Mound of Rebound" Charles Barkley.
NHL -- "Super Mario," of course.
I can't find the old SNL clip naming Daryl Dawkins "Man of the Millennium". It was awesome, though.
Round Mound Of Rebound might be the best ever.
Awesome list. Haha Big Sexy. I forgot about Bartolo. The round mound of rebound is also great.
The anniversary of Big Sexy's greatest moment just passed:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcD4ou5idzU
It's a shame we won't see pitchers hit homeruns anymore. Unless they are named Ohtani.
Actually on second thought, it's not really a shame. For every fun moment like this there were probably 1000 non competitive pitcher at bats.
This is sort of cheating, but my favorite nickname was when Shaq called a 40 year old Vince Carter "Half man half octogenarian" during a highlight breakdown that may have been Shaqtin a Fool. The NBA has so many awesome nicknames, it'll be hard for me to pick.
NFL - "The Mad Bomber" Daryl Lamonica
NBA - "The Dorture Chamber" for Lu Dort is an amazing nickname that I only just started hearing. My favorite, though, is probably either "The Worm" for Rodman or Hakeem "the Dream".
MLB - "The Big Unit" Randy Johnson
Big unit was my number 2 in baseball. I didn't even know that Dort's nickname was the Dorture chamber. That's awesome.
Grant Hill said it on the broadcast and then I heard someone else use it on a podcast.
I also think "Stifle Tower" and "Slim Reaper" are pretty great current nicknames, even if Gobert and KD aren't my favorite players.
Basketball actually has some really great ones currently. Ant Man, Joker, Spicy P, Jimmy Buckets.
They were great when I was a kid and then went through a lull (T-Mac, C-Web, etc). I'm glad they're back.
It didn't quite fit the prompt, but I love Splash Brothers as a two man nickname.
Save that one. Maybe next week I will do a nickname duo/trio post. Splash brothers and the bash brothers in baseball come to mind. murders row in baseball. Triple Bs in baseball.
Nice. I almost put "Soul Patrol" as my NFL entry. I'm glad I'll get to use it.
I'm not sure how many nicknames I can think of like that.
NFL- Jerome "The Bus" Bettis
MLB- Oil Can Boyd
NBA- Prince Of Darkness Bill Lambeer
NHL- "Jethro" Clark Gillies
"The Bus" is definitely an all-timer.
Celtics looking mortal tonight.
It looks like you were right that Mitchell could light up the Celtics.
Celtics had an off night. Let’s see what Cavs can do at home.
They can definitely be rattled.
Great name and it fit. He ran like a bus.
I totally forgot about Oil Can Boyd. Prince of darkness is pretty great for Bill Lambeer as well.
Going to list a few of my favorites:
NFL - Jim Harbaugh “The comeback kid”
MLB - Ken Griffey Jr “The Kid”
PGA- Eldrick Woods “Tiger”
NASCAR - Dale Earnhardt “The Intimidator”
NHL- Dominik Hasek “The Dominator”
And1- Phillip champion “Hot Sauce”
And Ballaholic (real name unknown)
Dominator would be my number two in NHL after Rocket. Hot Sauce. I like that one. I also like Pascal Siakam's nickname Spicy P.
I don't know many nicknames in sports, but I've always thought being called "the great one" is pretty cool. I think Gretzky still has many unbroken records to this day?
Similarly, over on the pro wrestling side of things, Katsuyori Shibata has earned the nickname "The Wrestler."
Can't get a much better nickname than that but maybe not the most fun one.
"The Mad Stork" Ted Hendricks
Haha that's quite the nickname. I wasn't familiar with that one.
6'7" Raiders LB in the 70's
Digging deep in the Raiders archives.
That was our Golden Age and the 70's were an age of great sports nicknames, in general.