First, fans started calling Jayson Tatum “The Anomaly.” Then they spiraled into even more surreal waters: Cade Cunningham is “The Paradox”; Santi Aldama is “The Trolley Problem.” It’s all patently absurd—and kind of awesome.
ByMatthew Roberson
March 12, 2025
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Think of the most iconic nicknames in NBA history. Whether it’s Pistol Pete Maravich, Hakeem “The Dream” Olajuwon, or Air Jordan, the very best hooper sobriquets all possess a distinct throwback flair. It’s not hard to imagine an old-timey radio broadcaster reading them in that transatlantic accent that nobody really has anymore. Even some of the canonical modern NBA nicknames (King James, The Joker, The Greek Freak) feel very last-century-coded.
For the most part, though, when current players receive nicknames, they almost always lack the creativity of their forefathers—either it’s just their initials (KD, SGA, AD) or a shortened version of their name (Ant, Book, Wemby).
Or that was the case, anyway, until a recent trend swept through the NBA like a midseason plague. In the place of newspaper columnists or local broadcasters, a new class of NBA nicknames are being coined by young, extremely online, gambling-addicted fans. And if you’re aware of this trend at all, it’s probably because of Jayson Tatum.
At some point this season, devoted Tatum fans decided that the Celtics star needed a nickname. They landed on…The Anomaly, a nod to Tatum’s unique skill set. It immediately took off online, eventually winding up canonized on his Basketball Reference page. And yet Tatum, understandably, isn’t all that sure about the moniker himself. During a recent press conference, the 27-year-old responded to a question about The Anomaly by swerving to some other nicknames: namely “Big Deuce” and “Taco.”
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The potential for bathroom humor aside, Big Deuce only really works as a nickname with the context that Tatum’s son is named Jayson Jr.—a.k.a. Deuce. Taco, meanwhile, sounds too much like something your friends might call you during a recess pickup game. Getting 30 dropped on you by a guy named Taco is fine on the playground, not so much during the Eastern Conference Finals. As such, we’re probably stuck with The Anomaly. Because of the way the world works now, full of irony and increasingly devoid of earnestness, expect NBA fans to refer to Tatum as The Anomaly for the foreseeable future.
But the real story here is the countless offshoots The Anomaly has inspired. In the span of a few days, NBA Twitter ran wild bestowing Anomaly-style nicknames to a wide range of players, often with absurd and hilarious results. Let’s run through some of them here, starting with a few that could be conceivably embraced by the players themselves.
Cade Cunningham: The Paradox
A couple of days ago, the popular TikTok account House of Highlights posted a video of Cunningham spinning to the basket with overlaid text that read “The Paradox with a tuff bucket,” accompanied by a flame emoji and the one where the guy is blowing steam out of his nose. That is, at its core, the whole point of these nicknames. If you can’t picture it being used by an aggregator account with that exact emoji combo, go back to the drawing board. It also helps that paradox is an incredibly fun word to say.
Bam Adebayo: The Onomatopeia
Truthfully, this one is my favorite, both because it’s accurate—his name is Bam!—and because it can hopefully teach our famously reading-averse youth a literary term.
Evan Mobley: The Predicament
Being called “a problem” is a universal compliment for any hooper. But watching Evan Mobley dominate both ends of the floor and declaring, “Bro is a predicament!” goes even harder.
Cam Thomas: The Singularity
It’s true that Cam Thomas is a singular presence in the NBA. Few players orient their entire game around getting buckets quite like the Nets’ top scorer, whose Twitter nickname made it all the way to team account and the in-game broadcast.
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Tyrese Haliburton: The Difference
It’s hard to pinpoint the exact origin of any of these nicknames, but on February 28, this video was posted:
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From a fan perspective, the subtext here is clear: Haliburton is often the difference between winning and losing. It’s a much cleaner name than, say, “The Difference Maker,” which is more descriptive but less snappy. In the short time since The Difference hit the internet, it’s gained some legitimacy, which leads us to our next entry…
Dyson Daniels: The Outback Outlier
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The Outback Outlier vs. The Difference. What a sentence. Would any person know what this post meant if it didn’t also include a picture of Haliburton with Dyson Daniels, the Australian defensive specialist for the Atlanta Hawks? No, they would not. But therein lies the fun of this current nickname machine: The more ridiculous you can get with it, the better. Let’s continue down that path, shall we?
Santi Aldama: The Trolley Problem
The undisputed GOAT of 2025 nickname mania, The Trolley Problem has gone international. I’ll be honest: I don’t know where this one started, but it’s easily the silliest of the bunch. The Grizzlies’ floor spacer from Spain has definitely given defenses some problems this year—Aldama is posting career highs in points per game, field goal percentage, and assists—but not exactly the ethical kind that asks if you’d kill one person to save five.
Jalen Green: The Ad Hominem Fallacy
Per Wikipedia, the ad hominem fallacy is a rhetorical strategy where the speaker attacks the character, motive, or some other attribute of the person making an argument rather than the substance of the argument itself. In the case of Jalen Green, the mercurial Houston Rockets shooting guard, fans were once quick to poke holes in his often infuriating shot selection, questionable defense, and the fact that he is dating a woman 17 years his senior.
But this year Green has undoubtedly made the leap. His defense and shooting has improved, he’s gotten much more efficient offensively, and he’s become one of the faces of a Rockets team that will return to the playoffs for the first time since the the Bubble. With this step forward, Green has shielded himself from the kind of basketball criticism that defined his early career. If you’re hating on him now, it’s probably a fallacious ad hominem attack.
Toumani Camara: The Tax Man
This one’s for the real ball knowers. The Portland Trail Blazers are one of the more anonymous teams in the league this year, but they may have found a gem in second-year Belgian player Toumani Camara. Long and springy, with a defensive mindset, Camara has become a cult favorite of the League Pass army. His play has also earned him a nickname that started with a Blazers reporter and then was cosigned by the team.
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The joke here is that if Camara is guarding you, he’s taking 35 percent of your field goal percentage. It’s a perfectly in-the-weeds nickname for a guy that’s not famous at all but has made the type of impact that basketball obsessives notice.
Terry Rozier: The Investigation
Finally, we have Terry “The Investigation” Rozier. Earlier this year the Miami Heat guard was in hot water with federal prosecutors due to some unusual gambling behavior. While Rozier has not been charged with a crime or suspended by the league, his performance during a game in Cleveland last week raised some eyebrows for all the wrong reasons.
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Many people watched Rozier spit up four turnovers and go 1-for-8 from the three-point line and openly wondered whether he was point shaving or taking the under on his own stat line. That’s how you end up with a dubious nickname like The Investigation, which is as humorous as it is troubling.