Troublesome player names

[Jon Chelesnik]

Have you ever had a player name or group of names that gives you trouble to pronounce?

[AkSarBen]

Four months out of college I was doing a Juco baseball game and the rival pitcher's last name was Aielerhallagen. A-lerhallagon, but it was tough to keep repeating it. Finally, he was taken out of the game and was replaced....by his twin brother.

[JoeVasile]

Doing high school basketball in Philly this year one team had a guy named Liamonds Chatkevicious...that was a fun one.

[Steve Clark]

University Women's Volleyball Name: Thinesa Sriskandarajah

Fortunately everyone called her Thinesa Sri. I was happy to go with that!

[jaymurry]

Two seasons ago, Washington University's men's basketball team brought in a team from Bejing to play in its early-season tournament. Fortunately, Wash-U head coach Mark Edwards videotaped the pronunciation of each Tsinghua University basketball player and head coach with an interpreter, and e-mailed it to me. It took me four hours to get the names to roll off my tongue smoothly, but the perseverance paid off with two memorable broadcasts of Tsinghua's games. As a backup, I wrote each of the Tsinghua names phonetically on my scoresheet.

One of the highlights of my play-by-play career!

[Bisko]

I've had a few that have given me problems

[JimRiley]

Up this way we're chock full of Eastern European names, including some where every other letter is a Z.

I had a high school fullback named "Wengrznek." My color man coached against him and knew how to pronounce it. Every time I butchered it, he'd calmly say "nice run by wen-jen-ek" With each subsequent butchering he became less calm.

Then there was Gryzwacz

[Krupper]

Often, the hard names don't give me problems. Some examples:

Several years ago, the Whalers had two Tyler Browns on the team and they stayed with Plymouth for the better part of three seasons. For a while, they played on a forward line together.

Tyler J. Brown is from Westland, MI. Tyler G. Brown is from Wasaga Beach, ON. They are different kinds of players and they both wanted to be identified properly.

When they made the team as rookies, I decided right away - as a sign of respect to the players and their families - that I wouldn't use nicknames, so it was Tyler G. Brown and Tyler J. Brown.

I learned to live with it. When Tyler J. Brown got traded to London, I didn't realize how difficult the task was until the first game when my team had just one Brown.

Roughly in 2000, the OHL had two Mike Smiths in the league - one is now a goaltender for the Phoenix Coyotes and the other was a good player in the league who played for Plymouth and Kingston.

I had a game once of having Mike Smith (the forward) shoot on Mike Smith the goaltender. If I remember correctly, whenever there was a question, I would say, "goaltender Mike Smith."

Also, last year there were two Jake Patersons in the OHL that were goaltenders. Jake Paterson (from Mississauga, ON) played for Saginaw and is now up for the NHL Entry Draft. Jake Patterson (from Sault Ste. Marie, ON) started last season in Plymouth and was traded to London. I do not think the two Jakes faced each other in a game last season.

Pete Krupsky
Plymouth Whalers

[ktomasch]

When CSKA Moscow toured the IHL in 1993-94, I prepped for our one game against them for weeks. Got the phonetic pronunciations, did them into a tape recorder and then listened back for weeks leading up to the game. Worked great, I was completely comfortable with the Russian names.

It helps to have either friends who speak different native tongues or a working knowledge of foreign languages yourself. You get to understand how some things should be pronounced in various languages, even if you've not seen that particular name before. Between ws as vs and ceks as "check," you get used to it if you pay enough attention.

My first night ever on the air on radio in 1985, Slobodan Zivojinovic won at Wimbledon. I didn't get it right then, but I always tried to get 'em right since.

[ktomasch]

Oh, as for the original question...types of names that give me trouble are Indian or other Eastern Asian names.

(Also, don't fall into the trap of thinking you have to sound like a native speaker of the particular tongue when you pronounce a name. I know some very gringo announcers who will overpronounce latino names, and it sounds ridiculous. Nobody expects you to be roll your rs as much as a native Spanish speaker, and it's pretentious if you do. If you're a gringo, be a gringo, just be respectful of the player's language as best you can.)

In other words, don't do this:

http://www.ovguide.com/video/saturday-n ... 5e2877c6b1

[Jon Chelesnik]

I always found it helpful to re-write difficult names phonetically on my roster.

[DonWadewitz]

I always found it helpful to re-write difficult names phonetically on my roster.

I spell out difficult names phonetically everywhere - roster, spotting sheets, lineup cards - but the problem I tend to have is I try to over pronunciate the difficult names. I can read them for an hour prior to the game but when I get to that name for the first couple of times in a game, I may try and break it down too much. Anyone do this or used to do this and have a solution? I've started to push some phonetics together as one syllable because I read it better. I normally break it up with a "-".

[Danny Breslauer]

While I was a student at Rutgers and calling games for WRSU, I had the opportunity to call RU @ Navy football. The QB for Navy was Kaipo-Noa Kaheaku-Enhada.

Good times.

[JPsT]

I'm usually good with anything except the Asian (Korean names, especially, are completely out of my realm).

[Paul Van Scott]

I always found it helpful to re-write difficult names phonetically on my roster.

Yeah I don't know why anyone wouldn't do this. When I first started in the business there was a tendency for me to think it was disrespectful to not write their names correctly on my charts. I'm not sure why I thought that but once I realized no one would ever see the charts but me and it was more important to make sure I get the names right every time that's how I have done it.