Mike Trout Joins Ichthyoid-Named Players' List

Mike Trout is the #2 prospect in all of baseball.  He was called up and tonight(7/8/2011) is making his first start in the majors for the Anaheim Angels(I will never call them Los Angeles).  His arrival in the majors is the latest in a line of top prospects coming to the league.

Trout is an excellent prospects capable of being a star.  Playing up to Double-A, his Texas League numbers this year were .324/9/27, with an amazing 28 stolen bases.  He plays excellent Gold Glove caliber center field as well.  He will be trying not to become the latest big name bust in the Angels.  The Angels have had two recent busts who were top prospects with similar numbers to Trout's Double-A line: Brandon Wood and Dallas McPherson.

Obviously, his last name is the same as the name of a fish.  Me, being fascinated by quirks, started thinking about all of the other ichthyoid-named players.  It's odd, but there have been several players with ties to fish.  One of the more recent call ups was Mike Carp of the Seattle Mariners.  You've got a lot of players with varying success on this list.

Starting off, we have names of forgettable MLB players like Art Herring, Jess Pike, Stuart Marlin, Brian Bass and George Haddock.  One of the more interesting names belongs to Art Garibaldi, which has to be a unique last name relating to a species of fish.  Another good one that comes to mind is Bobby Sturgeon.  Then you have the generic answer to the question, Robert Fish.

Art Garibaldi

One of my favorites is Chester Guppy.  When you look him up on baseball-reference.com, you see that they don't know anything about him.  His batting and throwing hand are listed as unknown, and his height is 0'0" with a weight of 0 lbs.  He did hit .312 in the limited stats they found on him though.

You can't have this list without mentioning Sid Bream(Yes, a bream is a fish).  A mediocre average player at best, he is remembered very well by ever Pittsburgh Pirates and Atlanta Braves fan to this day.  Back in 1992, he walked in Game 7 in the bottom of the ninth to load the bases against the Pirates, down 2-0 in the game.

After a sac fly, Francisco Cabrera hit a single to left fielder Barry Bonds of the Pirates, who fired home in time to get the slow-by-all-standards Bream.  However, the throw was offline, and Bream was able to slide around the tag to score the winning run and send the Braves to the World Series.

The Angels themselves have produced one of the best fish-named players ever before. Tim Salmon played 14 seasons in MLB, all for the Angels.  To the best of my knowledge and research, he is the only player to have played for all three incarnations of the Angels: California, Anaheim and Los Angeles Angels Of Anaheim(which I still call shenanigans on that name for being allowed).  He was an extremely talented player of the latter half of the 1990s, post-strike.

In 1995, Salmon had his best season ever of .330/34/105 with a 1.024 OPS.  He finished 7th in MVP voting that year.  He won the 1993 AL ROY with a line of .283/31/95.  Those are good numbers for anyone, let alone a rookie.  He had nicknames of Kingfish and Mr. Angel.  Salmon is often noted as the greatest hitter in Angels history.

Probably the most well-known person on this list is Hall of Famer Jim "Catfish" Hunter.  He won 224 games, posted a career 3.26 ERA and had 2,012 Ks in 15 seasons.  He was an 8-time all star and a 5 time World Series champion between the Athletics and Yankees.  He won 20 games five straight seasons, from 1971-1975.

While being the most well-known person on this kind of list, he is the only person on this list whose fish name was just a nickname.  There are varying stories of how Jim got this nickname.  One story said that a scout knocked on his door, which was answered by his mother.  His mother told the scout that he was out fishing for Catfish.  The more likely true story is that Charles O. Finley, the owner of the Kansas City Athletics, gave him this nickname for no other reason than he felt his flashy new pitcher should have a nickname.

Mike Trout will join this list tonight and will try to make an immediate splash.  He has all the tools, but I don't look for him to be a big power bat.  He's more of a contact guy with speed who can play excellent outfield.  The Angels have themselves another great prospect, and hopefully they won't get burned a third time in recent history.  I feel that he will be a solid player, as evidenced by my picking him up in two leagues where my outfield was weak.  Hopefully he can put up great numbers before spawning season.