On an auspicious day for names, the Western Hockey League held its draft for 14- and 15-year-old players. As in past years, the draft board is a revealing look at what parents west of Ontario and west of the Mississippi are naming their kids.

Here at NOTY, it’s axiomatic that a truly great name has it going both ways. Just look at the Hall of Name: Assumption Bulltron, Nimrod Weiselfish, Tanqueray Beavers, Princess Nocandy, Vanilla Dong, Destiny Frankenstein. And we haven’t inducted a new class in a while, so no Barkevious Mingo, Taco B.M. Monster, Nohjay…

For one of the two men who have made it to this year’s Name of the Year final, destiny awaits.

To all of you who have shouted at us on Twitter, through our email address, and in my Gchat windows: Yes, we know, we’re late.

For all the things that he has gotten wrong in his career as a mythmaker and world-builder and filmmaker and Extremely Satisfied-Seeming Beard-Haver, George Lucas has gotten the big things right. He’s seemingly constantly borne aloft on a cloud of oblivious self-regard, but also he created Star Wars, which means that…

Much is made of the fact that baseball’s history makes the sport so rich in numbers—a statistic to back up every story and an analysis to run for every situation, as broadcasters and newspaper columnists and front office nerds alike will all remind you—but that baseball’s history makes the sport so rich in names is…

Steve Smith Sr. was one of the best receivers of his generation. In a long, illustrious career for both the Panthers and the Ravens, he racked up nearly 15,000 receiving yards, over 1,000 receptions, and 81 touchdowns. He was consistent, exciting, and productive for longer than almost any other NFL pass-catcher.

Michael Lananna does an excellent job of covering college baseball for Baseball America. He did a particularly excellent job of selecting the game’s best names in a beautiful act of public service today:

Congratulations to junior tennis players Zion Heaven and Hunter Heck, semifinalists at the Copa Badia.

Last month, the voting public selected Boats Botes as the 2017 Name of the Year. Congratulations, voting public, on choosing a wildly inferior candidate for the second time in six months! The Name of the Year High Committee held a separate vote, as the committee often does. And while we could only right this one…

Spring is here. The weather is warm and the flowers are blooming and we, the too-lucky denizens of the hockey internet, are once again blessed with a bumper crop of names from the 14- and 15-year-old hockey players taken in yesterday’s WHL Bantam Draft. We have delighted in these drafts for a couple of years, and it…

Names are serious business.

The young boys on the USMNT U20 team won their age group’s CONCACAF Championship this weekend. Which, for diehard American soccer fans, should be great, being a good omen for the future and all. But fuck that. I never want to root for anyone with one of these nearly universally terrible names.

I believe, in my heart of hearts, that Corey Kluber doesn’t receive quite the stardom or respect he deserves as unquestionably one of baseball’s very best pitchers because of his name.

I am so happy, you guys. I have, no fooling, been looking forward to this day for a full year. It is the morning after the WHL Bantam Draft, and just like last year, the draft class is replete with a bunch of 14- and 15-year-olds with names like Vine stars.

I would like to announce that I am not a girl-blogger seeking anonymity, as many of our commenters suspect.

The 2016 Lacrosse All-Name Teams are here. The men have stars like IV Stucker, Hampton Worboys, and Brickman House. But the women have Oralee Hespenheide, MacEllen McDonough, and Eggy Plastaras. [Inside Lacrosse]

With Sepp Blatter (a pretty funny name in its own right) on his way out, the FIFA presidency is wide open. The rogues’ gallery of candidates are already positioning themselves—human rights groups accuse one potential frontrunner, Sheikh Salman bin Ebrahim al-Khalifa of Bahrain, of literally snitching on athletes who…

Iman Shumpert and singer Teyana Taylor are having a baby. The Cleveland Cavalier posted the sonogram on his Instagram, and announced plans to name the girl Iman Shumpert Jr. Relax. It’s not a big deal.