Thanx much, 1998 Yankees! Actually, the name's quite easily pronounced. In English, an X at the beginning of a word is pronounced Z (as in xylophone). After a vowel, it's prounced CKS (as in example). So, Xix = Zicks.
I'm experimenting with some things along the lines of what you suggest. Making some master files with the players I want extracted from master.csv. Trying to figure out how to get the stats in as well is the next step, but I'll certainly refer to your explanation above as I go along and may just go with the nameID/year import as you suggested. Still a lot of leafing thru my BB Enclyclopedia, but at least I won't be going in and altering every player.
Thanx much for the help!
-- Xix