Nation Glad To See Baseball Players Still Have Names Like Mookie Betts

ALTOONA, PA—Basking in delight and nostalgia as they watched the 2020 MLB World Series, the nation was reportedly glad Wednesday to see baseball players still have names like Mookie Betts. “There are very few things you can count on in this life, so seeing that there are still baseball players out there hustling in the outfield with names like Mookie Betts really gives me a sense of continuity and peace,” said local baseball fan Jim Cunningham, echoing Americans across the country who added that they worried after Chipper Jones, Pokey Reese, and Coco Crisp retired that the best years of baseball names were behind them, but seeing Mookie Betts grace their TV screens as the L.A. Dodgers outfielder strode to the plate gave them a warm, fuzzy feeling. “Sure, it might not be the golden years of the 1970s and 1980s, when you’d see guys like Gomer Hodge, Richie Zisk, Bake McBride, Rowland Office, Moose Haas, Spike Owen, Shooty Babbitt, Eric Plunk, Kirby Puckett, Tommy Toms, Carney Lansford, Rusty Kuntz, Candy Maldonado, Dickie Thon, Wally Joyner, Bucky Dent, and Bucky Guth out there, and obviously nothing will top the early era of baseball, back in the late 1890s and early 1900s when you had Chappie Snodgrass, Happy Felch, Pinky Swander, Stoney McGlynn, Dizzy Nutter, Rags Faircloth, Dode Paskert, Sweetbread Bailey, Socks Seibold, Hanson Horsey, Rolla Mapel, Moxie Meixell, Homer Smoot, Hippo Vaughan, Boardwalk Brown, Lee Gooch, Squiz Pillion, Buck Hooker, Moonlight Graham, Hooks Wiltse, Simmy Mirch, Moose Grimshaw, Pop Rising, Red Killefer, Hunky Shaw, Ivey Wingo, Rabbit Maranville, Zip Zabel, Possum Whitted, Toots Coyne, Dazzy Vance, Urban Shocker, and Sad Sam Jones. Today you see all these guys named Bryce and Cody, and you start to get worried, but you know, if there are enough guys around like Mookie Betts, Joc Pederson, Brusdar Graterol, and Randy Arozarena, we might see a baseball name renaissance like back in the ’50s, guys like Pumpsie Green, Yogi Berra, Tookie Gilbert, Corky Valentine, Dick Ricketts, Rinty Monahan, Hobie Landrith, Skeeter Kell, Dusty Rhodes, Footer Johnson, Sparky Anderson, Solly Drake, YoYo Davalillo, Dixie Upright, Rip Repulski, Royce Lint, Sandy Koufax, Rocky Colavito, Connie Grob, Rance Pless, Whammy Douglass, Milt Pappas, Coot Veal, and the immortal Gene Green. It’s just nice, in these troubling times, to know that baseball players named Mookie Betts are out there giving it their all.” At press time, the nation had grown anxious and bemoaned the decline of tradition after the Tampa Bay Rays brought a left-handed pitcher into the game who wasn’t even named Lefty.