Editor's note: In honor of hip-hop turning 50, ESPN tapped the culture's top voices to write about their favorite athlete name-drops in hip-hop history.
"Guardin' the base like Graig Nettles" -- Ghostface Killah on "Freestyle" with Raekwon (1995)
On the pothole-plastered streets of West Brighton, Staten Island, I spent the winter of 2008 scooping up ground balls and smashing tennis balls into parked cars with an aluminum bat whenever it was warm enough. My crouched batting stance was meant to mimic former New York Yankees second baseman Alfonso Soriano, and the casualness I tried to play the field with was to emulate Robinson Cano, the young replacement who was on the verge of superstardom.