“Carson” Baby Name Fever in Philadelphia

I don’t know about you, but I’m obsessed with baby names. I have no children myself, but I have a long list of possible first/middle name combinations for if and when the day comes that I find the perfect man and settle down to spawn. That’s why I find it so fascinating that NBC Sports Philadelphia posted about the spike in babies named Carson since last year, when Carson Wentz started the Eagles on the victorious trend that took them straight to the Superbowl.

Baby names follow trends, and some are transient enough to even be called fads. It’s most noticeable with girls’ names right now, where former “old lady names” like Charlotte, Ava, Olivia, and Sophia are ruling the charts. Significant world, national, or local events can also leads to jumps in baby name popularity. In Philadelphia, there was a rash of little Chases born in 2008 and 2009, right when Chase Utley and the Phillies were hitting peak excellence.

Now, it’s happening with Carson. Per NBC: “According to the US Social Security database, there were 301 babies named Carson in Pennsylvania in 2017, a clear spike from recent years. And we’re at the intersection of Chase and Carson. In 2017, for the first time in the last decade, there were actually more babies named Carson (301) than Chase (299) in Pa. And it’ll probably be that way for a while.”

This kind of trend can happen with beloved sports figures, and its most prominent when the person in question has a unique name. There has probably been an increase in the number of little Nicks and Nicholases since Nick Foles stepped in and did the damn thing back in January, but since that’s such a common name, it’s hard to track an increase in popularity.

Back to NBC: “The Eagles drafted Carson Wentz in 2016 and the rise of his name in Pennsylvania was immediate. In 2015, Carson was the 81st-most popular name (181 babies) in Pennsylvania. In 2016, the year he was drafted, it became the 59th-most popular name (247) and in 2017 it was up to 39th (301). It’s a pretty safe bet that we’ll see that number rise even more in 2018, even after Wentz was injured for the playoff run to the Super Bowl. For what it’s worth, Carson wasn’t even on the top 100 names in Pennsylvania before 2009, which means the name was already on the rise … but Wentz’s success clearly put a charge in it. “