 |
|
 |
  |
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
September 20, 2006 |
|
|
The baseball cap. Our
country’s contribution to “style”. Fashion leadership in menswear may come
from Italy’s Ermenegildo Zegna (try saying that three times after two beers)
while ladies look to Paris coutiers, but when it comes to USA stylin’,
nothing says “America” like a ball cap. True, the logo above the visor may say “John Deere”, “DeKalb Seed Corn” or “Jeff Gordon Sucks” but it’s still a ball cap. And frontward, backwards, inside out or sideways, Americans absolutely love ball caps. It’s not just a “guy” thing. The youngest daughter wandered the Iowa U. campus four years with her blonde hair either tucked under or pony tailed out of a Chicago Bulls hat (it was the MJ era). Today, trips to the grocery store with her daughters still include a ball cap on her cranium. Only today it proclaims, “Go Hawks”. For we follicle-ly challenged folk, a ball cap is a necessity in avoiding the skin charring rays of our Colorado sun. To the rest of the world, it’s a fashion statement. One full head of hair son-in-law would no more go out the door without a ball cap on his head than he would without his pants. And no greater example of the generation gap exists than today’s teen through thirty year olds thinking nothing of eating a meal in their ball cap while the “over-sixties” sit and fume at the egregious breach of good manners exhibited by people not only wearing a hat inside the house but actually leaving it on while seated at the dinner table. Ball caps proclaim allegiance. Be it the fight against breast cancer, your favorite team or choice in fly rods, it’s the ball cap on your head telling the world where loyalty lies. Ball caps can lead to confrontation. The wrong color on your head can get one shot in the world of gangs, wearing a Raider hat in the South Stands at a Bronco game guarantees a whole bunch of folks questioning your IQ from kick-off to final gun while wearing a Yankee hat to Fenway is a style only for Superman or mortals with a death wish. How a cap is placed on the head is almost factorial in styling. We geezers prefer the basic “missionary position” of ball cap protocol with a rolled visor facing forward. Rappers and NBA stars like a flat visor with the hat in “lock” position, the bill facing left or right. Many members of the under forty-crowd only wear a ball cap backwards. That same reversed visor look in my youth was the “rally cap”. Down two runs in the ninth, you turned the visor backwards in an effort to change the karma and promote hits, walks, runs and a win. Today’s “rally” cap style demands wearing the cap inside out. For pro football players, when the ball cap replaces the helmet, it means either they’re done for the day or not going to play. It also offers pro teams an opportunity to “goose” the sale of this year’s model. Like the new Bronco’s ball cap with the horse head logo embroidered in the mesh on the side. You see that hat on the Jay Cutler close up immediately filling the screen after Jake Plummer throws an interception. It’s my next Bronco ball cap purchase. The cupboard’s practically bare of Bronco caps. I’m down to my last half dozen. |