Press Box Attire - College Football

Ken Rosenthal makes the bow tie work. So did Bud Collins. Otherwise, it's a tough look to carry. Helps to be very tall and thin, or relatively short and fat. Bill Nye or Edward G. Robinson.

And thanks to its terrible popularity, the fedora is a real roll of the dice these days. Probably best left in the closet until it's actually cold enough out to need a hat.

 

That's pretty much my daily uniform right there. Teaching class, on a freelance assignment, Sunday morning big church....it' jeans and an untucked button-down. If I really feel like dressing up, I add a sport coat. I tuck in my shirt and wear a tie to funerals.

 

Yeah honestly, dark jeans help so much. And in the winter I usually added a sports coat. But the tucked in shirt, have always struggled with that, even when I was skinnier. Now if I tuck it in, I look like I am 7 months along :/

 

I didn't used to have a gut, but retirement and not giving a shit really changed that. However, I can still tuck in shirts without looking ridiculous. What helps is buying sports jackets just one size or so too large. Since I have extra long arms, I've always had to do this. Back in the day, I looked like a clipper ship under sail. Now, they fit.
PS: Last wore bow tie at age seven. Hated it then, too.

 

I remember wearing pants and a button down for swim meets and dying in the heat on the deck. After three or four years I realized I needed to be in shorts. RI winters don't allow for shorts to be worn in, so I roll in in sweats and once I hit the press room, take off the winter boots and sweats and wear golf shorts, golf shirt and put on boat shoes neatly stored in my backpack.
The newbies covering the meet look at me in amazement wondering why they didn't think of that.

 

I got married on Memorial Day weekend 10 years ago. There are two outstanding, unforeseen perks that have come with this:
1) I now have a valid reason for taking a week of vacation starting that weekend every year, thus getting a paid holiday and saving a vacation day for a later date.
2) Since I'm on vacation that week, I don't have to cover our local club swim team's big annual meet the first weekend of June. This was, hands down, the worst assignment every year. It's 92 degrees outside, the pool is outside, you're baking on that hot concrete deck, and you're 6 inches from the water and can't do anything but stare at it and imagine how refreshing it would be to jump in. Now some other sap filling in for me gets to have that pleasure.

 

I used to work fire a place where shirt and tie was mandated for 6 months of the year. It was usually April to October no tie October to April with tie. But it would get 90s to 100s in March into April and I'd be out watching softball with a tie and long sleeves and it be 95. It was awful.

 

He makes it work? He looks like a classmate of Prince William's kid.

 

"4th grade class photo" is a good way to characterize the bow tie.

That said, if you Google "bow tie sports reporter" Mr. Rosenthal and Mr. Collins are your returns. So it's a distinctive/distinguishing trait for the right folks. Tucker Carlson is another one of those. However you feel about him, his entire career was built on his willingness to wear bow ties.

I grew up and went to school with lots of bow tie wearers (likewise suede elbow patch pipe smokers and dirty buck wearers), so they seem more familiar to me, and less infantile.

As was noted upthread, it's always interesting how adamant our opposition to certain fashion statements can be. The late Mr. Deford being a wonderful example of a sports writing peacock. Extra tall and extra tailored, he was unmistakable and unmissable wherever he went.

My approach over the years has always been the opposite, to recede into the background. Just another out of focus face hovering above a grey suit.

 

Is JM22720 ever going to check in and let us know what he and others wore?

 

Hold the phone.

Didn't you advocate wearing seersucker suits to football games?

Don't get me wrong. I have no problem with it.

But in my experience, you can dress like a homeless person in a press box and no one blinks. But throw on a sports jacket, and unless it's the NHL, you'll be having to justify it the rest of the season.