The Most Inappropriate Nicknames

[SaadOffTheDeck]

Apologies if this has been done over and over here.

I'll go with "Vicious" Vaughn Bean & Freddie "Lil Hagler" Norwood for starters.

[Archie Moore]

Hector "Macho" Camacho?

[bollox]

Herol 'Bomber' Graham

[Mr E]

Eddie "Shasta Blaster" Machen -- I like the nickname but it evokes an image of a vicious, aggessive slugger, which Eddie was not.

Sam "The Boston Tar Baby" Langford -- inappropriate in every way, even for the time.

[HomicideHenry]

'The Ding-a-Ling Man'

[IKSRTFO]

'The Ding-a-Ling Man'

That was my first thought when I saw the title. That made me wonder if I let my daughter watch him fight without fearing having "the talk" with her.

[IKSRTFO]

Anyone nicknamed little Tyson.

[Grimm]

'The Ding-a-Ling Man'

That was my first thought when I saw the title. That made me wonder if I let my daughter watch him fight without fearing having "the talk" with her.

"When I hit you I ring your bell".

[boxing_fanatic_87]

That brief period when Lance Whitaker wanted to be known as "Goofi" seemed pretty ridiculous.

[Goodnight, Irene]

'The Ding-a-Ling Man'

That was my first thought when I saw the title. That made me wonder if I let my daughter watch him fight without fearing having "the talk" with her.

[NazNaci1]

'Dangerous' Dan Schommer.

As Barry Hearn said,' he was as dangerous as my dog, and he had only one leg'.

[oliverfennell]

Johnny Nelson, "The Entertainer", who was in two of the acknowledged most boring title fights in history at any weight, and even when he eventually found his confidence and form in a WBO title run, was still incredibly defensively-minded.

[man]

Hector "Macho" Camacho?

i found that always so much over the top that
it got okay again ...

[harrygreb]

i dont think the "tar baby" nickname was inappropriate Mr E. it helps modern readers get a feel for the sociological climate of those times. please dont be offended but its a bit late to cry over the wrongs of the distant past.

[Adamj1987]

the atlantic city express train

[Mr E]

i dont think the "tar baby" nickname was inappropriate Mr E. it helps modern readers get a feel for the sociological climate of those times. please dont be offended but its a bit late to cry over the wrongs of the distant past.

I'm not 'crying' over anything. Sam Langford was a great fighter -- quick, cagey, tough, and a tremendous hitter. My point is that an insulting (even for the times) diminutive like 'Tar Baby' does not even begin to convey the kind of fighter he was. May was well say 'Gentle Mike Tyson' or 'Hurricane Ernie Terrell.'

[raylawpc]

i dont think the "tar baby" nickname was inappropriate Mr E. it helps modern readers get a feel for the sociological climate of those times. please dont be offended but its a bit late to cry over the wrongs of the distant past.

I'm not 'crying' over anything. Sam Langford was a great fighter -- quick, cagey, tough, and a tremendous hitter. My point is that an insulting (even for the times) diminutive like 'Tar Baby' does not even begin to convey the kind of fighter he was. May was well say 'Gentle Mike Tyson' or 'Hurricane Ernie Terrell.'

I'm not so sure it was a racial epithet in the early 20th century. The term itself dates to the 19th-century "Uncle Remus" stories, and refers to a doll made of tar that traps the main character, the Br'er Rabbit. The more the Br'er Rabbit struggled, the more entangled he became. Thus, it was used to describe a sticky mess - which is what anyone who fought Sam Langford found himself in.

I guess it has racial overtones today, as discovered by former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney when he referred to Boston's troubled highway commuter tunnel project as a "tar baby," and was chastized by some African-American leaders for using a "racially insensitive" term.

[harrygreb]

yes, i had read that it derives from brer rabbit. in that context it is certainly a suitable moniker for the great sam. thanks for that.

had it been a referent to sam's skin colour i still think it would have sociological interest even though it - as mr e rightly states - doesnt say anything about his boxing genius.

[alexpaterson]

Jermain "Bad Intentions" Taylor, when thats what he really lacked

[SaadOffTheDeck]

Hatton & Leonard both were guilty of copyright infringement.

['Frilla]

The Greatest 8)

[ben geoghegan]

raylaw is exactly right. Tar baby isn't offensive at all. It was just deemed offensive later by people unfamiliar with that term who felt it was "bad". But it describes Langford's style. He was short and squat and deceptively clever and a big mess to tangle with. A tar baby was a trap used to snare pests and that's Langford. Just another case of the cult of zealously oversensitive political correctness overzealotry

[man]

anyone knows how i can add a pic here?

[BoxBuzz]

raylaw is exactly right. Tar baby isn't offensive at all. It was just deemed offensive later by people unfamiliar with that term who felt it was "bad". But it describes Langford's style. He was short and squat and deceptively clever and a big mess to tangle with. A tar baby was a trap used to snare pests and that's Langford. Just another case of the cult of zealously oversensitive political correctness overzealotry

Isn't it crazy? I was born and raised in southern tradition and this is just the worst offense of "educated buffoonery" at it's most blatant. Who made the connection of Tar=Black=Negative? Takes a lot of goofy imagineering to get there. Uncle Remus stories are hearfelt wonders not some sort of racial posturing.
The connection should have been thus: Tar=Sticky=Menacing (if utilized in the clever fashion that brer fox intended)

Someone said it earlier....the bad guys (Brer Fox and his more innocent side kick Brer Bear) were out to get the vastly more intelligent but a bit too overconfident brer rabbit. They set up a trap for him in the visage of the Tar Baby.....as the happy go lucky Rabbit wanders up he greets the young black image with a smiling "How do you do" (also a great song was made from this greeting) The Tar Baby remains mute, and Brer rabbit will have none of such a sour demeanor and is determined to "make a friend". So he shakes his hand....which leads to his near demise as he is now caught in Brer fox's evil plan.

Tar Baby is anything that is sticky, presents a threat, and has the possibility of overwhelming.

How the hell does that get evolved into a racial slur? Only an Ivy League mind could possibly explain this.


Another term Niggardly.......(notice the spelling is sans the "E"? No connection whatsoever to a racial statement.....but once again weak minds who have no knowledge of language and it's origins have often fired or punished various persons for using the term perfectly correctly. (That word and the racial slur do not come from the same syntax tree...they are absolutely free of meaning in context of each other.


"Niggardly" (noun: "niggard") is an adjective meaning "stingy" or "miserly", perhaps related to the Old Norse verb nigla = "to fuss about small matters". It is cognate with "niggling", meaning "petty" or "unimportant", as in "the niggling details".

"person" derives from the Spanish/Portuguese word negro, meaning "black", and probably also the French nègre, which likewise has become a racist insult in American culture, deriving from negro (the ordinary French word for "black" being noir). Both negro and noir (and therefore also nègre and person) ultimately come from nigrum, the accusative case of the Latin word niger, meaning "black".

In this case Tar Baby has suffered contextual confusion in a similar manner.

This may surprise you but retiring the word Niggardly makes sense to me, because it will be much more difficult to educate people than to abandon the term. However this is how political correctness evolves.....and it robs the well intended critical thinker of the meaning of language, and it is an insidious form of the dumbing down of our culture. Thus it should be challenged whenever possible IMHO.

I wish you all good intent, and in the spirit of Christmas....don't put a judgment on another that you wouldn't want put on yourself.



But whaddya gonna do? No one actually engages in much critical thinking these days....

[kevin mitchell]

i dont think the "tar baby" nickname was inappropriate Mr E. it helps modern readers get a feel for the sociological climate of those times. please dont be offended but its a bit late to cry over the wrongs of the distant past.

It's never too late, sunshine.