MANE ATTRACTIONS
Oakland has its share, if not more, of players with ‘luscious locks’
MESA, ARIZ. >> This is a hair story. The kind about shampoo, leave-in conditioner, man buns, headbands, regular trims and how other people like to run their fingers through luxuriant tresses.
“So you come to the bald guy,” joked A’s rookie pitcher James Kaprielian.
On a team known for loose rules regarding facial hair, Kaprielian is among the A’s players who boast shiny heads and need to use only a dimesize drop of shampoo. But this isn’t a story about the bald players on the team. This is a hair story. And who better to talk to
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about his hair than left-handed pitcher A.J. Puk?
“Puk doesn’t really talk about his hair,” pitcher Grant Holmes said. “I mean, his hair speaks for itself.”
It does. It’s long, straight and impressive enough to make pitcher Sean Manaea want to run his hands through it.
“I’ve touched it a couple times, it’s nice,” Manaea said. “It runs through the fingers really well. (He) takes care of it, it seems like.”
Despite its high-upkeep look, there’s really not much that goes into Puk’s hair routine.
“I’ve got straight hair. There’s no maintenance to it at all. It just falls in place,” Puk said.
But what about shampoo? He must have some kind of specially formulated hair cleanser that makes it shine the way it does. He does not. “Whatever the shampoo they got at the field. I don’t have any specific (brand),” he said.
But you know who does have a specific shampoo? Kaprielian.
That’s right. “The bald guy” uses Jack Black shampoo. But that’s not all he uses.
“I put sunscreen on my head, and lotion,” Kaprielian said. “I use face lotion with SPF so then I usually end up rubbing a little on my head and make sure I don’t get burned or anything. Same thing with ears and whatnot.”
Pitcher Jordan Weems, however, does not need sunscreen for his scalp because, well, unlike Kaprielian, he has been blessed in the hair department.
“He’s got some locks on
him,” Manaea said. “I don’t know how long he’s been growing it out, but yeah he’s definitely got some luscious locks.”
Of the A’s with notable manes, Weems is definitely a contender for having the longest.
Does he trim it himself? “I can’t do a hack job on my own hair,” he said, laughing. “I used to let my mom cut my hair, but now that it’s longer I want someone professional to do it.”
Weems has the kind of
hair he’s proud of and wears it down whenever he can.
“I put a hat on if it’s down, and if I’m doing something nice or I have to get dressed up I’ll just put it in a manbun and clean things up a little bit,” he said.
Holmes, another longhaired pitcher, would never go that route. “No man buns for me. Just not my style.”
Instead the right-hander leaves it down for all to admire.
Some have asked if they can touch his ringlets, but
for the most part, the answer is no.
“I’m kind of funny about people touching my hair,” Holmes said.
Noted hair-toucher Manaea said he loves Holmes’ mane, calling it “a mop.”
Holmes prefers to describe it as “flow-y.”
Pitcher Daniel Gossett doesn’t share the same fond sentiment of his own hair.
“Oh, it’s a nightmare,” he said. “It feels all out of sorts, but I’m just going to not play by the rules for a little bit and just go for it and see what happens.”
Gossett aspires to join the long-haired A’s but he’s not there yet.
“I’m at a pretty awkward phase right now where it has to be a hat at all times. So even in the hot tub — hat. It’s too short for a headband, can’t man bun it or pony it up,” Gossett said. I want to look like Jordan Weems at some point in time. He’s got the look.”
Though Gossett isn’t too keen on his own hair at the moment, Manaea is.
“It’s nice. It looks really good on him,” Manaea said.
And what did Gossett have to say about Manaea’s hair?
“His hair grows so fast,”
Gossett said. “He’s got that hair you can pretty much do whatever you want to with it.”
Almost sounds as if the right-hander might be a little jealous.
“A little bit, but I won’t let him get that win,” Gossett said.
Manaea has recently taken to dying his hair, showing up to spring training with a color he calls “kind of blond,” but it didn’t start out that way.
“It started out black, obviously, then it went to highlighter yellow for about two minutes, and then I was like, ‘That’s a little bright so can we darken it?’ Then it went to a greenish-yellow,” he said.
He decided to try hair dye just to see what he’d look like and so far, he likes it.
“Yeah, it’s definitely grown on me,” Manaea said. “Pun intended.”