Favorite nicknames

John "Hot Rod" Williams, especially after he put on a bunch of weight and cruel sportswriters began to refer to him as "Hot Plate".

 

Chet "The Jet" Walker and Bob "Butterbean" Love.

"Babe" Parilli. Harold "PeeWee" Reese and Jerome Hanna "Dizzy" Dean, my favorite TV broadcasting pair of all time. .

 

Was Jeff Francouer called Frenchy when he was a player or was that a clubhouse nickname? For some reason, it bothered me when Ron Darling kept calling him that during the playoffs.

 

The Waner brothers were Big Poison and Little Poison.

According to Wikipedia, "They got their nicknames from a Brooklyn Dodgers fan's pronunciation of "Big Person" and "Little Person", which was then picked up by a sportswriter in the stands. In 1927, the season the brothers accumulated 460 hits, the fan is said to have remarked, "Them Waners! It's always the little poison on thoid and the big poison on foist!"

I had never hoid -- uh, heard -- that before. I always pronounced it "poizon," as in deadly poison, which is where I assumed the names came from. Guess it's supposed to sound like "poisson".

 

BTW, I happened to have been born in Brooklyn, which I always refer to as "da land o' my boith."

 

PGA Tour caddies have great nicknames. Such as Steve "Asbestos" Duplantis, so named because he was fire-proof ... no matter how many times he was late or screwed up the yardage, somehow he always had a bag. Died getting hit by a taxi in Del Mar, Calif.

There also was "Disco" Dan Turning, who was busted for trying to buy cocaine in Jacksonville Beach during one Players week.

Mike "Fluff" Cowan
"Gypsy Joe" Grillo
Ron "Bambi" Levin (for no apparent reason)
"Reefer Ray" Reavis

And my personal favorite, for Lance Ten Broeck (who also played on the Tour): "Last Call Lance."

 

"The Master of Disaster"
"The King of Sting"
"The Dancing Destroyer"
"The Prince of Punch"
"The Count of Monte Fisto"

 

BTW, Johnny Blood did have a nickname -- "The Vagabond Halfback." Not because he played for five teams in his 14-year career, but because one year, when he was low on cash, he hopped a freight train to get to the Packers' training camp.

A reporter found out about it and told Curly Lambeau he was getting ready to write a story about the Packers' "hobo halfback." Lambeau talked him out of that, saying he didn't want people thinking his team employed hoboes. The writer changed it to "vagabond halfback," which Lambeau decided sounded dignified enough, and others picked up on it.

 

Clyde Frazier.

 

Clyde the Glide Drexler.

 

Dinner Bell Mel Turpin

Billy “The Whopper” Paultz

Brad “The Vanilla Gorilla” Lohas

Ken “The Animal” Bannister.

Dr. J

Mr. October

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