Nicknames: Position Players, BC, Celtics

Now it is time to give the position players nicknames. Some of these are old, some are new.

Doug "The Grand Baron" Mirabelli
The best backup catcher in baseball deserves a grand nickname. Going along the same theme as Varitek's nickname (that's coming up) Doug has been given a noble title of distinction. Furthermore, because he has hit a few Grand Slams, he is the GRAND Baron.

Kelly "Insurance" Shoppach
All throughout the offseason while Varitek and Mirabelli's fates were unknown, the end of every sentence dealing with these guys was "well, we got Shoppach in Pawtucket."

Jason "The Count" Varitek or Captain Tek
This guy just looks like a Count. He's big and somewhat scary. Captain Tek is somewhat obvious. He is the captain of the Red Sox.

Mark "Rodney Dangerfield" Bellhorn
Much like Rodney, Mark gets absolutely NO respect in this market. All the stupid Pokey Reese fans who are already overrated Edgar Renteria (who I like by the way, I even bought a Renteria t-shirt today, but I think people are overrating him a la Pokey Reese) are saying Renteria should bat 2nd, not Bellhorn. Mark was part of the reason why the Sox were such an offensive machine last season, and you don't fix stuff that isn't broke.

Kevin "Moose" Millar or The High Life
Moose is a classic from when I first did this on the old blog. The High Life is pretty obvious. I think Millar is a High Life man.

Johnny "The Evangelist" Damon
This is an ode to an old time player who stole aobut 80 bases a year without getting caught. I forget his exact name and will try to find it on Baseball-Reference.com.

The Glove (Jay Payton)
Homage to Gary Payton of the soon to be world champion Celtics.

Manny "Lunchbox" Ramirez
This was a suggestion last year. I think it fits.

David "Crusher" Ortiz
We all know he is Big Papi, but DO is also the Crusher. This goes back to one day in 2003 before the Sox played the Yankees at Fenway. I was sitting on the dugout during BP as Big Papi came out. I yelled at him "David, you're gonna crush em!" He grinned and replied "Oh yeah." One of the best moments of my life.

I still need nicknames for Alejandro Machado, Bill Mueller, Hanley Ramirez, Edgar Renteria, Ramon Vazquez, Kevin Youkilis, Adam Hyzdu, Trot Nixon, and Adam Stern so leave a comment or e-mail me. Next time, I'll give some of the Yankees nicknames.

Boston College got a 4 seed and will be playing Ivy League champion Penn in the 1st round. Then they have the winner of the Alabama/UW-Milwaulkee game. Then they will probably have Illinois if they mnake it to the 3rd round. I don't have BC going very far in my bracket.

The only other New England teams in the tourney are UConn and Vermont. I fucking hate UConn and I would be very happy to see UVM beat the Cuse in the 1st round.

The Celtics are flying as high as I've ever seen them. They beat the Wizards 105-101 the other night. They play the hapless Bobcats tonight in Charlotte.