Brandons still overrunning baseball

I pick the Major League games every day. As such, you notice names because of discussing the starting pitchers. The name that comes up more than any other is, "Brandon." Brandons overrun baseball. The 1980s must have been the age of Brandon. Every parent must have wanted to name their male children by that name. You would expect a lot of the names, Joe, Jim, William, Dave and other classics. You would expect a run of Hispanic names like Jose and Juan. But Brandon? Why Brandon?

When Brandon Cumpton makes his Major League debut today, he will be the 22nd Brandon to play in the majors in the last two seasons. Then there is the Brendan variation that includes Brendan Ryan and Brendan Harris to add two more. Then there is Brennan Boesch, which may or may not be another variant. There are nine more Brandons playing in the minors, so we are not done yet. Heck, there is a Brendan Brennan in the minors playing in the White Sox system. Maybe he wins a prize.

The other name that comes up a lot is, "Jonathan." There are eleven of those. Ten if you include Jonathon Niese of the Mets, who must have had a bad spelling nurse when he was born. But the Brandons still have it.

Here is a list of Brandons in the past two seasons: Brandon Allen, Brandon Bantz, Brandon Beachy, Brandon Barnes, Brandon Belt, Brandon Crawford, Brandon Dickson, Brandon Gomes, Brandon Guyer, Brandon Inge, Brandon Hicks, Brandon Kintzler, Brandon Laird, Brandon League, Brandon Lyon, Brandon McCarthy, Brandon Maurer, Brandon Morrow, Brandon Moss, Brandon Phillips, and Brandon Snyder. In addition, there is Luke Brandon Scott and Christopher Brandon Young. And today, we will have Brandon Cumpton.

That is a lot of Brandons.

But they could be dethroned in the next couple of years. I mentioned that there were eleven Jonathans with another Jonathon. But there are 19 Jonathans in the minors. So that name could take over from Brandon. But in the meantime. Brandon is king. Brandons are everywhere.