The Muscle Hamster
Doug Martin apparently never went to high school because he doesn’t seem to get how nicknames work. You can’t give yourself nicknames, that makes you a tool, and simply invites people to mock you further with the one you already hate. Doug doesn’t seem to get that the more he tells people to stop calling him Muscle Hamster, the more people are going to call him Muscle Hamster. It’s not like he works in a terribly professional job, he’s surrounded by a bunch of jocks, many of whom still have immature high school boy mentalities. Football has a massive fanbase of similar mentalities. His hatred of Muscle Hamster makes me only want to call him Muscle Hamster even more. Doug has two realistic options right now: accept that people will call him Muscle Hamster and ignore it, hoping it will die down eventually, or OWN THAT SHIT LIKE A MAN.
Muscle Hamster might not be the most flattering nickname to have, but holy hell, it is such a good nickname. It’s instantly unique, affectionate and disparaging at the same time, it comes with the best possible mental image, and it’s also incredibly marketable. I would buy a Muscle Hamster shirt. I would wear Muscle Hamster gear. I would hashtag #MuscleHamster tweets. Muscle Hamster is a bomb-ass nickname and he should be completely unashamed of it. Most great players never even manage to get their own #brand despite being stars, Doug was practically handed an easy marketing brand on a silver platter by his Boise State teammates and he’s shunning it like a moron. The Bucs don’t get media coverage, and if they do it’s not for him. He’s not a big enough star, and to be perfectly honest I kind of forgot he was even in the NFL until earlier this season, when he had a good game and then called out the NFL on twitter for using the name Muscle Hamster. His nickname has brought him practically his only real recognition! He needs to get on that shit like white on rice, and exploit the hell out of it for that extra dough while he can.
Just own it, Doug. Otherwise you’ll just be sitting there angry while we all still call you Muscle Hamster anyway.
Muscle Hamster.
I wrote a thing about it on Uproxx too
(I’d like to thank my twitter followers for coming up with two of those alternate nicknames, especially Swole Mole, which is just the best goddamn thing ever)
The only person who got to pick his own nickname and not look like a total tool doing it was LL Cool J.
The London Monarchs had a lineman called Marlon Brown, who went by the nick ‘Space Dog’. When asked why people call him that, he said ‘cause I tell them to’. Not gonna argue, he was a badass.
Kobe Bryant calling himself Black Mamba, while ridiculous, does kinda fit however. I always thought he was a bit of a dildo.
Oops, my bad, he was a linebacker.
I heard he doesn’t like the nickname because it reminds him of his ex girlfriend who broke his heart.. Not the actual name itself.
He and his girlfriend were given the double nickname “The Muscle Hampsters.” This keeps getting better and better.
Source: http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nfl/2012/11/08/buccaneers-doug-martin-story-behind-muscle-hamster/1693489/
The incident of him defending her and thus earning the sobriquet is a perfect example of how one acquires a nickname.
Best self-given nickname of all time:
Rod Smart’s HE HATE ME in the XFL.
If I worked the sound system at a stadium, after every play he touched the ball, Hamster Dance would play
Dee pa dee ba do do do do
please do this
Cannon, not canon. That’s a word, but a completely different one.
I think the Tank Rat or the Power Mouse is much more catchier, and makes Muscle Hamster seem like one of those spoofs that your twitter fans come up with.
I remember Doug Martin for his flashy first two years, then sucking in his third year.
To put it this way: have you ever been told that you look like an animal? Like a cat or a hamster? Or maybe had a girlfriend who you were told resembles an animal? It almost puts a smelly image to the person, and what I mean is that Doug Martin doesn’t want to think of himself as a hamster: an animal with small feet, small eyes and completely harmless. Even if it does have muscles.
seriously though. If he hired a halfway decent artist to draw him a ripped hamster logo he would instantly have something 1000x better than RG3.
also: All the comments make something pretty clear. If you don’t have a nickname and you put effort into it you *can* make one of your choosing stick. I think it’s pretty impossible to get out from under one you don’t like though
Reminds me of when Kevin Durant said he didn’t like “The Slim Reaper” because it sounded too scary or something, and said he’d rather be called “The Servant” instead.
THE SERVANT.
Instead of SLIM REAPER.
That’s one of the rare ways you can get away with giving yourself a nickname. “They want to call me something badass? Nah, just give me something boring and dull.”
Steve Sabol gave himself the nickname of “Sudden Death” during his college ball days by buying an ad in the local paper, supposedly purchased by his fictitious home town celebrating “Sudden Death Sabol”. He also wrote all the copy in his school paper.
Nuclear Nutria
Lightning Lemming
Bulldozing Beaver
The Chinchilla Thrilla
Some internet wag once suggested “Two Yards and a Cloud of Doug”, which is total brilliance.
Doug Martin should man the hell up, market the shit out of that nickname and make himself a fortune.
Oh, and that reminds me. How about that Eagles D. After spending weeks on the podcast saying how the Giants Offensive line was far, far better this year than last, it turns out all it took was a really good defense to tear it to shreds.
#FlyEaglesFly
Really missed the boat on Vascular Vole.
Does Doug Martin know that “Douggernaut” is already in Urban Dictionary as ” regular “guy nextdoor” who has a certain affinity for wild, unabashed sexual activities. You never know what he’s going to think of next, as his creativity in bed is without limit. Relates to the Marvel comic book villian “Juggernaut”, who has been deemed as “unstoppable”.”
Sick gains Guinea pig is a good one.
I love that one
Swole Mole is good too.
Capable Capybara
Iron Marmot
Go-ahead Gopher
First and Vole
Height supremacists pls go
I like Doug Martin. I played him on my fantasy team week 9 in 2012 when he rushed for 251 yards and 4 TDs. No Joke, my team name is the Fight’n Guinea Pigs (see the logo on my gravatar)–which was not named for Doug but was a happy coincidence.