the dilemma of the baseball jersey purchase

From time to time, I decide to switch my whole style up ala Ghostface Killah, and just throw people the fuck off completely. Most of the folks I run with in real life are either 30-something dudes who are a normal mix of hip hop/wacky art/pop culture/indie rock/metal mess, who drink beer out of cans, smoke weed out of pipes, and have more than one stupid tattoo usually. My wife's friends are earth bear types, naturalist folks that can run the gamut from cool new age types who are actually doing good things on the sides of mountains where no one is looking to goofy stereotypical hippies that are thankful for really Portlandia-ish things, to whole packs of non-descript white couples who look like Whole Foods starter families with children named after different species of trees. Some of those couples the earth tones blend together so heavily that I seriously cannot remember who is who. Seriously. It is a source of amazement and amusement for my wife, to the point that when I'm like, "Who is Bill again? Married to Sarah? Who are they?" and she laughs and goes, "They're 'THOSE' people," and we laugh and I know they are one of the indeterminate pack.
Perhaps because of these people, my very recent style switch has been to buy cheap as fuck but pimp as hell stitched jerseys, most likely of a bootleg nature, off of Ebay, to get my swagger on. One of the first things that came to me was an ABA Virginia Squires warm-up jersey in a moment of state pride, with the snaps, in garish blue, red and white, not a fucking thing earth toney about it. First time we had to rendezvous publicly, I threw on my Levi's carpenter jeans with the bottoms cut off because they never have pants the right length for me, always too long, rocked a red t-shirt underneath to match the red trim in the snap shirt, mostly blue, with big stitched VIRGINIA SQUIRES on the back. Walking around, my dick immediately grew 3/4 of an inch longer, plus with more hair around the base of my shaft. (I think this may be how black people do it, so if you have a son, I can't encourage you enough to buy him nice jerseys when he's like 11 and 12. He'll thank you for it later.) Most of the circle we run with do not bother with professional sports at all, because for the spiritually enlightened, I guess sports is a mouth-breather activity. Whatever. I think kids would be a bit healthier if they were running some full court basketball a few months out of the year rather than letting soccer be the only accepted new age sport. But I digress.
Well, obviously, me being a goofy assed whiteboy who likes to stir shit in people's sensibilities, I figure the proper step in assaulting these Whole Foods people's norms was to acquire a few nice ass Negro League jerseys. This also would be an interesting style to rock when I am in the blacker parts of my monthly routines as well, because I also like to fuck with those worlds. One of my favorite things to do lately is when like a burly black dude or bearded older hobo white dude is passing in or out of a store and holds the door or we cross opposite directions on a sidewalk, is to go, "Thanks podna" or "How's it goin' podna?" Oddly enough, there is something about calling these types of people a slurry version of "partner" that automatically makes you comrades. At first I was doing it just to see what would happen, but actually it has generated positive responses, and even one dude I passed again a few days later, and I was in work clothes - khaki pants and button down lavender oxford shirt, and he saw me, recognized the beard and wild eyes, and was like, "Sweet ass day out today, ain't it podna?" I said, "You know it," and as he walked past, he was talking to me and the sky, "I'm 'bout to get me a ice cold double deuce of Budweiser, and sit on the motherfuckin' porch." It was a moment that made my soul more pure, all because I called a random dude "podna". But I'd like to rock this "podna" test while wearing very obvious Negro League jerseys.
I've actually been reading a little bit about Negro Leagues online when I get a chance. There's a ton of great books about the Negro Leagues, because baseball fandom is one of the more nerdy/intellectualized pro sports there is, and is considered the National Past-time, so there's tons of sociology and anthropology professors out there looking to ease into retirement with a tome about the Negro Leagues. Some of it looks good. Some of it looks not so good. But this has helped lead to a ton of information inside the interwebs about the Negro Leagues, and I've had much fun reading through the hundreds and hundreds of team names, and wacky little facts. (I was gonna do a few lists of these for Baseball Feelings, but I do not have the leisure time of an anthropology professor. Plus I are lazy. Like I might not even finish writing this thing.)
Well, the only affordable sewn/stitched jerseys you can find online are usually bootleg. And there are those jersey snob types that would have you believe you should only rock authentic because fuck cheap Chinese knock-offs. I can understand this thinking, but also know it's complete bullshit, because the authentic ones are made by the same Chinese 9-year-olds, and really all you are paying for with that extra $100 is the endorsement of the overlording body, who would rather you feel proud to spend four times as much for the same thing, to be an official part of what is going on, as opposed to supporting illegal and non-designated entities. Well I say fuck that. I am a broke ass man who has a $110 electric bill most months, and to ignore than to buy an $180 jersey, when I could siphon $20 off thru paypal, get me a jersey, still pay the electric bill, and have money left over to rent a couple of Caballero Classics porns from the 1980s to watch on a drunken Friday night with the ol' lady on top of white lambskins stretched across the hardwood living room floor. A much better overall experience for my $180 than being authentic.
The problem with this philosophy of mine though is that the Chinamen only bootleg popular jerseys, or what they think will be popular. This means normal teams, and more famous players. I guess most black people still don't have the parts of the internet that shows them Chinapeople stuff, because you cannot find yourself a good source for affordable bootleg Negro League jerseys. So your next choice, if you are fucking around online, is to just look for legit sources.
This will lead you to Ebbett Field Flannels, a Mitchell & Ness type throwback company where the jerseys are made of actual flannel that slaves used to cry tears of hopelessness into, to make jerseys as authentic as humanly possible. If you had a time machine and wore one into the past, when you walked into the stadium, they would be shocked that there was an albino on the team, until they saw your normal white people hair, and then they'd think you were police. Ebbett Field Flannels are some very nice shirts, there is no doubt, but they are also very expensive. And when it comes to authenticity, at least if you are being MLB authentic, you can pretend to yourself that the player is getting a small cut of his merch sales. I don't think Negro League authentic throwbacks are digging up the crumbled bones of yesteryear's Negro superstars to send them to college.
What this all led to was a decision on my part, as I was perusing bootleg Chinaman baseball jerseys, to consider going all in on my budding Washington Nationals fandom, and get a Nats jersey. I mean, I am brainwashed by hip hop, so I am not above just buying colorful shirts I like with matching t-shirts to go underneath, and probably some dollar store stocking caps in various colors to rock with the ensemble when it gets colder again this fall. And obviously if you go this route, your two obvious first choices are an old Dave Parker Pirates jersey, most likely yellow, and a Rollie Fingers Padres jersey, doo-doo brown naturally. And after that, my first choice when looking through the bootleg choices online, is an all-black, black numbers on black jersey with orange trim, Giants jersey of some sort. That's a nice style. But that also reminds me that I grew up rooting for the Giants but made the conscious decision to go Nats when they moved to D.C. So that always makes me think, "Okay, look at the Nats jerseys, and get one. Let's do this."
That's when the problems begin. The Nats have boring colors - basic red and white. The red is not even an exciting red, but just a dull normal middle of the pack red, with no third color highlights to really set anything off. And curly W, traditional as it may be, definitely leaves something to be desired with my 2011 mind. I fear if I wore a boring ass home white Nationals jersey, I'd lose that 3/4 of an inch of dick-growing that I just copped from the ABA shirt. I'm not operating on enough of a surplus to be throwing dick away like that.
They did show off an alternate jersey in the off-season, but it's a dark blue deal with a stars and stripes in the D.C. letters on the breast deal - kinda iffy. I'm not ever at all into the whole red, white, and blue thing, especially if you are following the color codes of the U.S. flag. Those are some boring ass colors. If they had done an alternate jersey in red, white, and blue, and styled it after an old Expos jersey, that would have been tight, powder blue with a stars and strips bold ass D.C., bubble letters like that old happy fucking M used to be for the Expos. But they didn't, they went boring. But I guess I could talk myself into a red jersey, or an alternate blue one. But it would have to be stitched, buttons on the front, and feel pimp as fuck. Pimp as fuck, because really, the colors are pushing my limits of acceptance.
So as I settle into that, then I am confronted with what jersey do I get? If you have a deep Chinaman catalog to go through, maybe you can find a Nyjer Morgan jersey, which would always be great. But how long is that guy going to remain on any one team? He was flipping out last year, and I'm sure as the team gets whiter and whiter to make things feel safe for Herr Strasburg, they're gonna run off Nyjer Morgan, probably to some middling contender that could use his potential, which probably won't show up.
So if I limit myself to people who are on this team, and will be on this team, and I can not be ashamed of, what does that leave me? Not much. There's Ryan Zimmerman, who was a local boy who played at UVA right down the road from me in college, and has been the face of the Nationals since he was drafted. But that dude is white as fuck, and not very exciting. Plus, let's be honest, if they don't get their shit together, he's gonna go play for the Red Sox or Phillies or Yankees when his next big contract comes up. Fuck losing for less when you could win for more, you know?
I could jump into a Jayson Werth jersey, and really Werth's shaggy-faced good-timey probable stoner attitude fits my personal philosophies fairly well. But being a Redskins fan in football, jumping on board a brand new overpaid free agent signings jock with a new jersey is way too Dan Snyder-ish, and has me thinking Werth is gonna be dead or traded for a fifth racing big-headed President or injured into oblivion before we hit the 2012 election. So that's a no-go.
That brings us to the alleged can't miss phenomenon of last year - Stephen Strasburg, who was everything he was touted as being, blowing strikes by motherfuckers, until he fucked himself up right good and had to get Tommy John surgery. Now since he's the future of baseball in D.C., they are saying everything is going great, and he's building super conditioning right now while he can't throw, so that when he comes back, even after the surgery, he will be a monster of cyborg proportions who will strike out at least 4 of every 5 hitters he faces. This is what Nats people say. Other people say he has mechanical flaws that suggest he is fucked, completely. Historical evidence backs the trajectory that he, as a #1 super-hyped pitching prospect, will not be shit beyond exceptionally mediocre if he is lucky. Now I know he certainly looked awesome as fuck when he was pitching in the bigs last year. But I also know he's already damaged goods, at a tender age. And he's a quiet, studious starting pitcher. Those types are weird, and really untrustable, because they usually end up being salesmen of some sort when they are older, for like John Deere tractors or RVs or something like that that's popular in places like Indiana or South Carolina. And I'm just not comfortable hitching my wagon to the Strasburg train just yet. It seems doomed to fail, especially considering how the Redskins have done, and especially considering how the Washington Wizards have done in similar matters, and especially double especially considering how the Nationals have not exactly showed and proven themselves to be savvy on the management end of things thus far since they came back to America.
All that leaves is Bryce Harper - young and crazy fucking Bryce Harper, confident beyond his years, yet being molded with the fears of a franchise that has not yet showed and proven themselves to not be snake bitten on all matters personnel related. And I could get into a Bryce Harper jersey, if they embraced Bryce Harperness, letting the kid wear the Ultimate Warrior facepaint, and howl at the moon in teenage goofiness, and even rock some alternate black jerseys, get all grimy, with the dark blue starry D.C. on the breast and a dark blue number and name on the back. Or better yet, dark blue number, bright red name, bright red small number on the front, and like red outlines to the white stars in the D.C. letters. Tweak that shit out, make it crazy, embrace the Bryce Harperness. Fuck tradition and safety. You are the fucking Washington Nationals, pretty much engineered thus far to be looking up the divisional standings at Philadelphia and Atlanta, not nearly as prominent in the public's mind as the Mets, with the same social status of the Marlins, but with a few less championship rings, and your first one nowhere in sight on the horizon. Why would you want to hold onto that bottom feeder mentality so strongly? Shake it up.
But they have not. Instead, Bryce Harper is being asked by vets to not wear the crazy face paint. Catchers aren't supposed to last, so he's being switched to outfield. They are doing everything they are supposed to do in such a situation, following time-honored methods of assimilating the young buck into the Big Leagues.
And that's ultimately my problem, not only with getting a Nationals jersey, but in getting on-board wholeheartedly with the Nationals team. I mean, geographically, I'm more tied to them than anyone else, so I'll ride it out, my enthusiasm waxing and waning with their on-field performances, or getting spiked when Nyjer cranks up some new wacky antics and gives me something to amuse myself with. But they're mostly just doing the same shit everybody else thinks you should do, and there's not much to get excited about.
That's why rather than waste the money on a bootleg Chinaman Nationals jersey, I'll just keep stalking Ebay for a nice Ethiopian Clowns or Detroit Stars or oh man a Washington Black Senators jersey to show up. Because a lot of times, it's far more stylish to go the way of what is not accepted to do. And if you're gonna lose fucking 90 games every year, it's more fun to be stylish and crazy than boring and vanilla.

If you feel the need to purchase a Negro League jersey, I officially suggest you do it here where you can also get ancient Chinese medicine, Islamic items, and protection against harmful EMF rays. Really, House of Nubian is your one-stop internet shop for everything you need to be motherfucking righteous in the year of the devil 2012.