A Brief Oral History of the Worst Nicknames in the NBA

Because not everyone can be King James or Swaggy P…

Not everyone is meant to have a nickname, and not every nickname is worth remembering. By rule of NBA physics, for every Earvin “Magic” Johnson and Hakeem “The Dream” Olajuwon, there is an equal and opposite Harold “Baby Jordan” Miner and Amare’ “STAT” Stoudemire.

Some nicknames are funny, and some are just bad. Klay Thompson’s “Big Smokey” is a bit too obvious, and Corey Maggette’s is just NSFW. But only one player can have the worst nickname currently in the NBA, so we did some hard-hitting investigative journalism to bring you a brief oral history of the 16 worst nicknames in the league right now.

Armadillo Cowboy — Joe Johnson

You probably know Joe Johnson as Iso Joe or Joe Cool. Kevin Garnett calls him Joe Jesus because “He might not be there when you call on him, but he’s there when you need him.” But a decade ago, The Starters head honcho J.E. Skeets apparently decided to call Johnson The Armadillo Cowboy. Why? No reason at all, apparently. Some nicknames just exist. The lack of an origin story apparently hasn’t stopped ESPN’s Neil Everett or Charlotte Hornets broadcaster Eric Collins from using it, though, so why stop now?

Bean Burrito — Nick Young

Unlike Arya Stark, Nick Young is a man of many names. His teammates called him Noodles at USC, and he was The City for awhile. You probably know him best as Swaggy P. But for one rookie season with the Wizards, Nick Young was apparently called Bean Burrito. The Washington Post’s Dan Steinberg tells the story:

It was passed on from generation to generation,” Young said. “Only the great legends were named Burrito. They used [sic] call Michael Jordan ‘Black Bean Burrito,’ because he was dark, and his head was like a bean. Kobe was called guacamole.

Only Nick Young would have the audacity to name himself after MJ and Kobe. Even Dion Waiters was only bold enough to call himself Kobe Wade. And besides, who’s the idiot burrito namer that decided Kobe was called Guacamole when he literally has ‘Bean’ as his middle name?

Big Honey — Nikola Jokic

Big Honey falls in the long line of excellent ‘big’ NBA nicknames like Big Shot Bob (Horry), Big Baby (Davis), The Big Aristotle (Shaq), The Big Ticket (Garnett), and The Big Fundamental (Duncan). Big Honey was a name Denver Nuggets teammate Will Barton came up with for the smooth-passing phenom, perhaps a reference to Jokic’s honey-toned melanin. The Big Honey Hunt is also the title of an old Berenstain Bears book.

Blue Magic — Bradley Beal

Blue Magic is the name of a coconut oil hair conditioner or a special metal polishing cream. It was also the name of a popular ‘70s R&B group from Philadelphia.

Of course, Blue Magic is also the name given to the potent heroin once sold by Harlem drug lord Frank Lucas in the ‘60s, known for its blue color and its high purity (and subsequent overdose rate). Indeed, that is the Blue Magic of Bradley Beal, a reference to a jump shot that is similarly so pure.

One might imagine the azure color of Blue Magic was a likely inspiration for Walter White’s meth lab on Breaking Bad. Of course, Blue Magic is also the title of a book Washington Wizards owner Ted Leonsis co-authored about the IBM personal computer, so maybe Beal should just stick with Big Panda.

El Chapo — James Harden

You probably know El Chapo is a powerful drug lord from the Mexican cartel who is now in a max-security prison, or escaped, or back in prison again, depending on the day. You probably also know El Chapo has a nasty, estranged beard somewhat resembling the mess of follicles on James Harden’s face. “El Chapo” has no direct translation but comes from Culiacan slang, referring to a short, stocky dude. It’s related to Chaparrito, which you can think of kind of like an old grandpa pinching the cheeks of a cute, chubby kid with plenty of cheek to pinch. Harden apparently gave himself the El Chapo moniker, listing it above his own locker last December before a game against the Warriors. I mean… it is pretty hard to lock Harden up…

El Contusión — Manu Ginobili

Manu Ginobili is the sort of player with a name so unique that no nickname is required. Why come up with another name when it’s so fun to just yell “GINOOOBILIIIII!!!” after a big bucket? But that didn’t stop Spurs teammate Brent Barry from calling Ginobili “El Contusión,” the Spanish word for bruise, in reference to Manu’s “reckless-but-controlled-abandon” style of play on the court. Said Barry: “I was going up against him in practice and giving him a fight while knowing that he is going to bruise more people than he is going to get bruised.”

Count Blockula — Hassan Whiteside

Count Blockula reminds you of that old ‘90s breakfast cereal that turned your milk brown and gave you 17 cavities. That’s probably where Hassan Whiteside came up with the name, a moniker he gave himself. It’s not Whiteside’s first self-given nickname either, once calling himself Agent Block in another ill-fated attempt. The problem with Count Blockula is that it’s also what some people call Anthony Davis, and his unibrow fits the whole “Count” thing like a million times better. The other problem is that www.countblockula.com links to a Lego website, not a Heat website. The other other problem is that “Count Blockula” is dumb anyway.

The Drunken Dribbler — Corey Brewer

Listen, not all nicknames have crazy back stories. This one is pretty simple. Corey Brewer is a two-time NCAA champion and a decade-long NBA player, and he’s the reigning NBA Ironman, having not missed a game since February 2014. But that doesn’t mean Brewer can dribble a basketball, and that’s why his University of Florida teammates called him The Drunken Dribbler. These days, Brewer usually doesn’t even bother pretending to dribble:

Durantula — Kevin Durant

We’ve never really come up with the perfect Kevin Durant nickname, though that certainly hasn’t stopped folks from trying. Durantula is obviously a lazy portmanteau of Durant and tarantula — because Kevin Durant has eight hairy legs, or something? Kevin Durant does have long limbs but Durantula is a stretch and KD hates it.

Kevin Durant should be the Slim Reaper. Someone on Reddit came up with it and there’s even dope artwork for it, and it’s awesome and representative of his slender frame and killer game. But Durant apparently hates that one too, so he killed it — like the Slim Reaper he was always meant to be.

“I’m not here to be a guy of, I guess, death,” Durant said on Bill Simmons’s podcast. “You can call me ‘The Servant.’ I like to serve everybody — my teammates, ushers at the game, the fans…” Durant later said “The Servant” was a joke, the sort of thing you’d say after you tried out a new super cool nickname and got crapped on by seven billion people around the world.

Gobert Report — Rudy Gobert

Gobert Report is an obvious play on The Colbert Report, a defunct satire news show from Comedy Central. And really, it’s not a horrific nickname, it’s just that The Stifle Tower and The French Rejection and Gobzilla are all so much better. It also reminds everyone a little too much of an injury status update, too close to home for a guy that left his first playoff game injured in the opening 20 seconds. If you’re thinking Gobert Report sounds a lot like a bad Utah Jazz podcast or a terrible article title, you’re right. The name originated from a piece by Sports Illustrated’s Ben Reiter in February 2016.

The Great Rudini — Rudy Gay

Like many sports nicknames, The Great Rudini was given to him by a longtime local broadcaster. In this case, that was Sacramento Kings color guy Jerry Reynolds, a former Kings coach from the ‘80s that went 56–114 in the golden days of terrible Kings basketball. Unfortunately, the Great Rudini is also the nickname of Rudy from The Cosby Show. That’s the little girl and refers to her magician skills, and also, it’s The Cosby Show, so, no.

Humble Moses — Malcolm Brogdon

Milwaukee’s Malcolm Brogdon’s middle name is Moses, and he’s apparently a very modest and respectful leader, a man whose dreams include both winning Rookie of the Year and fighting world poverty and hunger. That’s inspiring, but it’s not particularly intimidating, sort of like David “The Admiral” Robinson or A.C. “The Virgin” Green. Brogdon’s two older brothers apparently nicknamed him Humble Moses years ago.

The Parisian Torpedo — Tony Parker

Basketball Reference lists both “Parisian Torpedo” and “Fiery Francophile” as Tony Parker nicknames, and it turns out they both came from one infamous interview. San Antonio Spurs coach Greg Popovich is a notoriously difficult interview, and that can lead some reporters to take a… different approach. Here’s Scoops Callahan doing his 1920s routine:

Champ, champ… Tell me about your Fiery Francophile, the Parisian Torpedo, Tony Parker. Can he continue to be your main butter and egg man and still crunk the boys from Big D?

Pizza Guy — Isaiah Thomas

For a guy barely 5'9 that was once the last pick in the draft, you might think “Pizza Guy” is a mean nickname hinting at a presumed inability to make a living playing hoops. It turns out, Pizza Guy is a way Thomas used to make a living — delivering not pizzas but lines from an advertising script. Pizza Guys is a local pizza franchise out of Sacramento, and IT did a couple of TV ads for the company when he played for the team.

The Kings were apparently in on the joke when they once announced they’d put Pizza Guy on Thomas’s jersey in what turned out to be an April Fool’s prank. Joke’s on Sacramento. Maybe they should’ve focused less on Isaiah’s pizza-delivering abilities and more on his ability to score 53 in a playoff game.

You’ll be happy to know Pizza Guys has a new Sacramento representative, guard Ben McLemore. And the way his career’s going, McLemore may want to get used to the moniker.

WOW (Way of Wade) — Dwyane Wade

Self-given names, as a rule, are an abomination. Self-given names given to yourself as a marketing scheme are a traveshamockery. The whole WOW thing was a publicity stunt Dwyane Wade broke out as a way to promote his Way of Wade Li-Ning shoes, and it’s still his website and personal brand. But when he tried to make it his nickname, LeBron rejected that crap like it was an Andre Iguodala layup in the Finals. WOW, that’s embarrassing.

This wasn’t the first terrible D-Wade nickname. This is a guy that tried to make everyone call him “Three” for a brief period after winning his third title with the Heat. Basketball Reference also lists “Pookie” as a nickname, a moniker apparently only his mother is allowed to use according to an old T-Mobile commercial.

The Yoga Instructor — Rajon Rondo

Rajon Rondo is a lot of things, but yoga instructor is not one of them. But that didn’t stop longtime NBA player Steve Smith and his NBA TV crew from coming up with the nickname one dark November night in 2015, referencing Rondo’s ability to contort his body and finish in traffic was the reason for the name. Can you imagine going to a yoga class led by Rajon Rondo? I can think of approximately 48,238,203,817 more relaxing things to do on a rainy Tuesday evening. Serenity now!

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