Columnist Dean Juipe: Showalter’s discipline out of line

Dean Juipe

Tuesday, April 1, 2003 | 9:41 a.m.

Dean Juipe's column appears Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. His boxing notebook appears Thursday. Reach him at juipe@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4084.

Youth coaches are routinely advised to treat their players as adults. Turn your boys into men, so to speak.

The idea is easy to comprehend: If the players are conditioned and expected to behave, there's a good chance they will.

And as they age they'll readily adjust to such formalities as wearing coats and ties when traveling or seen in public, as most college and professional teams require. Dress for success, and all of that.

Yet the opening of the baseball season and a quirky decision by new Texas Rangers manager Buck Showalter has brought a call for the fashion police, if not an experienced counselor.

I'm predicting an uprising, a rebellion and a crummy season for the Rangers, to say nothing of Showalter cementing a position for himself on Mr. Blackwell's annual list of bad dressers and fools.

The Rangers, you see, will not take to the road in a respected athlete's usual dignified attire. They won't be traveling in style.

By Showalter's edict, they'll look like a troop on loan from a French cabaret, or, perhaps, as if they're impersonating the Vienna Boys Choir.

In an embarrassing reversal of accepted mores, Showalter has decided to treat his men -- most of whom possess multimillion-dollar contracts -- as preteens on a field trip.

He has them all wearing what are described as garishly bright red sport coats, complete with a Texas state flag emblem and Rangers and Major League Baseball logos.

I don't expect this to go over too well.

"Hey, A-Rod, for $50 I'll let you have my accessories," some gal with a plume in her hat and trinkets to match could holler to the Texas star as he marches in step with his teammates through America's airports this summer.

Will Rodriguez -- he of the $252-million contract -- accept the ribbing with a good-natured chuckle? And even if he swallows his pride and takes it with a polite nod and a wink, will similar wisecracking and unsolicited comments roll off tough guys like Carl Everett, Juan Gonzalez and Rafael Palmeiro as well?

Showalter's got this all wrong. He wants a team of standouts, but what he'll be getting is a team that stands out.

One thing about it, the Rangers may lose their way or fall under the radar in the tough American League West, but they'll never get lost. Like a dog with a day-glow collar, their master will always know their whereabouts.

Showalter seems to have flipped, or at least gone a little too far with this discipline thing. As if the red sport coats aren't penance enough, he installed a clock in the team's spring training dressing room that did nothing but count down the hours and minutes until the club's next scheduled workout.

This is big-league baseball with a drill instructor's mentality. And if it isn't demeaning to the players, it at least had to blind-side those who trust themselves to be punctual or prefer a designer look.

The Rangers may be 1-0, having beaten the defending World Series champion Anaheim Angels in their opener, but they're a team with pitching deficiencies and coming off three successive last-place finishes. In Las Vegas, their over/under victory total is 79 and they're 50-1 to win this year's Series.

The clock and the hokey coats aren't going to help them play better or contribute to more wins. And the ridicule might hurt.

On the upside, however, they now have the first piece of a colorful ensemble that by June or July will have led to countless invitations to perform at parties, socials, concerts and the like.

If they can hone their juggling skills, they'll be all set.