For a brief moment, before my wife snapped me back to reality, I thought it might be a great advantage to name our newly born son “Senator” or “General”, figuring most people don’t pay close attention to much beyond the name, so what the heck, why not start at the top? As I have said with regret on numerous occasions, “seemed like a good idea”, and yet, so not.

As my first thought is almost always entirely off base, cheerfully acknowledging my questionable judgement, I surrendered. Not one to let a challenge slip away, however, I have been keeping track of equally presumptuous names over the course of the last thirty years or so and now offer my observation that in the sports world, some names are strikingly more predictive than others.

The world of sports is wide and filled with wonderfully evocative names. Let’s cut to the chase (we’ll return to that name before we’re done) and begin by assuming that some of the most striking names were received rather than given. Did Mother Berra look at a squalling child and say, “That’s my little Yogi?” Probably not. Similarly, we can be assured that Rabbit Maranvill, Dizzy Dean, and Hacksaw Reynolds did not spring from the womb with the names by which they came to be known. More contrived nicknames such as Darrell “Dr. Dunkenstein” Griffith and Charlie “Piano Legs” Hickman arrive on a yearly basis, but my interest is in the actual given names that seem to predict a particular sort of career in sport, in football to be precise, and as quarterback to be particular.

Let us return to Chase, shall we, a name that demands superior athletic ability; pity the sluggard named Chase. What hope has he if not at the deep end of the athletic pool. Yes, a banker named Chase could probably skim by, but your attorney? Your masseur? Your psychic? No, Chase is an athlete’s name, and widely applicable across several sports. Baseball has a few Chases (Utley, Headley, Whitley and, in a stunning departure from the “ley” tag, Anderson and Wright), football (Daniel, Blackburn, Coffman); boxing and wrestling (Stevens, Beebe, Tatum) and auto racing (Elliott, Austin) have their share. Chase is fairly evenly distributed across several sports and, in an odd crossover, seems to be ok for Country musicians as well. Not neutral; the stakes are still high for anyone walking around as “Chase”, but there is some range of opportunity. Less obviously annointed athletes, such as the McCaffreys, Christian and Dylan, could be running backs, point guards, folk singers, or corporate executives.

You name a kid “Colt”, however, or “Troy”, or “Peyton”, or “Brett”, or “Cam”, or “Ty”, or “Kellen”, or “Carson”, or “Landry”, or “Kirk”, or “Gage”, or “Cole”, or “Shea”, or “Bryce”, or “Brock”, and the world will expect that kid to be calling a snap count in his sleep before the first day of school. These are not interior linemen; these are quarterbacks. Of course there are quarterbacks of some quality who have climbed to the top with ordinary, more pedestrian names. “Tom” has done well. “Aaron” and “Matt”, “Russell”, “Philip”, “Patrick”, all earn a hefty paycheck, but they could as easily have ended up as running backs, wide receivers, or even grunts digging their paws into the turf at the line of scrimmage.

“Shea” is not a hard-nosed brawling tackle with a penchant for grabbing runners by their nether bits. “Colt” isn’t spitting teeth while jamming his knuckles into kidneys and ribs.

Another obvious difference between quarterbacks and the rest of the universe, I am shallow enough to admit, is that quarterbacks with a few notable exceptions, are handsome. Other positions have a claim on good looks as well; J.J. Watt is a god, Clay Matthews does Thor, Reggie Bush looks great on the field and off, but … most of the shakiest of Division I or II quarterbacks and almost any NFL quarterback is posterchild material.

Let’s just do the not-Tom Brady – not Aaron Rogers – not Russell Wilson quarterback sweep and see what turns up.

Mat Leinart? Come on! Jesse Palmer? Whoah! Case Keenum? Teddy Bridgewater? Nick Mullens? Ryan Tannehill? Drew Lock? Brett Hundley? Matt Barkley? Chase Daniel? A.J. McCarron? Blake Bortels?

I was on a roll there, and then … alright, there are some goofy looking quarterbacks as well. I have to admit that after watching this season’s Hard Knocks, Mike Glennon’s improbably long neck remains an uncomfortable memory. Similarly, Ryan Fitzgerald’s beard is off-putting; just too much. Josh Rosen deserves a better deal that he’s had with the Dolphins, but, ok, maybe not a poster. There’s something about Trevor Siemian’s eyes. Too close together? Moving in opposite directions? On the Trevor track, Trevor Lawrence? Am I the only one to see an Afghan hound?

Look, I’m a balding short guy with no chiselled features and a decidedly uninspiring midsection; I have no room to cavil. At least, and perhaps this is the weakest of defences, I am not matriculating down the field as a Chip, Chase, or Colt.

That would be a lot to live up to, and I suspect my wife’s excellent instinct has saved our children considerable grief. Good thing I can’t name my grandkids.

My son recently returned from a happy reunion with good friends. They’d gathered to celebrate the marriage of a college pal whose family threw themselves into celebration with great abandon. Families are tricky under any circumstance and downright dangerous when the spirits rise. A relatively jolly round of toasting had warmed the room when the groom’s grandmother grabbed the microphone and annonced:

“The time has come for me to rank the grandchildren.”

The plug was pulled, the amp cooled, and most of the audience was spared grandma’s itemized assessment of an entire generation. She went on at length, with brio, but without amplification. One or two tender shoots may have been bruised, but most of her spawn were spared.

Awkward? Certainly. Worst ever? Probably not.

Toasts are almost guaranteed to bring acute embarassment and lingering regret. The Best Man stands and raises a glass to the groom and a former girl friend, the Father of the Bride describes her toilet training, a friend tries to make a profound connection between favorite food (hot dog) and husband to be -“He’ll be the hot dog you swallow now.”

Cringeworthy.

Fear of public speaking is endemic, and a spur-of-the-moment toasting raises the stakes for anyone not comfortable ad-libbing in front of a crowd. On the other hand, some of the most carefully prepared toasts can miss the mark every bit as grotesquely.

“60% of marriages end in divorce, and in the rest you get to live happliy until death.” Glasses raised. “”Here’s hoping you die.”

I’m old enough to have heard my share of mangled speeches welcoming new employees to the team, one of which went south immediately and sank more emphatically with every effort to recover some slight vestige of dignity. The speaker, a man of about sixty-five, hoped to introduce a new employee who had been a childhood friend of his daughter.

“Here’s Leslie” would have sufficed, but, no, the impulse to get personal could not be squelshed.

“I remember when Leslie used to come over to our house, a cute kid with braces and a pony tail. She was more developed than Emily who was jealous of her figure…”

This aside was intended to prepare the audience for an appreciation of Leslie’s mature judgement and precocious ability as a manager, but slid sideways from the start.

“Boys were crazy about Leslie, surrounded her in droves, but she managed to beat them off without hurting their feelings.”

He must have been aware of the sudden shocked silence in the room. He reddened and tried to recover.

“I mean with a stick or club.”

Nice try.

“Not hurt them, you know. She’s always had a great touch …”

By this time, Leslie had left the room, his wife and daughter were seething, and the event was permanently scarred.

I’ve made more than my own share of bungled announcements, almost all of which were delivered in earnest and all of which backfired even as I spoke. Intending to thank the chair of the school’s prom committee, a school mother named Hickey Bitsy. I’m pretty sure I called her “Titsie”. I’m still blushing. Later, also in school setting, I tried to call returning students to a higher purpose: “Don’t hold back. Let a Math teacher share his fascination with Math with you, let an English teacher carry you into books that can change your life, let a language teacher French you …”

Just shoot me.

Actually, looking back on a career and life filed with things I most profoundly wish I hadn’t said, ranking grandkids seems relatively benign. I am determined to keep my feet out of my mouth, but I may need a designated interrupter on hand at all times to prevent me from digging yet another trench from which there is no escape.