The Best 8 Players’ Weekend Nicknames

If you missed it, the nicknames that will appear on the back of jerseys for 2018 Player’s Weekend were announced yesterday. This year’s Players’ Weekend will take place on the weekend of August 24th-26th. The Diamondbacks will be at home for three against the Mariners that weekend.

What this article presupposes is that I take the nicknames for the Diamondbacks that I, personally, like the best and brand them as the “best” ones in all headlines, and have people share this article on social media and say how much they agree/disagree with it in order to ratchet up engagement, which in a long and complicated way means $$$.

Here is the full list of Diamondback nicknames, for your edification.

8. Jake Diekman - Gut It Out

It’s evocative, but it evokes (in a small sample size) the struggles Jake has had since coming from Texas, but there is an implication that if you keep gutting it out, things that are good will happen. We’ll see.

7. David Peralta - Freight Train

An established nickname, so it doesn’t surprise anyone, but of nicknames regularly used by announcers, it’s a pretty sweet one. (I will go to my grave saying that “Dread Pirate Roberts” was a better nickname than “Tatman”. I will take no “Green Lantern” related questions at this time.)

6. Brad Ziegler - Unicorn

All unicorns are known for submarine pitching motions that are effective despite a lack of velocity. This is canon in every fantasy series.

5. Jarrod Dyson - Zoombiya

Dyson is on the DL and has been for awhile, so we probably won’t see him during Player’s Weekend, but the nickname is fun, and the way it’s spelled kind of, well, zooms by you.

4. Eduardo Escobar - El De La Pica

According to some cursory googling, it’s a reference to his birthplace in Venezuela, and an homage to his mother and early baseball coaches in his life. I’m always with that.

3. Alex Avila - Parkman

A reference, I’m going to assume with a lot of confidence, to Jack Parkman. If you forgot, he was the main antagonist in the vastly inferior to the original but still has its moments Major League 2. It’s hard to get a direct side by side comparison, but you can kinda see it

His shimmy drives all the ladies in Phoenix wild.

2. T.J. McFarland - Return of the Mac

Most nicknames involving your actual name aren’t great (Take your last name and add a “y” to it!) but when you can do it right, it’s poetry in motion. When it’s a direct reference to the mid-90s R&B jam Return of the Mack by Mark Morrison, it’s the absolute best.

I hope T.J. leans into this.

(SCENE: Bottom of the 7th inning of a game. Torey Louvullo talking to McFarland on the mound)

TOREY: Look, I know we said we’d give you this inning, but you’ve given up two runners and there’s a righty coming up and we need a double play and-

TJ: (So loud people in the 200 sections can hear him singing) YOU LIIIIIIIIIIIED TO ME.

1. Brad Boxberger - (Picture of Cardboard Box, Picture of a Hamburger, CHORUS editor doesn’t support emojis, sue me)

If your nickname inspires a throng of other people to say “Wait, I didn’t know we could do that!”, it’s pioneering. If it causes another throng of people to say that somehow getting images on your jersey for one weekend in what is ostensibly supposed to be a game that’s fun is the downfall of civilization, then it’s very very good.

I’m also fond of how Brad has leaned into the burger-adjacency of his name. I remember seeing him pitch for the Tucson Padres around 2012 and they had a very “Minor League Team” promotion wherein if he got a strikeout in his relief appearance, everyone in the stadium would get a coupon for a free hamburger.

The first player to just have 8 Eggplant Emojis on the back of their jersey will be President one day, mark my words.

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What are your favorite/least favorite nicknames from this player’s weekend for the Diamondbacks? Is there a player on another team that has a particularly fire nickname? (You can view a full list here.) Let us know! Preferably in the comments, It’d be weird if you all called me.