Ir'a Christmas Eve (or by the time some of you read this, Christmas Day or Christmas Past), and that means time for Bauxites everywhere to gather 'round the (Hot Stove enflamed) fire and join in a round of Christmas Carols, Hall of Names style.

Yes, mid-1980s journeyman catcher Steve Christmas (Reds, White Sox, Cubs, 1983-1986), even with a career OPS+ of 27, is going to get used a lot in this holiday "card," but ideas also came from the 2003 Holiday Chatter thread, not to mention the (2004-05) New Year's Wishes from Baseball's Hall of Names foray. But for now, let's all just join together and sing ...

Click the links to access the associated player or players with holiday thanks to the genius of baseballreference.com. All carols listed include at least two (and up to six!) links embedded in their title.

1. White Christmas
2. Blue Christmas
3. Christmas for Cowboys
4. Deck the Halls
5. Frosty the Snow Man
6. Have Your Self a Merry Little Christmas
7. Santa Claus is Coming to Town
8. Holly Jolly Christmas
9. Jingle Bell Rock
10. Jingle Bells
11. Jolly Old Saint Nicholas
12. Do They Know It's Christmas
13. Hard Candy Christmas
14. I Saw Three Ships
15. Joy to the World
16. O Holy Night
17. Santa Baby
18. Holly and Ivy
19. Feliz Navi-Dad
20. Hark! the Herald Angels Sing
21. Merry Christmas, Darling
22. Pine Cones and Holly Berries
23. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Rein-Deer
24. Sleigh Ride
25. Silver Bells
26. The Little Drummer Boy
27. Winter Wonder-Land
28. We Three Kings
29. A Christmas Canon
30. Carol of the Bells
31. Angels We Have Heard On High

Hitting the Right Notes ... Surely, if you've clicked through or even rolled over any of the link groupings, you've noticed this team plays a little, ah, fast and loose with the traditional Hall of Names rules. For instance, though clearly one who "Decks the Halls" can be defended as a "Decker," we are also, out of the ordinary, accepting alternate spellings such as "Nava" for Navi- and nicknames like "Dad" AND allowing the combination of players (such as, thank goodness for Pedro, Feliz Nava-Dad). In other words, this Christmas, close is good enough!

We also took a couple of opportunities such as the "Three Kings" and "Three Ships" carols to link to three guys named "King" and three guys with "Ship" in their names. On a similar note, though we try to not use names more than once -- see the item about our pal Steve the catcher, above, and a very few others -- where multiple options were not available, indeed we did use duplicates. But perhaps this is made up for by the inclusion of links to no less than TEN different men named "Bell" including a three-generation family. (Yes, they're all in the same song title!)

In fact, with those Bells, you'll note the word is broken into three links by every-other-letter; this formation also appears in the aforementioned Navi-Dad, as well as Rein-Deer and Wonder-Land; if you check, remember, proper spelling is optional! Elsewhere on the list, such as "Pine Cones and Holly Berries," the links are to just one man named Cone and another named Berry, but we are open to suggestions for improvements.

So, we have the above 31 -- for better AND for worse -- now let's see, can we get to a "Top 40"? Go ahead, Bauxites, name your favourite (or least favourite) Christmas Carol not on the above list and the players whose names would help constitute the carol's title. Don't feel obligated to write the code -- we can do that here in Santa's workshop! Just make your list, check it twice, and post it here on Batter's Box.