From Piggy Ward to Steamer Flanagan, here are some of the best Pittsburgh baseball nicknames

How one gains a nickname varies. Your friends catch you falling over, and suddenly you’re known as Faceplant for the rest of your natural life. Drink milk every day for lunch? Welcome to the world, Skim. In American baseball, however, nicknames come with the territory. The tradition dates back to the very early days of the sport, when mustachioed gents tucked their big, blousy jerseys into their big, blousy pants and (I assume) rode their penny farthings to the playing field/abandoned dirt lot. This certainly applies to Pittsburgh, which has boasted at least one baseball team since the 1800s. The city produced the Pittsburgh Alleghenys (now the Pirates) and the short-lived Pittsburgh Burghers team, which lasted a single season before merging with the Alleghenys. (Fun fact: The Pirates supposedly got their name after an American Association of Base Ball Clubs official called the Alleghenys’ aggressive recruiting methods “piratical.”) Pittsburgh also had two legendary Negro League Baseball teams, the Homestead Grays and the Pittsburgh Crawfords. Old baseball doesn’t exist solely in Pittsburgh’s history books, either. Each summer, the Meadowcroft Rockshelter and Historic Village in Avella, Pa., hosts Vintage Base Ball Day , bringing to life the sport as it was in the 19th century. In honor of the current baseball season and the upcoming Vintage Base Ball Day (Sat., Aug. 22), Pittsburgh City Paper combed through old rosters and Wikipedia pages to compile a list of the weirdest, coolest, and most suggestive (by today’s standards, anyway) Pittsburgh player names going back to the late 1800s. Top 10 Best Pittsburgh Baseball Names George “Foghorn”/”Doggie”/”Calliope” Miller ( Pittsburgh Alleghenys, catcher, 1884 ): OK, dude, save some nicknames for the rest of us. Buttercup Dickerson ( Pittsburgh Alleghenys, outfielder, 1883) : Despite being cred