It's Time For Some Internal Business

Perhaps we can someday build a Marina District on top of it.

in the stat category is what numbers are considered poor, fair, good, great, HOF worthy, etc. And maybe that’s not even possible in some categories, but when someone says a guy has a 1 WAR, I have no clue if that’s good or bad. Sure I can figure it out, but hell, if you’re up for the challenge, I say go all the way. Or at least halfway. ;-)

It is kind of where I was trying to go with my last post, but then Jack Cust signed, and that was the end of that.

Not sure if I ever welcomed you to the front page, but glad to have you.

Oh, and 67MARQUEZ = Stomper Stalker

Now what to do about that damn sigline.

I was serious when I said before that I’d get together with DFA and help put the sabermetric shit into easier to understand terms, so if you want a hand on that lemme konw.

I can’t even say Chris Carter… I just call him Crush.

The Bandit – Rajai

Captain Clutch – Coco

Cerberus McPhoxez – The three-headed 3B combo of McPherson, Fox, and Chavez (and possibly by favorite name ever)
Staples – Daric Barton (who also may be called “Dale” because of Gary Thorne butchering his name while in Japan). I’m pretty sure Barton has a couple other pool-related nicknames around here.
Mike Sweeney – Good Sweeney
Ryan Sweeney – Bad Sweeney, Swooney (Oddly, Ryan Sweeney > Mike Sweeney, but we can’t go and change history now)
Jack Cust – Spartacust
Sean Gallagher – Ex-Gallagher (which works even better now that he’s no longer with the A’s)
Emil Brown – DFA
Jack Hannahan – Hannahmontanahan, Miley, Hanrahan
Cross Bobbington – Not really a nickname, but a hilarious, if not horrifying, combination of Cliff Pennington and Bobby Crosby.

That’s just off the top of my head. I’m sure I missed some good ones.

Also, I submit that, while not technically a nickname, my use of the verb “Cahilling” to describe an organizations wasteful burning of service time for a not-ready top prospect be added to the glossary somewhere.

He is gone! Thank you Jesus!

Rajai: The Iron Chef
Cust: Spartacust
Cahill: Trevordacthill …bonus Trevor
Brett: The One, Mr. Anderson, Neo
Powell: The Eagle Has Landon
Suzuki: Captain Kurt
Bailey: Bail Out Plan
Mazzaro: Vindicator

or at least have a seperate section for former Athletics.

I also like calling Cliff Pennington “Cliffy P” but I don’t think anyone else liked it.

Everything in that “Everything Else” list predates my time here at AN except for Cindi. Annika Sorenstam Venereal Disease? Lemurconkers? Vibrational node?

that can record all these terms, and can easily be updated.

They added to the history of the Athletics, and absolutely have a place here. In fact, I think it’s interesting that people are actually (almost) arguing about nicknames of players who may not stick around for a long time…

There should be a survey with the top 5 options per player, and leave it to the AN to vote and decide…

Or just let The Big Bad Lew Wolff and his good Buddy Bud Selig decide what’s best for us (pause) NOT.

sadly, it took me a long time to figure out what TWSS meant. = (

back in November was to take a player per day or so and do a poll on what his AN nickname should be.

I realize there are as many opinions as people that follow this site, but it was just a thought to get a majority. Of course this would have to be done after compiling suggestions and limiting the options for a manageable poll. Top vote is the new nickname.

Perhaps there’s not enough interest in this, but it could be fun to ‘get out the vote’ leading up to the season.

And danmerqury, what about perhaps just splitting up the terms section into Alumni vs. current players?

I was usually ignored on my nickname attempts, esp with Jack Cust:
“Jacque Cust Oh!”
 
When Eric Chavez was playing (hurt, unknown to us) and flailing miserably at the plate, it was “Shabby” in my book.

“LS” for “Ellis” was great when doing a game thread. “LS!!!!!” was fast, accurate, etc.

Chad Bradford was inevitably “Brad Chadford” in my mind.

DFA’ed for Emil Brown.

And, I never fail to laugh at the memory of someone else’s nickname for Huston Street:

“Sir Fucks-It-Up is coming in…”

to that original anagram packed post that included utter hotness as well as many other hillarious anagrams? that post was classic and it seems like now would be a good time to bring it back to life.

and while we’re reminiscing, when’s the last time anyone busted out some krazy wand action?

As an advocate, I will continue to lobby for the nicknames I like and against the ones I don’t. But as keeper of the list, you need to step back and ask yourself what the purpose of the list is.

Is it an archive to serve as a sort of recap of years of AN lore? Is it a glossary to help newbies understand unfamiliar names? Is it a stamp of approval telling people which nicknames are officially endorsed by the blog?

How you expect the list to be used will tell you how to present it and what to include. If you expect users to turn to it when they see an unfamiliar name and ask “who the heck is ‘Staplehead’?”, then you’ll want to organize it by alphabetizing the nicknames. If you expect readers to use it more to get ideas, like “Hmm, what clever thing can I call Rajai Davis?” then you’ll want to organize by player.

If it’s meant primarily as a glossary, there’s no need to list names like “the Out-Man” or “Cliffy P”. For many of the names mentioned on this thread anyone reading them will immediately know who is being referenced, so including them in a pure glossary serves no purpose. If you intend your glossary to include information telling the story behind the origin of a name (for those that actually have a story, besides just being invented by someone one day), then your list would expand. No one will need to wonder who “Swooney” or “Trevordacthill” is, but they might well wonder where the name came from.

Do you want the list to be comprehensive dump in which everyone’s pet nickname is aired, or is it to be a useful reference tool for those trying to know which ones are actually in frequent use? If it’s the latter, then there is a point at which being inclusive is counterproductive. My intuition is that your list is more in danger of suffering from including too much than including too little, for the same reasons that budgets are always in danger of busting: because for any given item there’s always someone eager to include it, and no one wants to be the meanie who says no.

In almost any case, I think, you’re going to want to give preference to names that are actually in common use in the threads. We all have our favorites, but there are several being pushed here that really don’t get used at all. Depending on the nature of the name, AN search function might help root out some of those.

(and not definitive by any means whatsoever…most are just play on words, but some are from my memory in threads, etc).

You could put some of these, among other submissions, into polls just for fun and see what the people lean toward.

A’s 40-MAN ROSTER

Starting Pitchers B/T Ht Wt DOB Nickname Ideas
49 Brett Anderson L/L 6-4 215 02/01/88 Mr. Anderson/Neo/BullDog/The One/BA
51 Dallas Braden L/L 6-1 200 08/13/83 Pepe/Dally/Tex/DB
53 Trevor Cahill R/R 6-3 210 03/01/88 K-Hill/TrevDog/TheKid/Trevordacthill/TC
60 Fautino De Los Santos R/R 6-0 205 Festivus/Santorreah/FDLS
58 Justin Duchscherer R/R 6-3 200 Duke/Duke of Hurl/JD
30 Dana Eveland L/L 6-1 225 10/29/83 GreatDane/Eviland/Nibbles/DE
47 Gio Gonzalez R/L 5-11 195 09/19/85 GO/G-Gon/GiGi/GoingGone/GG
54 Vin Mazzaro R/R 6-1 215 09/27/86 MazzaroWorld/Maz/VinDog/VM
62 Clay Mortensen R/R 6-4 180 04/10/85 Mort/Clay/Clay Man/CM
55 Josh Outman L/L 6-1 185 09/14/84 OutMan/InningOutie/JO

Relief Pitchers B/T Ht Wt DOB Nickname Ideas
40 Andrew Bailey R/R 6-3 235 05/31/84 ROY/Game Over/Bail Out/AB
13 Jerry Blevins L/L 6-6 180 09/06/83 SlimShady/Chunk/JB
56 Craig Breslow L/L 6-1 180 08/08/80 Brez/CB
— Bobby Cassevah R/R 6-3 195 09/11/85 Casanova/BC
33 Joey Devine R/R 6-1 230 09/19/83 DivineJ/Joey…Baby/JDev
65 Pedro Figueroa L/L 6-1 165 11/23/85 Figaro/Figgy/PF
39 Brad Kilby L/L 6-1 235 02/19/83 KillerB/KillB/Killer/BK
65 Jon Meloan R/R 6-3 225 07/11/84 Melon/MelonMan/Who’sJonny?/JM
63 Henry Rodriguez R/R 6-0 210 02/25/87 Fix It Dear Henry/H-Rod/HR
64 Justin Souza R/R 6-1 185 10/22/85 Souz/Boy Named Sue/JS
48 Michael Wuertz R/R 6-3 205 12/15/78 WuertzOfTimes/WorstNightmare/MW
31 Brad Ziegler R/R 6-4 205 10/10/79 Ziggy/Ziggy Stardust/BZ

Catchers B/T Ht Wt DOB Nickname Ideas
35 Landon Powell S/R 6-3 260 03/19/82 AllMuscle/POW!/BackStop/LP
8 Kurt Suzuki R/R 5-11 200 10/04/83 Zooks/Iron Man/Kurt Klutch/Kaptain Klutch/The Handler/KS
     
Infielders B/T Ht Wt DOB Nickname Ideas
10 Daric Barton L/R 6-0 220 08/16/85 Dale/Head Case/Staplehead/DB
22 Chris Carter R/R 6-4 225 12/18/86 Cartman/Masher/ChrisMust/ChrisMash
3 Eric Chavez L/R 6-1 220 12/07/77 Chavvy/IR/Back at Third/EC
14 Mark Ellis R/R 5-11 195 06/06/77 MaEl/LS/Unicorn/ME
5 Jake Fox R/R 6-0 210 07/20/82 Foxy/JF
7 Aaron Miles S/R 5-8 180 12/15/76 7 Miles/Miley/AM
1 Eric Patterson L/R 5-11 170 04/08/83 E-Patt/Patty/Stand Pat/EP
26 Cliff Pennington S/R 5-11 190 06/15/84 Clifford/C-Penn/CP
2 Gregorio Petit R/R 5-10 200 12/10/84 Petite/G-Pet/Wonder Pet/GP
     
Outfielders B/T Ht Wt DOB Nickname Ideas
6 Travis Buck L/R 6-2 230 11/18/83 T-Buck/Bucky/TravDog/Dog House/TB
— Coco Crisp S/R 6-0 180 11/01/79 Coco/Cereal/CC
57 Aaron Cunningham R/R 5-11 205 04/24/86 Mr. Cunningham/Happy Days/Ritchie/AC
11 Rajai Davis R/R 5-11 195 10/19/80 Raj/Speedy/RD
12 Scott Hairston R/R 6-0 195 05/25/80 Hairy/Scotty/SH
15 Ryan Sweeney L/L 6-4 220 02/20/85 Swooney/Ry Guy/RS
     
Designated Hitters B/T Ht Wt DOB Nickname Ideas
32 Jack Cust L/R 6-1 240 01/07/79 SpartaCust/Babe/Jack It/Jimmy Jack/JC

.
.
And just for kicks, there are these “To be named” prospects as well…

A’s NON-ROSTER INVITEES (as of 1/12/10)

Pitchers B/T Ht Wt DOB
– Cedrick Bowers R/L 6-2 220 02/10/78
– Sam Demel R/R 6-0 200 10/23/85
– Lenny DiNardo L/L 6-2 220 09/19/79
– Fernando Hernandez R/R 5-11 190 07/31/84
– Marcus McBeth R/R 6-2 185 08/23/80
– Tyson Ross R/R 6-5 215 04/22/87
– Matt Wright R/R 6-4 270 03/13/82

Catchers B/T Ht Wt DOB
– Josh Donaldson R/R 6-1 215 12/08/85
– Joel Galarraga R/R 6-0 155 03/20/82
– Anthony Recker R/R 6-2 240 08/29/83
– Max Stassi R/R 5-10 205 03/15/91

Infielders B/T Ht Wt DOB
– Adrian Cardenas L/R 6-0 185 10/10/87
– Grant Green R/R 6-3 180 09/27/87
– Dallas McPherson L/R 6-4 225 07/23/80
– Jemile Weeks S/R 5-10 175 01/26/87
– Matthew Whitney R/R 6-3 215 02/13/84

Outfielders B/T Ht Wt DOB
25 Matt Carson R/R 6-2 200 07/01/81
– Grant Desme R/R 6-2 205 04/04/86
– Michael Taylor R/R 6-6 250 12/19/85
– Corey Wimberly S/R 5-8 180 10/26/83

and burn AN down.

Geo Storm

is that Swisher stays! That’s the last remaining bit of him on AN :( Though can’t say I’ve ever used PORN! to reference him…

The only ones I recognize, and I visit daily are Spartacust, MAC, and Pepe

Ryan Sweeney = Swingles

(at least until he starts hitting for some power)

half of that shit is really really not at all funny, going by the nicknames in the OP, and even for the other half i’m not sure why some sort of cheat sheet is necessary. these terms will be kept alive if whoever the regulars here are continue to use them, otherwise they will die off. that’s pretty much how internet forums work. this is not the french language.

i could see why a stat dictionary could be useful, though.
also, i agree with iglew’s comment above.

the only thing I’m going to miss about Nomar is being able to write Reverse Ramon during the game threads.

is to make our own form of A’s Pig Latin, which would be somewhat different from normal Pig Latin:

Alice Radenbrad
Drew Bailian
Ustinov Jukesure
Anders Bretterson
River C. Trahill
Out Joshman

Just Crack
Moran Ills
Ark Mellis
Otter Scareston
Dojo Ravus
Urk Kurukis
Ache Jox

I have way too much free time and not enough drugs, please help me.

This from the Jumbotron at the Coliseum… When the A’s had gANgster nicknames from their “Turn Back the Clock” game… When Ellis hit the walk-off HR JUST barely over the LF wall… What a great game… ANyway… here:

“1929 Philadelphia” Athletics:

1. “Machine Gun” Kennedy
2. “Crazy Legs” Davis
3. “Stonewall” Suzuki
4. “Knuckles” Hairston
5. “Fidgets” Garciaparra
6. “Bing” Crosby
7. “Babyface” Everidge
8. “Hands” Ellis
9. “Noodles” Cunningham

Check out that lineup… And yes, we WON that game. ANything is possible.