One of the in-game books in Daggerfall (that hasn't been in any later games), http://uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Fools%27_Ebony, jokes that all mages are named Shub. The story is also pretty silly, if you couldn't tell already.

Maybe I'm reading too much into things, but after I realized Urag was basically a mage named Shub I got a good laugh out of it.

It always seems like orcs have two-syllable last names... so I'm going to say ya its a reference.

That is kind of neat. These kinds of things always confuse me.

On one hand, the Devs may indeed have done that.

On the other hand, are these the same Devs that made so many other mistakes?

I'd like to believe that the devs are clever

I think it might be.

We also have http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Ria. Given her race I'd say it's a reference to Ria Silmane from Arena.

And then the reference to Tharn and Barenziah's lovechild.

Shub appears 81 times in the book

If the UESP is to be trusted, then, due to the way Orsimer names work, Urag isn't named Shub, but his father is. Gro-Shub basically means "Son of Shub".