Shorts

If a paper has a dress code, it's usually based on the image it wants to project to the community, not to a small band of out-of-towners who live there for a few months. I don't see much point in dressing up for a press conference where the readers wouldn't see me and dressing less well for a game where they would see me. And again, the appropriateness would vary from town to town. But the opinion of the scrotum-scratching third-base coach is inconsequential.

 

Fair enough, Frank. My paper has no dress code, for the most part, at least not one that's widely circulated. I guess that has a lot to do with the fact that we exercise common sense. I will say that I wear collared shirts every time I cover said team. So it's not like I'm going to games in t-shirts. There's enough running back and forth between the clubhouse and the press box that in the summer, shorts are just more comfortable.

 

OK, first of all, many, many men have extremely ugly toes. Second of all, few sounds make me homicidal quicker than a man walking with flip flops smacking the soles of his feet. I don't know why. But that sound makes my skin crawl. Ergo, no man flops!

 

If I'm a member of the "community" and I see a dude show up in a coat and tie to cover an outdoor event during the summer, I'm personally making it my mission to punch that dude in the face.

I thought we got over this "image" shit in junior high.

 

Get a pair of those short pants that sit halfway down the butt, show the crack and come down to your ankles. That'll fit right in.

 

I've often said that a dress code should be simply to look clean and respectable. Nothing wrong with dress shorts and sandals and even a stylish T-shirt. Why would a company reject that but accept a jacket-and-tie code where the guy wears a clip-on circa 1978?

I've covered NFL training camps where it's been 90-plus. None of the reporters look good on those days. But I sure looked better than John Clayton who walked around in a white undershirt and coach shorts until changing for the camera.

 

I live in South Mississippi, where we have six months (or more) of brutal summer weather, and my feeling is that when the schools start banning shorts (even the ones that make the kids wear unis allow shorts), then I might consider a ban on shorts for late spring/summer/early fall events.

And I might be in the minority here, but I don't have a problem with wearing decent T-shirts (i.e. no holes anywhere and no inappropriate signage on the front or back) to a high-school game. I am not a polo shirt person. As far as footwear, I wear tennis shoes with foot socks, but I don't have a problem with a decent pair of sandals. I draw the line at flip-flops.

 

My hatred of the step-Slap! is gender-neutral.

 

You'd be the guy wearing the orange jumpsuit after that.

 

She's worried about what people are wearing while they're filing from home? That's insane.

 

I've done teleconferences from my home office wearing:

• a nice shirt, ironed and buttoned up;
• a nice tie, properly tied;
• board shorts (dry, not wet) or jean shorts, and
• my trusty Quiksilver flip-flops.

Webcams' field of view ain't all that much, but how would your coworker have felt about that?

 

Yes -- if you are covering Bermuda High Cricket match