Yasiel Puig is so popular that people are naming their children after him
People are naming their kids after Yasiel Puig
Most children are named after their parents or the parents' parents or some other relative or the place they were conceived. But it appears that a slew of children born in the last year or two have Dodgers phenom Yasiel Puig as their namesake.
When Puig burst onto the scene for the Dodgers in June of 2013 to the tune of 44 hits and 7 homers in his first month, many people still speculated about his potential as a ballplayer and as a fan favorite. However, in the Pasadena Star-News, one expert hypothesized that "Yasiel" would rise to prominence as a popular baby name, like "Kobe" did in 1997 (after some guy named Kobe Bryant took over the NBA straight outta high school).
Between 2000 and 2010, there were fewer than 50 children born in the United States named Yasiel. According to NameBerry.com, approximately 100 boys were named "Yasiel" or "Jasiel" in 2013 and that number is expected to grow (the site says the name's popularity is up 162 percent this week).
Over at BabyCenter.com, they've organized their data into a fancy little graph that demonstrates exactly how popular "Yasiel" is right now.
Boom. That's that "it" factor that you can't teach right now. Sure, Mike Trout has his WAR and Jose Abreu's got that power, but they're not altering the course of human history by reversing baby name trends. Yasiel Puig is the new everything.