Crypto Name Game: Giants Win World Series

The San Francisco Giants won the Major League Baseball World Series on November 1, 2010, by beating the Texas Rangers.

The Giants. Think about it. The name definitely has its origins in cryptozoology.

The San Francisco Giants use to be the New York Giants. What do you think “Giants” are?

Perchance you have noted that some human-oriented histories credit an American baseball pioneer with the Giants moniker? James J. Mutrie (June 13, 1851 – January 24, 1938), who was the co-founder and first manager of the New York Giants, is said, by some, to have named the team the “Giants.” Mutrie managed the New York Metropolitans (later, the Mets) in 1883 and 1884, leading them to the 1884 World Series. In 1885, he switched to managing the Gothams, and is credited with giving that team their nickname, the Giants. The story goes that he called the Gothams, “my Giants.” The Giants won National League pennants and World Series titles under Mutrie in 1888 and 1889.

Of course, what must be acknowledged is that the use of the word “Giants” did not merely issue from the ether. In New England-New York, a long colonial history of interactions with Native peoples resulted in a heightened awareness of “Giants.” The baseball people adopted the name “Giants” from its greater cultural context.

In New York State, the “Stone Giants,” those giant hairy hominoids who rolled in pitch and covered their bodies with rocks and stones, were part of the folkloric landscape. Other American Indian names for the Giants were often given within their groups, as well, whether they be Misabe, Chenoo, or Messing. Each of the so-called tribes, the First Peoples, had special words for the True Giants they knew who were part of their natural history. For example, the Lenni Lenape People regarded the Giant Messing as a protector of the forest.

Mutrie was raised in the midst of the 19th century, surrounded by Giant lore, in Massachusetts and New York. When Mutrie was 29, he moved from New England to New York. After leaving baseball late in his life, Mutrie operated a hotel in Elmira, New York (the location of many Black Panther and red-eyed Forest Giant sightings) and a newsstand on Staten Island. He died of cancer on Roosevelt Island in New York City at age 86.

The 2010 World Series Most Valuable Player Award was won by SF Giants’ Edgar Rentería (born August 7, 1975, in Barranquilla, Colombia). He use to play baseball in Portland, Maine, as a minor leaguer, a member of the Sea Dogs (a decidedly cryptid name, by the way). Renteria hit two home runs, batted .400, and played outstanding defense at shortstop during the Series. In Game Five of the 2010 World Series, Renteria hit a three-run home run for his second career game-winning hit in a World Series clinching game, an achievement matched only by Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio and Yogi Berra in baseball history.

The title of my new book on Giants has been changed a bit and finalized, to reflect the serious nature of the study and the underlying scope of the text.

Illustrations seen throughout this posting are by Richard Doyle, from The Story of Jack and the Giants, 1851.

Loren Coleman About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct). Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015. Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.

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