Improved Hockey Nicknames, Cheap

In today’s St. Louis Post-Dispatch, columnist Dan O’Neill, who once deservedly got raked over the coals (deservedly so) for getting several St. Louis Blues players’ names wrong when he covered them (probably while intoxicated), pens a laundry list of hockey nicknames and calls it a column.

I have to admit, I’ve always thought most hockey nicknames were kinda boring. Jamal “Jammer” Mayers? Tyson “Nasher” Nash? Tony “Twister” Twist? Come on, where’s the creativity, the poetry?

So ever since I have been a Blues fan, I’ve applied my own nicknames to the players, from afar, of course, since some of those gentlemen are bigger than I am. So hear they are, for your enjoyment:

Last year’s crew:
Player

Nickname

Reason
Eric Boguniecki

Bug-on-the-windshield

He’s a little guy, and sometimes when he throws a check on a bigger player, he looks
like one.
Petr Cajanek

Bionic

Rhymes, almost, with Cajanek.
Dallas Drake

Ducky

A drake’s a male duck. Must I draw a picture?
Reed Low

Beaver

He has a prominent overbite. Don’t tell him I said so.
Steve Martins

Harvard

He went there.
Jamal Mayers

Gunboat

Tough and fast.
Scott Mellanby

Hawk

Mellanby, especially when he’s got his helmet on, looks like the guy from
Buck Rogers
in the 25th Century
.
Keith Tkachuk

Ka-Ching!

He makes a lot of money.
Barret Jackman

Bert

Heavy brows, high forehead, who else could it be?
Alexander Khavonov

Never

Never Khavanov. Come on, it sounds cool.
Chris Pronger

Cap’n Happy

Grant Fuhr started it.
Bryce Salvador

Kermit

He looks kinda like Kermit the Frog.
Brent Johnson

Big

Roman Turek was “Large.”
Old friends:
Scott Young

Walleye

Television cameras often caught him gasping and with an eye on the jumbotron, making
him look like a fish.
Scott Pellerin

Droopy

He looks kinda droopy, even when he smiles.
Tyson Nash

Pinball

His playing style was to crash from one opponent to the next.
Michal Handzus

The Zusinator

The guy was a machine, and he never smiled.
Lubos Bartecko

The Wolf

Lubos is kinda like lupus, which…. ah, screw it, it’s too scholarly to
explain.

Aren’t those much cooler than what the hockey players themselves use? Perhaps the NHLPA can hire me as an official Alternate Collquial Designation Originator or something.

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