From Air Jordans to Tunnel Walks: The Evolution of Basketball Fashion
Landline is like if Air Bud also majored in history. In today's issues, I explore the complicated love affair between basketball and fashion . . .
March Madness is here, and for those of you who think basketball is not for you, I have a topic that should spark your interest: fashion. Basketball and fashion have been as close as Magic Johnson to his fur coat, or Satou Sabally to the top of every best-dressed ballers list.
Since 2021, when the NCAA determined players could make money off their name, image, and likeness (NIL), there has been an increased focus on players as individuals. Paige Bueckers of UCONN trademarked a nickname used by fans, “Paige Buckets,” to create a clothing line, for example. This got me interested in the ways basketball players use fashion to set themselves apart, both on and off the court.
Early basketball uniforms were mostly practical, but we can see gestures toward establishing a team aesthetic.
While the team uniform evolved, (from the short shorts of the 70s to the longer shorts popularized by Michael Jordan in the 1980s), the looks players wore to arenas were a moment to highlight personal style. Here is Walt Frazier looking like a model.
Much has been made of the basketball rivalry between Magic Johnson and Larry Bird, but it’s not a real rivalry when it comes to their clothes. Larry Bird’s aesthetic is very much “man who buys clothes as Costco.” (not judging, I love their sweatpants).
Michael Jordan is an icon in the sport, and the contribution of Air Jordans alone helped to influence the rise of sneakers as a place where players could express themselves. As of the 2023-2024 season, 26 NBA players have a signature shoe.
History has been kind to Dennis Rodman and his style, in part because of his openness to play with gender through clothes, whether on magazine covers or the court.
The biggest area where we see fashion shape individual appearance is the outfits players choose to wear to the arena. Called “tunnel walks” referring to the walk from the tunnel of the arena to the locker room, these have become opportunities for team social media managers to photograph and promote players’ arrivals as if they’re walking a catwalk.
These “tunnel walks” have created opportunities for players to partner with fashion designers or to make political statements with messages on their clothing.
These collaborations have expanded exponentially in the last twenty years in part because of a controversial dress code. On October 17th, 2005, David Stern, then commissioner of the NBA, was frustrated by player fashion before games that favored baggy sweatpants, hoodies, chains, and headphones.
In response, he established a dress code that mandated “business casual attire” be worn to games and at press conferences. Read rightfully as racially coded, many Black players reacted negatively to the change believing it was an attempt to push back on the influence of hip-hop on the game. Player Stephen Jackson said it was “definitely a racial statement” in response to the league becoming “too hip hop.” Even more explicit in his criticism, Jason Richardson sounded off on the hypocrisy of the NBA’s dress code before a 2005 pre-season game.
"I don't understand what that has to do with being business approachable. ... You wear a suit, you still could be a crook. You see all what happened with Enron and Martha Stewart. Just because you dress a certain way doesn't mean you're that way. Hey, a guy could come in with baggy jeans, a 'durag and have a Ph.D. and a person who comes in with a suit could be a three-time felon."
While I resent the shade against Martha, a fellow Leo who was also the victim of profiling (she had to make a poncho in prison while many male CEOs continue to roam free having done worse), this point stands. Emphasizing a white vision of what professionalism looks like definitely drove this dress code, the first imposed by a major league sport, which has since been relaxed over time. However, the legacy of this change was that it directly influenced the rise of “tunnel walks,” and the competition to serve looks among the NBA, and now WNBA.
Here are some of my faves:
The WNBA also uses fashion walks to demonstrate personal style in ways that invite conversations about gender and expectations for female athletes.
Here are some of my fave looks:
The women’s game still struggles with issues of equity (in pay, playing conditions, etc.) and you can see that in fashion, too. The Air Swoopes were the first sneaker designed to honor a woman, Sheryl Swoopes, in the leadup to the 1996 Olympics. Her shoe was notable in part because it was the first to celebrate a great woman in the game, but also because she played a role in the design and asked for features to suit women players. For example, she asked for a heel tab for her shoe so she could easily pull it on with the long fingernails she wore when she played. The women’s game is still working to provide similar opportunities for women players.
Beyond the informal politics we can see in basketball fashion (more men with sponsored shoes than women, for example) we can see players using fashion to make explicit political statements. After Jacob Blake was shot seven times in the back by a police officer on August 23, 2020, WNBA teams wore shirts which collectively spelled his name across the front with seven bullet holes on the back. After kneeling during the anthem of all league games, every team left the court in protest and declined to play. As Washington Mystics player Ariel Atkins noted in a statement after their game, “This isn’t just about basketball . . .when most of us go home, we still are Black.”
Fans mirror this with their fashion. Recently, Sheryl Swoopes appeared on a podcast and mistakenly stated that Caitlin Clark was attempting to break the all-time women’s scoring record in her fifth year (college players get a bonus Covid year, that Clark has since announced she will not be using as she will enter the WNBA draft at the end of the season). During the episode, a host corrected her, and she apologized. When asked how Clark would adjust to the WNBA, she suggested it would take time for Clark to get acclimated, comments similar to ones she’d made months before about Angel Reese of LSU. However, just like Clark’s own rivalry with Angel Reese, fans in Iowa reacted negatively toward Swoopes in a way that could be read as racialized. Not long after pull quotes from the interview went viral, fans arrived at games wearing “Don’t be a Sheryl” t-shirts.
There is a troubling trope in basketball that makes heroes of white women players in larger numbers than the Black players who form the majority of the league. This fashion trend demonstrates the celebration of white women is at the expense of Black players. Here white fans weakly attempt to imagine Sheryl Swoopes, the best women’s player of all time, as a “Karen.” This is particularly odd since “Karen’s” are associated with demanding white women, not Black women making measured comments based on their own experiences. These Iowa fans are coming off like Gretchen Weiners trying to “make fetch happen,” and I hope we don’t see it again next season.
The suggested relationship between fashion and politics doesn’t end with players. Kim Mulkey, coach of LSU’s women’s team, is known for her flamboyant game-day style.
Getting less press is her behind-the-scenes behavior. As Mariah Rose explains, Mulkey asked Britney Griner to remain closeted while coaching her at Baylor, and mis-gendered her own player, Kateri Poole, whose they/them pronouns are clearly stated on their instagram. When asked about their absence from the team earlier this season, Mulkey said “she is no longer with us” as if they were dead. Poole has now entered the portal to transfer, and that seems wise. Arriving at a press conference coughing and unmasked, Mulkey also said that she wouldn’t test for Covid or mask and implied she wouldn’t care if she got everyone sick. Real nice coworker behavior, Kim!
I love sneakers and t-shirts and things that make me feel like my clothing is an expression of who I am. I will be genuinely interested to see how fashion shows up in the tournament and the later NBA playoffs. Who is your fave basketball fashion icon?
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