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I Love a Man in Uniform

By Jeremy DerfnerPosted Wednesday, Aug. 9, 2000, at 11:30 PM ET

Picture Phil Jackson in anything less than a designer suit. Now imagine Bill Parcells dressed like Phil Jackson. Inconceivable. Or Jackson in high tops and Parcells in full pads? Ridiculous. And yet Joe Torre wears a regulation Yankees uniform. Baseball managers wear the same uniforms their players wear, football coaches wear the company picnic uniform (khakis and knit shirts with logos all over them), and basketball coaches wear their Sunday best. Why? There's more rhyme to the reason than you might think.

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Location, location, location: Where do baseball managers work? In dirt holes underground. Fans never see them, so why should they bother making themselves presentable? This argument can be extended to explain the twin evils of scratching and spitting. In the private world of the dugout, men can afford to indulge their boorishness. The rule book even mandates this principle: A manager can wear any clothes he wants—Connie Mack skippered his Athletics in a suit and tie—but he can't visit the mound unless he's wearing a uniform. Football coaches are more visible than managers, but with all those extra-large reserves and assistant coaches milling around the sidelines, they rarely make an impression. They wear civilian garb out of deference to the tailgating crowd. What about Tom Landry, you ask? Obviously he was a basketball coach who took a wrong turn. And then there are the generals of the hardwood. Oh—the scrutiny! Only a dozen guys on the bench, all of them sitting except you. And the crowd sits right on top of you in small arenas. The slightest trace of residual frump becomes a frightening matter of public record. (The pressure is such that the women coaches of the WNBA have followed suit and are wearing power outfits.)

Setting the tone: Basketball coaches may favor suits because they project authority. Teen-age millionaires are predictably unruly, but they might still be young enough to look up to well-dressed elders. And respect is something every basketball coach needs, because the average player can beat the hell out of the average coach. You can bet P.J. Carlisimo forwent his usual DKNY that day in practice three years ago when Latrell Sprewell choked him. You might think football coaches, with their hulking and violence-prone players, would strive for the same respect, but the stakes are just too high, and they gave up long ago. Football players can kill easily, and if Rae Carruth is any indication, they do, so the suit has become a gesture of hopeless defiance. Baseball managers, meanwhile, have nothing to worry about, because their players are the weakest athletes around. Although the availability of bats complicates matters somewhat, your garden-variety manager can hold a middle infielder at bay until help arrives.

Demographics: The less stylish sports, football and baseball, are more or less for rednecks. Think Bear Bryant and his porkpie hat or Roy Hobbs from The Natural. (By my count, there are three baseball Hall of Famers named "Rube.") But basketball is an urban game if ever there was one. You learn on the playground, not in the cornfield, and to be a decent basketball coach you've got to have street cred. And the easiest way to get it is by showing off your sartorial sensibility. (Note that notorious slob Bobby Knight coaches Indiana farm boys, the only hicks who've got game.)

Traditions die hard, but they're born just as stubborn. If Jim Mutrie had had his way in the 1880s, the great American pastime would have a very different look. Mutrie helped found the New York Giants baseball team in 1883 and wore a top hat and tails in the dugout. But when his team slumped in 1891, he was fired, and the Giants dynasty rose with the hiring of fierce establishmentarian John McGraw, a conventional dresser if ever there was one.

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Jeremy Derfner is a former Slate editorial assistant.

Photographs of: Joe Torre by Jim Bourg/Reuters; Phil Jackson by Mike Blake/Reuters; Bill Parcells by Ray Stubblebine/Reuters.

COMMENTS

Reader Response from The Fray:

You forget to mention a key factor--baseball and football are played outdoors, often in less-than-perfect conditions, while basketball is an indoor, climate-controlled sport. That tailored silk suit wouldn't last too long at Lambeau Field in January, or in Wrigley Field in August. Explains why most hockey coaches wear suits too.

--John

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Derfner misses the historical point in reference to baseball managers. In the old days, some managers played the game and it wouldn't have been feasible had they been wearing street clothes.

--David Speer

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Baseball managers wear uniforms because baseball is a sport of ordinary-looking guys with a collection of different talents. Equal parts redneck and sophisticate, it's for the common man as much as the sporting mandarin. By wearing a uniform the manager is parlaying his affinity for the men on the field. Rather than flaunting his authority, he is more of a learned peer, and beer drinker, than overlord. Sure some are bastards and yell like a Parcells, but rarely outside of the dugout. They appear to be one of the guys when the game is going on.

In Basketball the coach needs an 'otherness.' In practices, however, coaches wear kevlar and polo shirts. But don't discount the various motivation techniques of different coaches. And the urban v. cornpone thing doesn't work. Rick Pitino at Kentucky was GQ. Louie Carnessecca at St. John's in New York wore self-deprecating sweaters during his heyday in the 70's and 80's.

Football coaches—well, as I far as I can tell, their authority derives from being psychotic madmen who crave power, authority and drill-sergeant synchronicity. By dressing in the same clothes they wear at practice--and probably to bed--they are showing that 1) They have no time for fashion 2) They are so focused on winning, they don't care how they look 3) They have so little creativity they couldn't come up with a wardrobe to save their lives. Watching the dull as dirt NFL kick field goals week after week, I tend to think it's a lack of imagination.

--J

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One thing you failed to mention is that coaches in their respective sports tend to dress similar to the level that their players dress off the field. For example, every millionaire NBA player is sporting a nice Armani suit when he leaves the locker room--just like coach. Football players tend to leave the locker room dressed in their Sunday golf clothes--just like their coaches. Baseball players wear uniforms when they leave the locker room--just like their coaches wear uniforms on the field. They all wear that cheesy Hawaiian-style flowered silk shirt and black pants.

--Roland

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[Note from the Fray Editor: Fray posters enjoyed the article, but they had a big communal question: "What about hockey coaches, then, Jeremy?" David Speer (see also above) helped out: "since they work behind glass and are never seen on the ice, their suits and ties are the only thing that distinguishes them from their hordes of fans. Suits on hockey coaches look like hats on pigs. Nobody knows where he got it, and he don't know what to do with it." And Jake gave us this tempting sentence: "From Robbie Ftorek's ill-fated cardigans to Pat Burns' Italian suits to Don Cherry's high collars and mobster chic, hockey fans have long debated the fashion sense of those standing behind the bench." Your Fray Editor is unsure which is in more need of illustration: an ill-fated cardigan or a self-deprecating sweater (see J's post, above).]

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