Legends of the Follicle: The New York Yankees Are Always Impeccably Groomed, And Why It Matters
As a kid, you’d always fear him.
And you were right to.
It’d start with the sound of his stomps, the ones that would fill your heart with terror before he’d find you and give you shit. Or maybe all it took was a cold, hard look. Either way, you’d always rue messing with this man.
You’d do anything to dodge his wrath, too, whether he was your hard-nosed football coach or the don of all disciplinarians — your dad. The way his brute logic and impetuous morality would one-two you when you thought being a teen would suffice in a row. And if you grew up anytime between the ‘50s and the ‘90s, good chance that arbiter of order would always, always be clean shaven.
Sometimes you’d hate the guy, and sometimes he’d be your hero.
You’d love him for the example set by his greatness, yet you hated him for all the well-earned power he’d wield when it mattered most.
If baseball manifested an equivalent of this bastard, it’d be the New York Yankees.
The same New York Yankees that, as of the publishing of this piece, are lapping the league with 58 wins and playing .731 baseball while laughing. Just last month they broke the record for most home runs in June — 57.
These guys could win 100+ games.
They’re saying this could be the best Yankee team of all time.
And if you didn’t notice, the New York Yankees are always, always clean shaven.
And nary a Yankee dares rock long locks.
Not that they’d have a choice on either matter, that is if they want to don those stripes and win those ballgames.
For the past five decades, baseball’s biggest (and arguably greatest) team has upheld a strict no-beard, no-long hair policy. And while many of us would laugh at such a thing, late team owner, George Steinbrenner, foresaw its value. Always resplendent in his Brooks Brothers Rep Stripe tie, tailored suit and side-part, the Rocky River, Ohio native ran the tightest of armadas in the Yankees, and he did so from 1973 — when he and a posse of business partners bought the team for a cool $10 mil — to 2010.
Oh yeah, and he was a walking, never-ending well of controversy during his entire reign tenure.
Whether he was getting banned for conspiring to get rid of pitcher, Dave Winfield, firing meddling with managerial affairs on the regular, or becoming a cameo fixture on Seinfeld as himself (that last one’s random, but still worth mentioning), Steinbrenner went down as the Yankees’ self-appointed emperor who ruled his roost unabated, hellbent on nothing but winning, and at any and all costs.
The guy was a champion, but he hit the big time while being hated by many.
He didn’t give a shit, either. Such was Steinbrenner’s brand, and he imposed it with full force.
Legend has it “The Boss” thought up the grooming rule in ‘73 after bemoaning the shag cuts he’d spotted on guys like Bobby Murcer and Thurman Munson during the opening day national anthem. Allegedly, Steinbrenner — who served two years with the U.S. Air Force — insisted regular shaves and short hair was the Yankee way.
Here’s the policy that, as you know, still exists to this day:
“All players, coaches and male executives are forbidden to display any facial hair other than moustaches (except for religious reasons), and scalp hair may not be grown below the collar. Long sideburns and muttonchops are not specifically banned.”
Is the whole thing archaic and due for deletion? There’s a case to be made for that.
But wouldn’t that be a little too easy?
If someone posited that shaving/no long hair rule played x percent of a role in the Yankees’ utter dominance the past three decades, have fun finding a rebuke.
Mind you, that’s coming from a company that sells beard products.
There’s a way to understand this without going all Post Hoc; To claim this team crushes it as a direct result of shaves and haircuts would be dumb.
But yes, men’s grooming’s got a stock in that pedigree.
And it’s not the shaving itself that’s key here, but rather the uniformity it yields when done every day, no matter what.
For the opponent, it doesn’t matter how stacked they are — if they’re playing the Yankees, they’re going to feel it. They’ll feel it when they see those stripes. And sure, they’ll feel it when they see real-life giant that is Aaron Judge (who actually rocks a beard come off-season, but don’t say anything). And they’ll feel it subconsciously, when they realize the truth the Yankees are an army with one pure goal, and not a team of egos.
And for the Yankees’ players, said uniformity gives their minds an edge; It keeps them sharp and, as Pacino said in 1995’s Heat, “where they need to be.” Consider this mass study pulled off in 2016 on a select group of schools across three continents (which includes Asia, the Americas and Europe). The researchers’ goal was to see if wearing school uniforms made any difference on things like “noise levels, teacher waiting time, students working well and class start time,” and of course, they compared the performances of uniformed students against ones clad in normal attire. The results said it all: The kids who wore uniforms outshone the others in every category, and the researchers were certain mental discipline — the kind that comes from uniformity — factored most.
Sure, baseball can’t be played without actual uniforms, but everyone knows that. It’s the subtler things like no surnames on said uniforms, and yes, the grooming rule, that take that uniformity to another level. That’s a place where the elite reign.
And if you think the Yankees’ seven World Series wins since ‘73 has nothing to do with shave cream and barbershops, still, you have to love how the two can make this much noise in one of the world’s most rotund of sports leagues.
To put things into perspective, the MLB survived the notorious “Steroid Era”, and theirs is a curious aversion to salary caps in a time when all other major sports leagues check-marked said box eons ago; This is arguably one of the reasons fat cats like the Yankees live atop the table — theoretically, they can buy anyone they want, whenever they want (and don’t even start with that “luxury tax”). These are all big issues, yet, men’s shaving and haircuts still own prime real estate in baseball news. Don’t mind us wiping the dirt off our chests, but men’s grooming — or the mere act of making yourself look better — transcends more than we’d think.
Everyone, from pitching hall of famer, Randy Johnson, to enemy line crosser, Johnny Damon, has had to ply their trade babyfaced and with hair no longer than one’s “collar” in length. Both those icons were basically long hair ambassadors. But at least Randy got to keep his signature ‘stache. And Johnny had no qualms with cleaning up if it meant winning it all… which he did. “Without a doubt,” he said when asked about having to shave during an exclusive farewell interview with Boston’s WBZ-TV just before he left for the Bronx. “George Steinbrunner has a policy and I’m going to stick to it.” No chance Johnny liked it, but the Kansas native did it anyway. His reward came in the form of his second World Series ring in 2009.
But just as you’d expect when a suit-and-tie-clad disciplinarian throws his weight around a room of grown male athletes, a few Yankees wouldn’t have it.
Of all the men who defied Steinbrenner’s grooming rule, Don Mattingly takes top billing to this day. By spring training ‘91, Mattingly was into year one of a freshly-signed, five-year contract worth just over $19 mil — one on which he and Steinbrenner had locked horns beforehand — making him the highest-paid ball player at the time.
Yankees management even made the first baseman captain that year.
But once June rolled along, the Yankees found themselves below .500 and as the reality of a rebuild sank in, Mattingly — who wanted to contend — asked for a trade. He didn’t get it (though in fairness, why sign a five-year deal knowing what’s coming then complain when the going gets tough?).
What he received instead was a request to chop his signature mullet. Mattingly was one of four guys on the team to get asked to groom to The Boss’ tastes: Pascual Perez, Matt Nokes and Steve Farr were also sent the memo. None too pleased about the demand from on high, Mattingly refused to get a haircut and was subsequently benched and fined $250 (plus $100 for every day he didn’t get a cut). Embittered at getting strong-armed, Mattingly finally folded.
But some guys weren’t so flexible. In November 2013, New York needed a gun to fill the void left by Mariano Rivera, who’d just retired. Steinbrenner had World Series-winning Dodger closer, Brian Wilson, well in his sights.
The only issue was Wilson’s jet-black mane and Mohawk; His literal nickname is “The Beard,” and how could it not be. That thing’s just as much a world beater as his right arm.
Hell, that thing would tame a silverback gorilla.
Wilson went the route of preservation and had his agent tell then Yankee GM, Brian Cashman, that it wasn’t to be, that the beard wouldn’t budge.
Respectable. But would Wilson have walked had he not already won it all? There’s no questioning the man’s character, but it’s worth pondering.
There’s even a book called The Day The Yankees Made Me Shave, an autobiography by former MLB “supersub” and 1985 World Series champion, Greg Pryor. Pryor was a utility baseman who never said die and a low-key legend of the game who played with gods like Bo Jackson and filled in for giants like George Brett. Random side-note: Here’s a video of the latter recanting the time he soiled himself on account of some bad seafood. Kids, if you don’t live on a coastline, always ask when those crabs were caught.
Pryor had his best years with the Royals in the mid-eighties, but the ‘70s were cruel to the man. In 1977, the Texas Rangers traded Pryor to the Bronx Bombers and it took no time for him wind up right back where he was, the minors. Pryor was pissed and wanted out, so he did what any man with balls would do — he led a “Moustache Revolt” with his Syracuse teammates. Moustaches weren’t even allowed at the time, but Pryor won the battle and the Yankees loosened their rules to allow minor-leaguers to wear them.
In a way, Mr. Pryor paved the way for men like current Yankee Matt Carpenter, whose bare knuckle boxer look is criminally underrated.
And if we’re talking lip rugs, who could forget the ‘Stache Squad of 2015?
Today, Steinbrenner’s grooming rule is stares extinction dead in the eye.
In a post-modern age when beards are as common as clean shaves, critics of the rule call for banishment of what they believe is an outdated tradition, citing superfluous reasons like how cool Aaron Judge looks with a beard during the off-season, and legitimate ones like the players should be allowed to express their individuality. But then, doesn’t individuality fly in the face of uniformity?
Some have taken full-on shots at Steinbrenner’s rule, and satire specialists The Onion one of few who spared no mercy.
Also, don’t forget the state of New York passed a law that makes “discrimination” on the basis of hair illegal, and that was in 2019. That means the Yankees’ top brass can’t technically can anyone who grows a mullet, or they’ll get taken to court.
But the unwritten rule still stands, and the Yankees’ players still shave. Not that there’s a single lawman who’d go to the Bronx and tell that ball club’s top brass what to do.
The question is, should the Yankees do away with their nearly 50-year-old grooming rule?
Normally we’d say you’re damn right they should. Remember when we wrote about NHL GM, Lou Lamoriello, for his own no-beard rule and how it’s got to go? But then, one could argue that man’s commandment violates another time-honoured tradition — the playoff beard. Plus, Lamoriello’s not the New York Yankees.
Whether fans like it or not, clean shaves and short cuts are part of the Bronx Bombers’ brand.
And while some might disagree, that brand intimidates the shit out of people, not unlike the way the All-Blacks’ haka lives rent-free in their opponents’ minds.
Now, if, say, a Sikh man wanted to play for the Yankees, then said man would have slam dunk case to keep what’s his, and Steinbrenner would like keep mum about it if he were good enough. But save for something as sensitive as a religious exemption, it’d be a shame if the Yankees did away with their grooming policy. And one last time — we love beards. But it’s not about that.
Look at it like this: How you perform matters if you want to run the show, but so does how you’re perceived. No beards and short hair is the Yankees’ war paint, and there’s something beautiful about that. And it’s not about caring what others think, but rather, investing in your own, unmistakable look.
Why would we be against something like that?
Love them or loathe them, the Yankees do things their way, and as of now, that includes mandatory shaves.
But they’ll still let you wear a mo, and that’s not half bad.