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Boston Globe
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Boston Globe
Meet the Massachusetts man (and lifelong Red Sox fan) who designs and delivers the team's beloved T-shirts
Consider it a physical manifestation of the camaraderie and vibes that have developed over the summer. Advertisement 'I feel like we lead the league in T-shirts right now,' said hitting coach Peter Fatse, something of a ringleader in this accidental trend. 'It's one of those morale boosters over the course of a season. It's a long year. When you have things like that that rejuvenate the guys, they see something new in their locker, it's fun.' Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Jarren Duran said: 'Those kinds of T-shirts mean something happened to have us make those T-shirts. So we all know the joke behind it or the story behind it.' Related : And Trevor Story: 'It's kind of our brand of baseball. We're telling a little story through the shirts. Paul does an amazing job of making that come to life. It's something cool that I think a lot of guys love to rep, and we appreciate it.' Advertisement The origin centers around Procopio and Fatse. Procopio, 36, long has known the Fatse family through Western Mass. baseball circles, and he has known Peter specifically for more than a decade, since he helped outfit Fatse's teams at his former local training facility with uniforms and gear. During spring training, Fatse reached out to Procopio, who last year turned his screen printing/embroidery company, Primo Products, into a full-time gig. Fatse sought stuff displaying his '9-on-1' philosophy — nine batters against one pitcher — for his hitters, and Procopio came through. That was the first of at least eight shirts in the Procopio/Red Sox partnership. Pitching coach Andrew Bailey has requested a couple, including a Crochet-inspired iteration that says 'Beast,' which is the ace's catch-all nickname for his teammates (and, in turn, their fitting nickname for him). Justin Willard, director of pitching, had Procopio fashion shirts that read 'Fuego' on the front and feature Pedro Martinez on the back, a trophy of sorts for any pitcher in the organization who reaches 100 miles per hour with his fastball. 'I've just become known,' Procopio said in a telephone interview, 'as Pete's guy.' In early July, when Gonzalez described himself — fairly — as feeling 'tremendously locked in' at the plate, Story loved it. He decided that such a sentiment needed to be commemorated. Working with Procopio to turn it into a shirt, they settled on Miami Vice-style pink and blue lettering (a nod to Gonzalez's hometown) for that quote across the front, plus Gonzalez's No. 23 on the back. Romy Gonzalez said the "Tremendously Locked In" T-shirt was the first time he had been celebrated in a clubhouse like that. Courtesy/Paul Procopio Gonzalez, a role player enjoying by far the best of his five seasons in the majors, said it was the first time he was celebrated in such a way by his club. Advertisement 'There's different ways to build up your teammates. That's a way that I've found,' Story said. 'It's just a way to make him feel good, but also it's part of our team. It's a little bit of a mantra, too. It came about organically and that's the best part about it.' Gonzalez said: 'I thought it was sick.' A few weeks later, Procopio hit Fatse with a question: 'What is going on in the clubhouse right now?' What was buzzy? What would make for a fun shirt? 'Everybody,' Fatse told him, 'is saying, 'Turbulence.' ' The team's plane ride from Boston to Minneapolis on July 27 was fraught. Bad weather forced the team to land in Detroit. Many players got sick. The effects impacted them and others into That infamous flight, harrowing in the moment, has become hilarious in hindsight. 'One of the funniest things is Greg Weissert . . . on the crazy plane ride,' Duran said. 'We were about to land and then we had to re-circle around for like 30 more minutes. He just kept talking about, 'I love the grind. Keep giving it to me. When you think you're done grinding, you're still grinding.' That kind of stuff is funny. People are dying, people are throwing up, people are running to the bathroom. He's over there just absolutely loving every bit of the chaos. 'Little stories like that is what makes teams really close. Even though we were on a crazy plane ride, we have some stuff to laugh about.' Related : Then it became a rallying cry — and an on-base celebration, players extending their arms like plane wings and pretending to teeter after a hit. Advertisement Procopio got to work. His final design featured 'Turbulence' written across the front, an outline on each side of a player doing the arms-out call to the dugout, and, naturally, the head of Wally the Green Monster. About 48 hours later, he made the two-hour drive to Fenway Park to hand-deliver the fresh product. 'I don't know how he does it, but he gets it within two days to us,' Fatse said. 'Boom.' For Procopio — who normally works with youth, high school or college teams, and a wide range of other companies who need branded apparel — this has been good business, sure. But it also is sort of unreal. He always has been a big baseball guy, playing at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts in North Adams and helping coach his alma mater, Taconic High in Pittsfield, to three state titles. He was in high school for the 2004 and 2007 championships. And now the Red Sox are wearing his stuff? Every day? It is so popular among players that on Thursday he sent out another batch of Beast shirts for the hitters and Turbulence shirts for the pitchers. Each group was envious of the other. 'When was the last time you saw Jarren Duran in just a classic Red Sox baseball shirt? He's always wearing different crazy things,' Procopio said. '[In conversation with Fatse] I'm like, dude, Trevor Story makes like $20 million a year. There's no way he's like, 'Man, I love this Turbulence shirt,' right? The experience I've had is holy [expletive], he is right, these guys are wearing it everywhere. It's all they wear.' Advertisement There may well be more to come. Procopio didn't want to spoil too much — or jinx it. 'If the Sox make the playoffs,' he said, 'there are some things in the works.' Tim Healey can be reached at
The Guardian
18-02-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
The tournament that refuses to die: Champions Trophy back for more
As the ICC Champions Trophy resurfaces in Pakistan this week, nearly eight years since the last one, folks will be forgiven for a few double takes, for feeling a bit like Ian Wright reuniting with his old teacher in that lovely viral clip, jaw dropped to the floor and gasping: 'You're alive! Someone said you were dead!' Although did anyone seriously think the Champions Trophy was toast? They say cockroaches and microbes would survive a nuclear apocalypse but there is every chance international cricket's 50‑over tournoi would also spring up in the wasteland, glowing with radiation but still ready to stick its presumably mutated winners in those Miami Vice-style white blazers and deliver that sweet, sweet broadcast money. That might be a bit harsh. The Champions Trophy has always been a fun, punchy affair, its eight editions to date throwing up seven different winners since it first appeared in 1998. Even South Africa have won one, although England, somehow, have not. And while the full‑scale 50-over World Cup has become a seven-week test of endurance, little brother does not muck about. Starting in Karachi on Wednesday, the hosts taking on New Zealand, this one features 15 matches in just 19 days. Ideal. It is just that in the T20 era – ie, the two World Cups era – the Champions Trophy has been hard to take as seriously given its diminished status and repeat resurrections. Neither edition from 2013 and 2017 in England were the original plan, rather fallback positions when thoughts of creating a World Test Championship with semi-finals were aborted. With a WTC now in the calendar, this latest return is solely about servicing a £3bn television deal that apparently must have at least one men's event a year. But then the Champions Trophy has always been about the money, its very genesis being as a device to bridge the revenue gap between 50‑over World Cups. Australia, New Zealand and West Indies have never hosted, you will note, their time zones not juicy enough for TV. It was also supposed to take the sport to emerging territories, the debut in pre-Test status Bangladesh and then Kenya in 2000, only for the full members to take over. Associate nations have not even appeared at one since 2004. This latest Champions Trophy, which is televised on Sky Sports, features the top eight from the 2023 World Cup group stage, qualifying criteria that became public knowledge only halfway through it. The International Cricket Council and the broadcaster Star even pondered converting it into a T20 at one stage, only to be swayed by concerns this would reopen a four‑year gap between 50-over World Cups and possibly hasten the one-day format's demise. And yet for all of its baseline confection – the tournament is the ICC in microcosm, one could argue – this Champions Trophy is also a hugely significant moment for the sport. Pakistan is hosting its first global men's event for 28 years, the latest milestone on the long road out of security-dictated isolation that was first paved by the creation of the Pakistan Super League and the slow return of bilateral tours to the country. Pakistan are also defending champions, even if there are just two survivors – Babar Azam and Fakhar Zaman – from that giddy 180-run walloping of India at the Oval in 2017. According to the board president, Mohsin Naqvi, the country is just desperate to show off its warm hospitality and has poured an estimated £16m into refurbishing the stadiums in Lahore, Karachi and Rawalpindi. ICC deadlines for the upgrades were beaten like an Indiana Jones hat-swipe. The only catch? As widely expected when Pakistan were awarded the tournament in late 2021, India are not setting foot in the country after citing their own security concerns. This means the superclasico against Pakistan, the biggest money spinner, will take place in Dubai, likewise India's other Group A games against New Zealand and Bangladesh. Even the final will be moved from Lahore to the desert should Rohit Sharma's men get that far. Like the T20 World Cup last year, when India were down to play the Guyana semi-final regardless, things are worked out around cricket's superpower. Sign up to The Spin Subscribe to our cricket newsletter for our writers' thoughts on the biggest stories and a review of the week's action after newsletter promotion If this highlights one of the issues the ICC has to juggle – or rather, the countries that actually dictate ICC policy – then Group B has another. Australia, South Africa and England are all feeling squeamish about having to play Afghanistan, given the Taliban's grim regime of female oppression back home. The sport has already muddled through three men's World Cups with Afghanistan since the fall of Kabul in 2021, however, and individual boycotts appear unlikely. Full member rights trump human rights, it seems. As for the contenders, India begin as favourites, ready to unite the Champions Trophy with the T20 World Cup that Sharma and Jay Shah lifted in Barbados last year. Having thrashed England 7-1 across eight white‑ball internationals these past few weeks, they are in ominous touch too. It could even become a golden farewell for two 50-over greats, with Sharma, 37, and Virat Kohli, 36, having already called time on T20 internationals. India's decision not to play in Pakistan also brings a tactical advantage. While every other team had to select 15-man squads that considered conditions across multiple venues – including that hop to the United Arab Emirates – India's planning can focus on one ground and one surface. A phalanx of spinners has been duly selected, though sadly Jasprit Bumrah's whip-crack wizardry will be missing to rest a sore back. As the reigning 50-over world champions, Australia should be the top seeds but have lost Pat Cummins (ankle), Josh Hazlewood (hip) and Mitchell Starc (personal reasons) – their first men's global tournament without any of the trio since 2011. They will probably go far. Even if slightly eroded, home advantage should assist Mohammad Rizwan's Pakistan, the world's third-ranked ODI side, while South Africa, runners-up in the T20 World Cup last year, look a value bet. Who knows, perhaps the form-bereft England will spring into life on the flatter surfaces. It all starts on Wednesday and ends on Sunday 9 March, location TBC. One thing we can be sure of is that the Champions Trophy will return again after this one, with India already slated to host in 2029. Because this thing is utterly indestructible.
