Before I give you the details, let’s bash William Shakespeare a bit. It’s his fault that I have to write this. It’s his fault that you have to follow my instructions if you want your baby to be the next Tiger Woods.

What did Shakespeare do to merit a verbal thrashing? It was that damn rose thing. “What’s in a name,” he queried ? Then instead of waiting for an answer, he gave his own erroneous response. “A rose by any other name would still smell as sweet.”

Okay, Okay. It might work for roses but not for people. Do you think for one minute Rocky Marciano would have become Heavyweight Champion of the World if he had been named Percival? His Mom and Dad named him tough and he lived up to it. And it is no coincidence that several other guys named Rocky went on to win Championships.

And what about the Tiger? Ask anybody who ever played against Mr. Woods and they will tell you he is a Tiger. I think his game would have withered and died if his folks had called him Mortimer.

Look, if you want your offspring to be a great motorcycle racer - it’s a no brainer. Call the kid, “Harley“.

If you want him to be a baseball player, “Bat” is good. Call him “Mike” and he’s got a good shot to win American Idol. That will work even better if your last name is Crofone.

Stay away from the old names. Call your kid Bill and he will be disliked because he will remind people of something everybody hates that comes once a month. Bob is no better because it’s what we do for apples at Halloween parties. Jim is no good because it is a place where people go to sweat.

Matt is bogus because if you name a kid Matt, people will walk all over him. Jack? Nope. That’s a car part.

Richard would be okay except that everybody is going to shorten it to a body part - and do you really want to call your kid a Dick. And what about when he gets older and other kids come to the door and ask if little Dick can come out to play. And if little Dick is a junior that means there’s a big Dick and I know that’s going to be uncomfortable for somebody.

To sum up. You’ve got nine months from the time of conception to come up with a name that can make your baby a hero or a zero.

Even with careful planning things don’t always work out the way you hope….but if you pick wisely things will turn out fine.

I can’t verify this…but I heard that back in 1964 there was a man who loved movies more than anything in the world except for baseball. He was a rabid New York Yankee fan and his favorite player was Roger Maris.

After Maris set a new record by hitting 61 home runs, this man decided to name his unborn son, “Maris”.

Everything was great. His wife also loved the name and all was set until the delivery. Instead of a son his wife delivered a beautiful baby girl. The man was distraught. He did not know what to do. He had his heart set on having a little Maris.

Then a kindly nurse spoke to him.” You can still use the name, Maris,” she told him. “You know how they put an A on the end of a boy’s name to make it female. Like Martin becomes Martina. Your baby won’t become a baseball player but maybe she will become a great actress if you name her Maris-a. Marisa. Marisa. “

“How does that sound to you Mr. Tomei?”