Changing Coach Attire. Side A: NBA
It’s 1982, the Los Angeles Lakers head coach is Pat Riley. He is wearing a brown Armani blazer with white pants, a white shirt, a striped tie, and dark-brown Oxfords. It’s 2022, the Los Angeles Lakers head coach is Darvin Ham. He is wearing a dusty black quarter-zip pullover with tiny monochrome Nike and Lakers logos, black tracksuit pants, and black sneakers. What happened?
Why Side A? Two reasons. First, there are two parts to this text: Side A and Side B. Second, this topic has been brewing in the NBA discourse for some time, and my goal is to dissect it as extensively as possible, and then compare the situation with the one in European football.
In the old times (pre-2020 COVID Bubble), NBA coaches predominantly wore suits. Some, especially in the 1970s-80s, would diverge from the standard attire, but all their experiments stayed within the boundaries of ‘official clothing.’
They either went the perfect tailoring and ultra-expensive suits way, like Chuck Daly, who had a sponsorship deal with Hugo Boss while working for the Detroit Pistons, and Pat Riley (Los Angeles Lakers, New York Knicks, Miami Heat), famous for his Armani suits and Savile Row shirts. Or the classic suit with some colorful element or interesting pattern way, like Jack Ramsay (Portland Trail Blazers) with his plaid pants, bright blazers, colorful turtlenecks, and Hawaii shirts, and Flip Saunders (Detroit Pistons) with checkered jackets and ties. Of course, there were also outright experiments with the attire, but they began and ended in the 1980s. Like Lenny Wilkens’ leather jackets and Larry Brown’s jeans overalls. In short, there were no official NBA coach fashion regulations - until 2005.
Chuck Daly (Sun Sentinel) / Pat Riley (Getty Images) / Jack Ramsay (Getty Images) / Flip Saunders (NBA) / Lenny Wilkens (Getty Images) / Larry Brown (Sports Illustrated)
In 2005, the NBA introduced a dress code for both players and coaches. It was a reaction to Allen Iverson’s fashion choices, as well as Malice at the Palace. At first, the regulations were controversial, as some NBA players claimed that it targeted hip-hop culture specifically and imposed a financial burden on them. Coaches, however, were largely unaffected by the dress code - wearing dress shirts with sports coats - as they already aligned with it.
The regulations were strictly enforced until 2014, when the commissioner of the NBA, David Stern, was replaced on his post by Adam Silver. Since then, the dress code gradually became more lenient for both players and coaches. Moreover, coaches were given a financial incentive to wear suits: since 2008, there was a deal with Men’s Wearhouse to supply them with Joseph Abboud suits. Dwane Casey, at the time working for the Toronto Raptors, was one of the coaches who wore them. The agreement lasted a decade until the end of the 2018/19 season. The very next season, COVID happened.
In the NBA COVID Bubble, the pendulum swung to the opposite extreme of the fashion spectrum: now, coaches were allowed to wear athleisure (tracksuits, polos, pullovers). The league not only permitted wearing this business-casual - let’s be honest - golf style, it encouraged coaches to do so, as it served as free promotion for the NBA’s merchandise partner, Nike. And practically every one of the coaches has fallen for it.
This is a symptom of a larger trend in society, as the pandemic made everybody lazy and unimaginative in regards to their fashion choices. Wesley Morris called this phenomenon the ‘epidemic of athleisure.’ It has persisted ever since the actual pandemic began.
Similarly, after the Bubble, the NBA decided not to bring the old dress code back, and the new regulations only require coaches to wear ‘business attire’ (same old athleisure with polos and quarter-zip pullovers). And many of them have been appreciative of the change. Monty Williams (ex-Phoenix Suns and Detroit Pistons) and Gregg Popovich (San Antonio Spurs) both said they preferred the new dress code for its simplicity (they don’t have to worry about what to wear each day) and comfort.
Even those coaches previously thought of as stylish, or ones that used to be protégés of NBA fashion icons, have switched to athleisure. Doc Rivers, a god of tailored suits and expensive watches (he has a Submariner), has worn tracksuits of three different teams since the Bubble (LA Clippers, Philadelphia 76ers, and Milwaukee Bucks).
Doc Rivers (Getty Images, 2020 / Sports Illustrated, 2022 / Chicago Tribune, 2024)
Rick Carlisle and Erik Spoelstra, apprentices of Chuck Daly and Pat Riley, respectively, have both betrayed their mentors and started wearing ‘business attire.’ Carlisle once said that if he ever coached a game without a tie, “Chuck [Daly] would roll over in his grave.” Yet, since the bubble, Rick has been wearing team-branded pullovers and t-shirts. Spoelstra, who once wore Pat Riley’s old Armani jackets, has too, chosen Miami Heat fan shop polos and pullovers. He claims that the new casual style is ‘simpler.’
So this is where we are now. The NBA is ‘a world of lazy, unimaginative coach style.’ Their tracksuits are just sad to look at. Clothes can be a part of the game plan, of the team’s strategy, yet they are just passing on this opportunity. Suits can instill fear into the opposition and confidence into your own team.
Coaches are supposed to represent authority, power, responsibility, the highest degree of professionalism, skill, and care. These people represent major, extremely successful and expensive, multi-billion-dollar organizations. These coaches worked their way to their position with hard work; they deserve to be leading their teams.
However, their athleisure costumes do not reflect any of this. Neither the values nor the importance. They don’t show the NBA’s status, seriousness, and the levels of competition and attention paid to it. These coaches effectively reject tradition, spitting the league in the face. They could be transforming the NBA fashion or experimenting with it, yet they choose to ignore it.
As Graeme Campbell of Highsnobiety put it: “When playing sports growing up, the coach was god, and god would never wear track pants.” Coaches are older men, at the very minimum, they look odd in these tracksuits. And the comfort argument is ridiculous; with their salaries, they can afford the most comfortable and fitting suits there are. Coaches deserve to look respectable.
This especially applies to the NBA playoffs, to the important games. This is the biggest night of your career; you worked 15 years to get your team into the NBA Finals, how dare you stand on the sidelines in Nike pajamas?!
Joe Mazzulla (Getty Images, 2024); Jason Kidd (CGTN/CFP, 2024)
And yet, this is exactly what happened this year. Both Joe Mazzulla of the Boston Celtics and Jason Kidd of the Dallas Mavericks shamelessly stood near the NBA Finals court in their green and blue quarter-zip pullovers, respectively.
Every single one of the 16 coaches in 2024 NBA Playoffs wore athleisure
Wesley Morris connected this unwillingness of coaches to dress accordingly to their status with the change in our societal perception of authority. We don’t like authority anymore, and coaches can sense that. They not only don’t want to represent power, they want to seem distant from it, to make it look like they are on one level with players. Some of the coaches tangentially repeat this idea. Monty Williams, for example, said of the NBA fashion: “It's a player's game; no coaches are going to set any fashion trends.” Which at the moment is true, but it wasn’t always like this, and it doesn’t have to be. And there is a man - just one man - in the NBA who thinks so too.
The only modern NBA coach who dares to diverge from the boring norm and try something different is Quin Snyder of the Atlanta Hawks. He has found the new way, the third way - casual style. He started wearing tailored suits while coaching in Europe, in the NBA he sometimes wears the tracksuit, but his own style is the most interesting one.
AP, 2019 / OutKick, 2023 / AP, 2023
It’s always full black - black top, black pants, sometimes black footwear - with the addition of a bright-colored element. Snyder has collections of black leather designer belts with big metal buckles (Ferragamo, Calvin Klein) and good watches (Breitling, Panerai, Submariner, Hublot). He combines them with red glasses (red for Hawks) and colorful beaded bracelets. His sneakers contribute to the overall casual style too.
Perhaps, Quin Snyder is the forerunner of the change in the NBA coach fashion that is to come soon. Given how much the league has loosened its dress code regulations in the last ten years, each coach is essentially allowed to wear what they want (it’s just that they want to wear damp garbage). Thus, NBA fashion is following the same trajectory as European football coach fashion, only a good 10-15 years behind on the curve. This is what I will look at in the ‘Side B’ part of the text.
