http://newyork.yankees.mlb.com/team/player.jsp?player_id=466320
I checked both the Yankees’ website and Wikipedia and there is no further explanation offered. I get I assumed it was short for “Melquiades” (which I had only heard of from that movie Tommy Lee Jones directed with that name in the title) or some other name…
Melky? Really? His parents named him that?
Why not? A few years ago Alabama had a running back named Siran Stacy, whose mother (a) explained that she named him after Saran Wrap, and (b) did not actually know how it was spelled.
I thought it was a Spanish name. He was born and raised in the Dominican Republic.
There is apparently a Melky Sedeck in music from Haiti.
I have never heard any anecdotes about his name like Robby Cano, who was named after Jackie Robinson.
Jim
I thought it must be short for Melchior or something related to that name - Melquiades might be the Spanish equivalent - but like you, I could never find anything to back that up.
Oh - I am with you; parents can do whatever they want and there is no shortage of examples of interesting names. This one just struck me as that much more…interesting-er 
so I assumed there was a story in there somewhere…
Knowing Dominicans and the art of naming their kids, Melky as a stand-alone name is a good enough bet. I know a Flady (male), Gaudy (female) and have seen the names Panky and Bredyg (not a typo) in Dominican newspapers - first names of journalists. Our mechanic’s baby daughter is called something like Lychee (that’s what it sounds like anyway) and I’ve also come across a Macbeth (female) and a Stormhawk (male).
If I don’t stop now, I could go on ad nausea (sic).
Yes, unlike some of the more tight-sphinctered European countries, we in the islands are notorious for how obviously we do NOT have a Bureau of What NOT to Name Your Child at the registry office. Then again we don’t even have spellcheckers for the regular traditional names; Og help the child if dad has really bad handwriting when filling out the form…
A number of girls born in the 80s around here, for instance, are named Leididai (Lady Di, rendered phonetically in Spanish) and that’s one of the mildest, easiest to understand, instances. It’s just that by some circumstance, the DR and Haiti seem to get nailed even among their neighbors as being particularly enthusiastic about inventive names.
BTW, Marley23, Spanish for Melchior is “Melchor”. Melquiades is a different name altogether (and someone named Melquiades is stereotypically a senior citizen)
Melkor? Morgoth plays for the Yankees??? :eek:
(You know all those Sox fans noticed that a long time ago.)
The Scots use it as slang for a physical beating (as well as for getting stone drunk) although the spelling is “malky”. The pronunciation is really more like “melky” with a proper Scottish accent, though. 
I’ve a feeling though that with a last name like Cabrera, there’s probably no Celtic relation.
Don’t forget the Cubans - they are masters of the art. 
Ah, ah, ah… Spanish does not use “ch” to convey the glottal ch’ sound. We only pronounce “ch” as in “chocolate”.
Next up: What is Yuniesky Betancourt’s real name?
And what’s with all those Vladimirs in the DR?