You don't like the vests?

I'm kind of a traditionalist too, but I don't like the vests. I like that whole sort of early '60s aesthetic in other areas -- for a couch, say -- but I just don't like the vest look.

Oh, well, sorry, man. It's slowly becoming the thing.

It seems like the back-to-basics thing kind of hit about 10 years ago.

In '93 or so, everyone went back to the belted pants instead of the elastic waistband. Everyone went to the button-front jersey instead of the pullover, so the last decade or so has been a slow return to basics ...

Well, there's been some slippage.

... except everyone has the colored jerseys.

There was that gray hat period.

The gray -- ohhhhh, the dreaded gray hats, the Pirates and the Royals with the gray hats. [Moans.] Well, those didn't last.

People need to understand that, once upon a time, teams were coming up with their logos and their uniform designs, and different factors were influencing them. A century ago, what a team wore largely had to do with what kind of textiles and fabrics were available from the sporting goods manufacturer in their city, because that's who supplied the uniforms. So if they had pinstripe fabrics available at a decent price, well, maybe the team would wear pinstripes. And if they had this kind of felt available at a decent price, or maybe if the owner wanted to splurge a little, well, this is how they're going to look. But it was totally an individual thing.

Eventually the suppliers went national, so Spalding would be supplying the team, or Wilson or whatever, but the decisions on how my team was going to look, if I owned the team, were made by me and the people in my office. Nowadays, teams make these decisions, not in isolation, but with consultation from brand advisors and brand design consultants and the league office, and especially the merchandising arm of the various league offices.

When the Indians announced this new uniform that they're going to this year, which is a vest uniform that they're going to wear at home on Sundays and holidays, one of the things they talked about at the press conference was that they had actually been looking to go to a vest as early as 1993, but the league office said, "Well, a bunch of other teams are doing that too, and you don't want to look like all the other teams. Why don't you wait a few years before you go to the vest." So a lot of this is coordinated with a sort of grand plan in mind.

Back in the '50s, '60s, even into the '70s, merchandising was nothing like it is today. It wasn't as coordinated and it wasn't as large-scale. Now it's such a big revenue stream in sports that it's really the tail wagging the dog. It used to be what you wore on the field would determine how you merchandise. Now, how you want to merchandise determines what you wear on the field.

And it even starts farther back in the process because now new teams are named by the marketing department, as opposed to a century ago when maybe a local sprortswriter would slap a nickname on a team and it would stick.

Right. Exactly. So all this goes into these brands that we end up having this incredibly emotional attachment to. And whether you think one way is better or another way is better, it's certainly different now than it was a long time ago. I think it's safe to say that the "Mets" would not have been developed if it was an expansion team today. It's the New York Metropolitans Baseball Club, that's what that stands for, and it's really, it's a nonsense word.

Not to mention the Knickerbockers.

Exactly, exactly. But that's what makes the history and the heritage of these teams interesting.

Last question. I almost never ask this to people on the phone, but what are you wearing right now?

What I almost always wear every day, which is jeans, sneakers and a T-shirt.

So you're not a fashion plate yourself?

Well, it's a good pair of jeans and a good T-shirt. I do have a lot of old uniforms that I sometimes wear. I'll take them from any sport but I especially like old baseball, old flannel jerseys, and pants if I can get them. I've got a few beautiful uniforms from the '30s. I'm not a big guy, I'm like 5-8, 150, and most athletes are bigger than that, so it's hard for me to find stuff that's small enough to fit me, but if I find anything that fits, I buy it.

I did a reading recently in New York of Uni Watch material, and I wore this beautiful 1930s, pinstriped, flannel baseball uniform, complete with the stockings and everything, for a company team, like a factory team, and it said on the jersey "Aluminum Products," because it was from an aluminum manufacturing plant, and it was their company team. I'm always looking for stuff like that. I don't, like, walk around the neighborhood in baseball pants, but I might walk around in the jersey. So yes, in some ways the sports uniform obsession has infested my closet.

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