 |
|
Saturday, February 13, 1999
Reds clean-shaven since 1902 BY JOHN ERARDI The Cincinnati Enquirer
In seeking to find the last Red to have worn facial hair, we would have thought it would have been a player in 1966, just before the newly hired General Manager Bob Howsam instituted the official “no facial hair” policy that still exists today. But, it turns out, the last Red to have facial hair was probably center fielder Dummy Hoy in 1902. And the curious thing is: The Reds weren't the only clean-shaven major-league club for the next six decades. Every club was. Not a single Major League player had facial hair from 1918 to 1971, a period of 53 years. So wrote authors Neil McCabe and Constance McCabe in the award-winning book, Baseball's Golden Age. From Wally Schang (Philadelphia Athletics) in 1917 to Reggie Jackson in 1972 (Oakland Athletics), the game was whisker-free. (We said whisker-free, not whiskey-free; that's another story). Baseball policy didn't require clean-shaven faces from 1917-1971. It just happened to be “the look” in society in general.
It was until the 1980s that the Reds became baseball's final frontier of follicle-free faces. They had out-lasted every one of their fellow franchises. It had become tradition. Reds General Partner Marge Schott — to whom Vaughn still intends to appeal his case — bought the club in December, 1984, and has been an ardent backer of the no facial hair policy ever since. Jon Braude, the former Reds media relations director, worked for Schott from 1984 to 1994. He had, and still has, a moustache. “Mrs. Schott used to kid me about it (the moustache),” Braude said. “I kept waiting for her to say, "You have to shave it.' I'm not sure what I would have done. But she never said it.”
Whiskers a go-go Reardon's clean-shaven look was enforced at a much higher level than that of the media relations director. Braude was glad of it. Usually, the job fell to him to tell all the new acquisitions that they needed to shave off their moustaches, beards and goatees. Once those new acquisitions got to town and they met Braude — and his moustache — they inevitably asked: “Hey, how come you get to keep your moustache and I don't?” Braude would always laugh it off by saying he had a choice between a $500,000 contract and keeping his moustache ... and chose the latter. “Most of the players knew I was kidding,” Braude said. In the 1970s, clean-shaven mugs were rarely an issue because it was the era of the Big Red Machine and players wanted to be traded to Cincinnati and didn't think twice about challenging the policy. In the 1980s, the player with the stature to challenge the rule was Dave Parker, but he had come here willingly as a free agent following some difficult years in Pittsburgh and was eager to return to his hometown and help revitalize the franchise. He didn't hesitate to shave his beard. But even in that era, baseball was relatively clean-shaven. There were some moustachioed muscle men (Willie Stargell) and some menacing Fu Manchus (Goose Gossage), but the baseball kingdom wasn't the goateed herd it is today. Today, facial hair is more in than out. But the Reds weren't the only team with a no facial hair policy last season. The Arizona Diamondbacks had it, too, although they've relaxed it this year to make room for the addition of Randy (The Big Unit) Johnson. Many clubs have policies on players being neatly groomed. “I am still in favor of athletes looking clean cut and wearing uniforms in a way the fans can be proud of,” Howsam said.
They had "the look' “A person has to look at the overall picture and see what's best for his team,” Howsam said. “I don't know. I'm not in the game anymore ... But you have to find out what will fit and what won't fit. I've always felt Cincinnati was a city that always appreciated the team representing them in their uniforms and their "look' and in the way they played the game ... “These guys (the players) have to understand you are selling the game — and the fans are the most important people there are for the game. If a city wants to be proud of its team in a certain way, that is the way you appeal to. You have to think of how the fans want things.” The folks at Disney World in Orlando, Fla., see it Howsam's way. They like the clean-cut look, and not just on cast members or the theme-park staff. Even theme-park employees who work at desks with no contact with the public have to adhere to the no facial hair policy. “We have guidelines we go by that are part of the Disney look, the clean-cut look,” said Rene Callahan, a spokesperson for Walt Disney World Co. It's the way Howsam ran the club in the 1970s, and the way he ran it when he returned for a short stint in the mid-1980s. He's the man who signed Parker as a free agent after the 1983 season and traded for Pete Rose to become player-manager in August, 1984. Four months later, Schott bought the team ... and Howsam was soon gone. But his firm policy of no-facial hair remained. It's the policy that Vaughn — he of the 50 home runs last season for the San Diego Padres — may be forced to challenge by filing a grievance. Unless Schott relents. Officials with the Players Association have said the Reds' no-facial-hair policy is not enforceable and that if Vaughn files a grievance, he will win the case because there is nothing in the collective bargaining agreement with the players about no facial hair. Vaughn and Reds officials are hoping it doesn't come to that. The leverage would appear to be on Vaughn's side. In the 1970s, the team policy could be relatively easily enforced because the superstars were behind it. If a player chose to defy the policy, he was traded (see Bobby Tolan and Ross Grimsley). Somehow, the Reds managed to win back-to-back World Championships, anyway. And the fans supported the policy, too. Schott doesn't have the Big Red Machine's leverage. No Reds player is rushing to the defense of the policy. The fans want Vaughn's 50 home runs in the lineup. In the mid-1970s, Marvin Miller, head of the Players Association, wondered aloud if the Reds were turning off young people with their no facial hair policy. Howsam's response was the short-haired Reds ranked third in attendance in all of baseball, behind only the Dodgers and Mets. So far, Schott has not been willing to discuss her feelings about no facial hair policy with reporters. Still, she thought enough of the policy to put it in the contracts of Reds Managing Executive John Allen and Reds General Manager Jim Bowden. They are not allowed to relax the standards set forth by Howsam two generations ago.
Reds Stories
Ambrose to shop elsewhere | ||||||||||||
|
Search | Questions/help | News tips | Letters to the editors Web advertising | Web access | Place a classified | Subscribe | Circulation Copyright 1995-2000. The Cincinnati Enquirer, a Gannett Co. Inc. newspaper. Use of this site signifies agreement to terms of service updated 4/5/2000. |
