There is an 1890's first baseman/catcher named William Brown. He is listed in the whatifsports database as Willard. Does anyone know the reason for this ? All the other references to this particular player on the internet list him as William and his nickname was Big Bill. Just wondering.

It could be a mistake, a typo. The 1947 Willard is a HOF inductee from his Negro League play(2006).

They have them linked correctly to their bbref.com page.

I do not see anywhere that the earlier player used the name Willard.

You could send a ticket to admin to clarify. Perhaps in the next update they will correct it.

There are occasional updates to things like this. for example, I am now reviving a regressive league that's been dead for a while, and when I went through the rosters from our last season played at the end of 2017, one of the players on someone's roster was Andy Thornton (he was a 1B/DH in the 1970s and 80s). Now in the WIS database, he has become Andre Thornton, and he is Andre Thornton on Baseball Reference now. It's the same dude, different name.

Coco/Covelli Crisp is another

Players who've changed their names (Mike/Giancarlo Stanton, Bobby Moore/Ahmad Rashad, Lew Alcindor/Kareem Abdul Jabbar) also can cause complications.

Here is a weird one I just noticed when researching for a progressive league draft. Jose Deleon is sometiems in WIS with a small "l" and sometimes spelled with a capital "L". The stranger thing is that it appears it is spelled with the "L" only when he played with more than 1 team in a season

		Player	Team	T	IP/162	W	L	SV	ERA	WHIP	OAV	K/9	BB/9	Salary	F/R
1		Deleon, Jose	1983 Pittsburgh Pirates	R	108	7	3	0	2.83	1.13	.196	9.83	3.92	$3,480,709	B/D
2		Deleon, Jose	1984 Pittsburgh Pirates	R	193	7	13	0	3.74	1.24	.214	7.16	4.31	$5,079,369	D+/D-
3		Deleon, Jose	1985 Pittsburgh Pirates	R	164	2	19	3	4.70	1.40	.231	8.24	4.92	$3,415,792	B+/D
4		DeLeon, Jose	1986 Chicago White Sox	R	79	4	5	0	2.96	1.15	.179	7.75	4.78	$2,337,808	B/A
5		DeLeon, Jose	1986 Chicago White Sox	R	96	5	8	1	3.87	1.31	.195	7.46	5.57	$2,387,376	B/A
6		DeLeon, Jose	1986 Pittsburgh Pirates	R	96	5	8	1	3.87	1.31	.195	7.46	5.57	$2,204,615	B/A
7		Deleon, Jose	1987 Chicago White Sox	R	206	11	12	0	4.02	1.33	.230	6.68	4.24	$4,830,067	D/D
8		Deleon, Jose	1988 St. Louis Cardinals	R	226	13	10	0	3.67	1.26	.237	8.31	3.43	$5,519,937	A+/D
9		Deleon, Jose	1989 St. Louis Cardinals	R	245	16	12	0	3.05	1.03	.197	7.39	2.94	$7,881,026	D-/D
10		Deleon, Jose	1990 St. Louis Cardinals	R	183	7	19	0	4.43	1.39	.246	8.08	4.24	$3,962,911	C-/D-
11		Deleon, Jose	1991 St. Louis Cardinals	R	163	5	9	0	2.71	1.26	.239	6.53	3.38	$3,497,828	A+/D+
12		DeLeon, Jose	1992 Philadelphia Phillies	R	118	2	8	0	4.37	1.36	.250	6.06	3.68	$2,429,314	A+/C
13		DeLeon, Jose	1992 St. Louis Cardinals	R	118	2	8	0	4.37	1.36	.250	6.06	3.68	$2,423,267	A+/C
14		DeLeon, Jose	1992 St. Louis Cardinals	R	103	2	7	0	4.57	1.35	.245	6.33	3.78	$2,093,609	A+/C
15		DeLeon, Jose	1993 Philadelphia Phillies	R	47	3	0	0	3.26	1.40	.229	6.51	5.17	$832,918	A+/D-
		Player	Team	T	IP/162	W	L	SV	ERA	WHIP	OAV	K/9	BB/9	Salary	F/R
16		DeLeon, Jose	1993 Chicago White Sox	R	58	3	0	0	2.98	1.29	.217	6.28	4.71	$1,194,261	A+/D-
17		DeLeon, Jose	1993 Philadelphia Phillies	R	58	3	0	0	2.98	1.29	.217	6.28	4.71	$1,129,174	A+/D-
18		Deleon, Jose	1994 Chicago White Sox	R	97	3	2	2	3.36	1.18	.200	9.00	4.16	$3,165,745	A+/D
19		DeLeon, Jose	1995 Chicago White Sox	R	77	5	3	0	5.19	1.30	.238	7.05	3.72	$1,606,303	D-/D-
20		DeLeon, Jose	1995 Chicago White Sox	R	86	5	4	0	5.45	1.34	.238	7.70	4.14	$1,760,609	D-/D-
21		DeLeon, Jose	1995 Montreal Expos	R	86	5	4	0	5.45	1.34	.238	7.70	4.14	$1,628,262	D-/D-

There are two seasons of Dave Dellucci, and the rest of his career he's David.

As I recall Andre Thornton actually changed the name he played under. Early in his career he was Andy on baseball cards/lineups/etc and then later officially decided to go by Andre.