Ranking the 20 best, most interesting names of the 2017 MLB Draft

Let us now declare which of the more than 1,000 names selected are the greatest of all

By Dayn Perry

Jun 16, 2017 at 1:21 pm ET • 4 min read

Baseball's 2017 First-Year Player Draft is over, and that, quite obviously, means it's time to rank the most aesthetically pleasing names of all those who were selected over an interminable span of 40 rounds.

Yes, we have done the yeoman's work of giving expert and thorough consideration to the entire honking database of 1,205 names in order to determine the 20 most soaring names of all, and what follows is our authoritative ordering of those names.

We're also listing each young man's draft position, so that, if you wish, you may verify that, yes, someone actually has that soaringly perfect name. We have also taken the liberty of telling you what each evokes within the imagination -- i.e., what each name sounds like. We come not to mock, but rather to celebrate.

Now let us begin ...

20. Oliver Jaskie, No. 183 overall, Mariners

Sounds like: Puckish concierge whose outward affability conceals a certain longing.

19. Ledgend Smith, No. 534 overall, Brewers

Sounds like: Popular senior who drives a van with curtains. He'll park at the lake, open up the doors, and let the aftermarket Rockford Fosgate do the talking. Yeah, buddy, he's got an extra koozie. Prolly on the floorboard somewhere.

18. Antoine Mistico, No. 425 overall, Tigers

Sounds like: Handsome traveling illusionist, forever subject to his basest urges. Has open-ended Erythromycin prescription.

17. Ricky Tyler Thomas, No. 225 overall, Cubs

Sounds like: Country singer recently reduced to opening-act status at plains-state casinos. Peaked at no. 33 on Billboard country chart in 1992 with the single, "Yeah! Whomp, Whomp! No!" off the LP "Whiskey Dammit." Once threw a punch at each member of Diamond Rio.

16. Cash Case, No. 107 overall, Reds

Sounds like: Name on fake ID of moneyed suburban Atlanta high school junior. Real name, Cayeaduhnne Case.

15. Edmond Americaan; No. 1,034 overall; Rangers

Sounds like: Minuteman who fired the first shot at Lexington/Concord but did so not with a Brown Bess musket but rather -- thanks to time travel and black-market contacts -- an RPG-7 rocket-propelled grenade launcher. Also Nathan Hale's MySpace password (replace space with underscore).

14. Logan Warmoth, No. 22 overall, Blue Jays

Sounds like: Orc who went to prep school.

13. Cole Stapler, No. 652 overall, Diamondbacks

Sounds like: Bixby, Okla. native who wrestled for years as the hated Vladislav Mikhailov and later as the even more hated Dirty Masked Pan-Arab Sultan. Now owns a reasonably successful tuck-pointing business outside Tulsa.

12. Joe Record, No. 826 overall, Twins

Sounds like: Nom-de-mischief spontaneously conjured up by local 12-year-old male and presented to Plano, Texas law enforcement during detainment and questioning regarding a rash of house-eggings within gated community.

11. Baron Radcliff; No. 1,190 overall; Braves

Sounds like: Heir to Le Tigre menswear fortune, worried that yet-to-be-conceived son will attend a lesser Ivy.

10. Packy Naughton, No. 257 overall, Reds

Sounds like: 5-foot-2 beat cop whose mother keeps nagging him to sit for the sergeant's exam. His cousin Angus passed it, you know. Lifetime record of 408-399 in off-duty street fights.

9. Trey Hair; No. 1,009 overall; Rays

Sounds like: Nom-de-mischief almost spontaneously conjured up by local 12-year-old male and supplied to Plano, Texas law enforcement during detainment and questioning regarding a rash of house-eggings within gated community. Suspect went with "Joe Record" instead.

8. Brock Deatherage, No. 868 overall, Pirates

Sounds like: Short-lived side project of Krokus frontman Chris von Rohr. Also name of an orc who did not go to prep school.

7. Colton Hock, No. 119 overall, Marlins

Sounds like: Unsuccessful attempt at profanity howled after Packy Naughton slammed his thumb in the door of the wall safe. No, the other wall safe -- the one hidden behind the framed embroidery of the Notre Dame defensive line sacking Hitler.

6. Frankie Tostado, No. 576 overall, Giants

Sounds like: Nickname of Chicago-based wheeler-dealer and hustle-man. Sure, it's endearing when he outfits his mother with a new washing machine every six months, but it also hints at distant yet approaching consequences. "Relax, Ma," he says while demonstrating the front-loading door. "Everything's gonna be fine." Facing low-level racketeering charges after failing to contain his underworld feud with Mickey Doubloons and Larry the Ding Dong. Pretty soon, though, that problem will seem quaint by comparison.

5. Franklin Van Gurp, No. 756 overall, Giants

Sounds like: Personal injury lawyer to the Habsburg Dynasty. "Summon my services via parchment and plumed quill, get paid you will!" was advertising slogan.

4. Janson Junk, No. 662 overall, Yankees

Sounds like: Scandalously suggestive Jazz Age dance move. Chief cause of Fitzgerald's marital strife after Zelda and Oliver Jaskie gyrated the Jason Junk at the 21 Club one particular New Year's Eve.

3. Obie Ricumstrict, No. 344 overall, Rangers

Sounds like: Tribal leader of rogue band of tapeworms marshaled along the Colorado-Nebraska border.

2. Preston Grand Pre, No. 730 overall, Dodgers

Sounds like: Lisbon-based cat burglar with striking resemblance to Robespierre. Will do this one last job, make love for a week straight on the banks of the Danube, and then do the next job, probably.