PORT ST. LUCIE — Glenn Sherlock was not sure he'd ever see this day.
As a young coach in the Yankees’ minor league system in the late 1980s, Sherlock had participated in the lengthy meetings that codified the Yankees’ facial hair policy, among many other ideas and rules that have defined the organization for generations. Then he was one of the many people tasked with enforcing it.
“I’m extremely surprised,” Sherlock, now the Mets’ catching instructor, said at Mets camp on Friday morning as news spread of the Yankees’ decision to finally allow players to wear beards. “During [pregame] stretch, if anyone came out unshaven, we would have to send them back in to shave.”
As Sherlock knows firsthand, the story of the rule’s genesis and history is richer than most fans realize. And in fact, the Yankees have updated several of the rules about personal appearance over the past decade or so. Facial hair was merely the highest-profile bullet point.
The origin (which I learned while reporting my book, The Yankee Way, on which much of this article is based) of the policy stretches back to the mid-1970s, when new owner George Steinbrenner wanted players to mirror the look that he experienced while attending military school and serving in the U.S. Air Force. Steinbrenner ordered players to trim their hair and facial hair, but the policy was not yet codified in writing.
The long process began with a chance encounter in 1976 between Steinbrenner and a college coach named Jack Butterfield. The two met at an event at the University of South Florida, where Butterfield was then working.
Butterfield impressed Steinbrenner with his depth of knowledge and all-business personality. Soon after, Steinbrenner hired him to run scouting and player development.
“Dad was organized and detailed,” Brian Butterfield, Jack’s son and a decorated coach himself, told me in a 2022 interview. “He was in perfect line with what Mr. Steinbrenner represented. Mr. Steinbrenner was extremely disciplined — the short hair and playing the game the right way. He had a football background, and dad had also been the football coach at [the University of] Maine. Mr. Steinbrenner valued toughness, and dad believed in all the same things. He was fearless.”
Jack Butterfield died in a car accident in 1979. Steinbrenner promoted one of his proteges, Bill Livesey, to replace him.
One spring training in the early ‘80s, Livesey learned firsthand the importance that Steinbrenner placed on players’ personal appearance.
On a particular morning, several squads of Yankee minor leaguers were playing Baltimore on a backfield. Steinbrenner sat between the fields, glowering.
“Livesey, come here!” he barked. “You see those uniforms?”
“Our uniforms?” Livesey said.
“No!” Steinbrenner answered. “The Baltimore uniforms!”
Sure enough, the name patches on the back of the Orioles’ jerseys were sloppily applied and peeling off.
“If I ever see a Yankee uniform like that, you’re gone!” Steinbrenner said.
Recalling that in 2022, Livesey laughed and said, “He can’t find anything we’re doing wrong, so he warns me about the other team’s uniforms!”