Baseball sticklers are creating a foot flap
Kansas City Royals pitcher Danny Duffy, like everyone else in baseball, wears customized cleats.
His are grey and blue New Balances. The hex codes and Pantone designations match the Royals’ official team colours. Even the number 30, a tribute to his late teammate Yordano Ventura emblazoned on the back of each shoe, fits into the colour scheme. Duffy plays within the arbitrary rules that were set in the most recent collective bargaining agreement.
But when ballplayers across the country began to receive letters from the league office claiming they violated a rule that requires “at least 51 per cent of the exterior of each player’s shoes be the club’s designated primary shoe colour,” Duffy spoke up.
“I think they’re just picking and choosing what they can control and what they can’t,” he said. “It’s weird.”
Indians pitcher Mike Clevinger, who often wears cleats that are tie-dyed and dotted with sunflowers, posted a picture of the warning he received on Friday on social media with the caption, “Make baseball fun again, they said, it would be fun, they said ...”
On the other end of the spectrum was former Royals player Ben Zobrist, who was threatened Saturday with a fine if he continued to wear all-black cleats with flaps “that do not comply with the uniform regulations.”
Royals starter Jakob Junis received a warning this week, too. The cleats he wore in his last start weren’t quite grey enough.
“I don’t even know what colour his cleats were,” Duffy said. “Probably white and blue. It’s like, ‘47 per cent blue is just not enough. We’re gonna have to get rid of these.’ It’s so stupid.”
The players’ frustrations stem from Major League Baseball’s efforts to make itself more appealing to younger audiences. Yet the league has also continued its campaign to rein in its players. The efforts seem contradictory.
“If your personality gets out, it’s gonna be good for MLB and it’s also gonna be good for you,” Duffy said. “MLB needs to figure out a way to trust that we’re not gonna go have middle-finger emojis on our cleats. We’re gonna be responsible enough to know the limit as opposed to just flat out fining people. They want certain people to be themselves and others not.”
Duffy pointed to the Nationals’ Bryce Harper, who made waves in 2016 with his determination to “Make Baseball Fun Again.” He has worn shoes featuring the eyes of a tiger and a pair that had stars on one shoe, stripes on the other.
“MLB tweets that stuff,” Duffy said.
When he started Saturday at Progressive Field, Clevinger wore pink shoes that were not the pair approved by the league for Mother’s Day. The shoes, instead, were adorned with flowers and the names of women in his life, he told reporters in the Indians clubhouse.
“Ultimately, all we’re trying to do is play the game,” Duffy said. “If we like the way a certain shoe looks and it has our team colours on it and it doesn’t take away from the rest of the game — what’s the big deal?”