BALTIMORE -- When Trey Mancini was around 8 years old, a family friend named Ray Mouton gave him a nickname that would wind up standing the test of time. Noting how he shared a last name with famed boxer Ray Mancini, Mouton, whose son was Little League teammates with Trey, began calling the budding slugger “Boom Boom.” It was the same moniker as Ray Mancini, who won three consecutive WBA lightweight titles in the early '80s.

A few years later, Mancini and another teammate grew into forces in the middle of their Little League lineup. Teammates called the other kid “Bam Bam” and Trey “Boom Boom,” because “we were both giant 12-year-olds who liked hitting home runs.” The nickname stuck, eventually morphing into “Boomer” during Mancini’s college years at Notre Dame.

• List of player nicknames

“Most of my college friends call me ‘Boomer’ and not ‘Trey,’” Mancini said. “I feel like there are some people who might not even know my real name.”

Flash forward to the present day, when Mancini called it “an easy choice” to don the nickname for Players’ Weekend. This will be the second straight Players’ Weekend that Mancini has done so, but as one of MLB’s 30 team ambassadors this time around, it marks the first one during which Mancini has assumed a leadership role. As the Orioles’ ambassador, Mancini will take the team lead in championing the initiative and his teammates’ efforts during the three-day event, scheduled for Aug. 23-25.

• Players' Weekend details

“It’s always a really cool thing,” Mancini said. “It lets the fans see kind of how we are off the field a little bit too, and that’s a really neat thing.”

Across the Majors, players have selected nicknames for themselves for the back of their jerseys, and they were given the chance to design, wear and use creatively colored and decorated equipment. A patch honoring late Angels starter Tyler Skaggs will also be available for players to wear on their uniforms, if they choose.

Other notable Orioles nicknames include Stevie Wilkerson (Breeze), Anthony Santander (Agua Blanca) and Paul Fry (Papa Frita). For Baltimore, Players’ Weekend coincides with three games against the Rays at Oriole Park.

“I think the players love it,” Orioles manager Brandon Hyde (Hyder) said. “Any time you’re going to add positive fan experience from it, guys have fun with it obviously. Don’t take yourself too seriously in this tough business we’re involved in. I think it’s great. I think it loosens things up.”

Hyde chuckled when remembering his nickname, calling it “pretty boring.”

Mancini, though, revealed his with pride, calling it “a testament to my whole baseball career.” He recalled a memory from 2016, when a surprise waited for him after a game at Triple-A.

It was a signed photo of Ray Mancini that read: “From one ‘Boom Boom’ to another, good luck.”