I’m currently traveling around Europe for more than a month. Everywhere I go, I see many people wearing New York Yankees baseball hats. They are clearly not Americans. As a Yankees fan from New York, I wonder what’s going on here. Are the Yankees popular? Is it just a fashion thing? If I talked to these people, would they know anything about baseball?
39 comments
It‘s fashion, most people would probably not even know about the Yankees and think it‘s the logo of New York
As a European, I also want to know this! And you are right, they are ubiquitous, and have been for a long time. It’s almost as if someone decided this is what a default baseball hat looks like.
Btw, I’m in Poland and this type of hat is not even called a baseball hat here. It’s “czapka z z daszkiem” – a hat with a little roof/shade. And a visor is called “daszek”.
It’s a cool logo. As a kid I remember the hats being something of a fashion piece. They must be back in style.
Just a fashion thing. Wouldn’t be surprised if most people wearing them don’t even really know what the Yankees are.
New York are one of the most visited places in the USA from a European perspective, and I guess baseball hats are a easy thing to bye to remember the place by and are something one will use, not consider that it is a sports teams logo on it.
Just a fashion thing.
I doubt they even know it as a Yankees hat. Its just a New York hat.
I doubt they even know what the Yankees are. Nobody watches Baseball over here.
People associate it with New York City and wear it for that reason. Baseball, unlike basketball, isn’t very popular in Europe, so it’s more about the fashion really, like an I♥️NY T-shirt.
Purely fashion, practically nobody here follows square cricket.
Those in the scene associate with East Coast hip-hop. Those without the scene just think it looks cool.
Weren’t they fashionable ages ago when Limp Bizkit was popular? Maybe they’re leftover from that time. Most people probably don’t even know they’re baseball hats.
Same reason LA Dodgers hats are popular here. Both contain the acronyms of very famous American cities and people here don’t know anything about baseball. They likely don’t even realize that these are baseball team hats.
Every newborn European is blessed by the ghost of Mickey Mantle.
No, but seriously 99 % chance they can’t name a single Yankee, 90 % chance they don’t know it’s a logo of a sports club. Like Jay-Z said ”I make the Yankee hat more famous than a Yankee can”. Much like in the US, it’s a fashion accessory first and fan apparel second.
It’s sort of escaped its original signification and is now just a sigil of nebulous fashion-forwardness. I’ve seen people weave the logo [into old ties](https://www.tiktok.com/@allovenvintage/video/7449833827855387926), even.
They sell well on used marketplaces in Europe, better than regular ties; and I doubt there are that many fans of the Yankees in Hungary or Romania that also go on thrift hunts for menswear and simultaneously happen to enjoy those kinds of stylistic clashes.
I struggle to imagine a regular, straightforward fan of the Yankees go out of his way to wear some old paisley tie with the logo superimposed atop it like a sear from a branding iron (as it looks like there are official Yankees ties that aren’t quite so quirky and could “reasonably” be worn with a suit).
I imagine it’s less a matter of supply aimed towards the demand for surreal Yankees merch and more for people that are stylistically alternative and wear the tie as a gimmick.
I’m always fascinated to hear comments like these from Americans. Like this one time an American tourist saw a Chicago Bulls logo in some shop in Budapest and just freaked out saying OMG I’m from Chicago and couldn’t believe her eyes. How are you all so unaware that popular culture around the whole world is completely overrun by America? We watch your films and your shows, we listen to your music, we wear jeans, we eat burgers, we know your politics, and your pop culture references are our own even if we have never visited New York or don’t know where to place Chicago on a map.
I really don’t understand how Americans can be unaware of this.
It’s a sign of intelligence over here. We all, at least once in our lifetime, tried to understand the rules that baseball is played by, and we failed. So, anyone that wears the hat is considered a genius, that managed to understand how the game works.
For real, kids started to wear them when they tried to copy US rappers. The same went for shirts from basketball teams like Bulls. They saw them at rappers, they started wearing them, without watching the sport or team. They became fashion.
US sports are kinda exotic to us and many Europeans travel to NY since it’s kinda one the big cities to see on the East Coast.
When I was a teen Chicago Bulls merch was very popular because it was Michael Jordan’s teams, none of us ever watched basket but that made the team popular anyway.
The US used to be quite popular in Europe. People liked to indentify themselves with the US because Americans were perceived to be cool.
In my country at least, it has kind of been the “standard” hat logo for decades at this point, and I would guess that 90% of people wearing it has no idea where it is from. (It is also an indicator that the wearer is basic as hell)
It’s just fashion, you see it everywhere around the world. Same with dodgers hats. When I was an exchange student in Germany I bought a few orioles hats as gifts cause I knew about this.
Here in Portugal some people use it too, but usually my wife who is Brazilian take some to Brazil, because the family ask for it. I think no one of it ever heard about baseball.
It’s just a style. I couldn’t understand why I moved over. People where stuff from towns they don’t even know, have never been to, have zero affiliation with.
It’s fashion. I had a Yankees t-shirts (or perhaps a beanie) when at university, and we had an American professor who always tries to get me upset, like pulling up his sweater and showing me his Red Sox tee with “There’s no crying in baseball, except for in New York” when I passed him and so on. I had no interest what so ever in baseball so that was wasted on me.
They were super popular for a couple of years back in the early 2000s and seem to have had a revival. For most people it’s a cool logo that they saw someone else wearing and now want to wear themselves.
I do wonder if every 20 years the Yankees merch team do a random merch push by sending some hats to celebs or if this is just an organic rolling trend
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Here in Sweden those hats are especially associated with young people, often of immigrant background, who are very into American street music such as rap and hip-hop and general street culture. There is also some association with criminal gang culture unfortunately. Outside of these groups, these hats are therefore often considered a bit trashy and not something you would wear if you wish to appear cultured.
I asked my cousin from the Netherlands about this and he said it was because the hip hop artists he listened to wore the hat.
Yankees? I don’t know about that, we were Bulls supporters over here.
Yeah, I know, different sport, different city, same fashion sense 🙂
I think it’s a matter of New York Yankees not suing clothing brands for using their logo for random items of clothing. I don’t even know what sport they’re in but I’ve also seen the logo around a lot.
Americans don’t really care for football/soccer, but you still see plenty of Messi jerseys in the states
almost nobody in europe cares about yankees or their team… its just a timeless and most commercial logo
Chicago bulls merch used to be rly popular, for fashion, I’m sure 1 in 10 000 actually follow NBA tho ik a few people that do (but they don’t own merch)
Becuse the NY logo is pretty legendary design for one thing, and because a lot of Europeans visit New York and buy one there as a souvenir for another. It’s probably the most iconic American fashion product along with Air Jordan shoes. Just my opinion.
Becuse people have seen in films and like the logo. Most people don’t care that it is sports team. It is just New York.
They are popular here in France but the Dodgers hats are probably even more common here. The French are fond of NYC and LA.
When I was a kid it was really common to have their hat, I had one. Didn’t even know what it meant. Just thought the pattern was nice. Only found out later it was meant to be letters. Still have never seen a base ball match and the only base ball player I could name is Babe Ruth.
The early 90’s in Germany: My favourite base cap when I was 14 or so was from the “Pittsburgh Pirates” ( I liked the style and the “P” matches the initial of my surename). Then some other Kid stole it…
My Pa gifted me a new cap to cheer me up. It had a Yankees logo and he bought it as it was available at a gas station in Getmany. Suddenly many other pupils noticed it and thought it’s cool as the symbol was well noticed from movies in the 80s and 90s in Germany like “lethal weapon”. But I still missed my Pittsburgh cap…
Oh, and BTW most of us know sh*t about baseball. We like the merch, think baseball is cool but play “Brennball” in school……
It’s got nothing to do with the Yankees in most cases.
People just know this hat from American films and TV shows, and so it’s a popular thing to get.
It’s just popculture fashion.
It’s just a cool thing to wear since people just think it means New York. I am guessing that less than 3% would know it’s actually the logo of a baseball team. Source: I had been wearing one for 10 years till I learned it’s actually the Yankees logo.
Generally, we know next to nothing about baseball. MLB is barely ever televised here, we don’t play it as kids, we don’t know the rules – it’s simply not a European sport.
They sell them in Penney’s.
If I didn’t know they were a sports team I’d have guessed it’s just one of these like, american aesthetic logos.
I doubt that it is a fashion thing now – but it was in the 90s – not so much because of the team but more the culture.
Of the 4 us national sports – baseball is by far the least watched in Europe