He’s done it again, folks. Eric Adams—the avuncular, tomfoolery-addicted mayor of New York City who was recently indicted on charges of bribery, campaign finance, and conspiracy—dropped another banger on Monday. No, it wasn’t a newly formed brotherhood with a Turkish dignitary, nor was it a memorable one-liner on par with “Let your haters be your waiters when you sit down at the table of success.” Instead, Adams’s latest and greatest contribution to the world was a sartorial choice: At the city’s Columbus Day Parade on Monday, the (alleged) Brooklyn resident stepped out in a black baseball hat that was embroidered with both the New York Mets and the New York Yankees’ logos, bisected by an X. (It was perhaps that letter—a bit of streetwear parlance denoting a collab—that drove the final stake.)
Expectedly, people were enraged by this. The Mets and the Yankees are not just baseball teams on opposite sides of a crosstown rivalry; they’re also immediate signifiers of who you are as a New Yorker. By many metrics, the Mets have long been “the people’s team,” symbolic of the outer-borough working class and other notions of historical underdogism. The Yankees, on the other hand, are capitalism personified, synonymous with excellence and glitzy high-class society and whatever other propaganda George Steinbrenner led us to believe during the franchise’s heyday. To openly support both in the space of one hat is sacrilegious to many New Yorkers, while others would argue that it’s no big deal. He is the mayor, after all, and with the Mets and Yankees both still alive in this year’s playoffs, it makes sense that Adams would want to show a little love to both clubs. He famously loves clubs!
What we have here is an argument at the center of style and sports. Who better to hash this out than us, GQ’s own style writer Eileen Cartter and sports writer Matthew Roberson, to decide, once and for all, whether Mayor Eric Adams’s hat is actually good or downright despicable? We’ve devised a series of questions that will hopefully lead us to a conclusion.
Forget the sports implications for a second. Is the hat objectively cool?
Eileen Cartter: Yes. People love sacrilege. It’s also so New York—a Mets-Yankees mashup hat feels like a bootleg item you could buy on Canal Street or in a Midtown souvenir shop. Might as well also throw a yellow taxi and a Big Apple and the Statue of Liberty on there. Plus, our colleague Samuel Hine, GQ’s fashion writer, pointed out that the hat is in honor of the actual 2000 World Series, when the Yankees beat the Mets 4-1. So that also makes it trendy in a Y2K way, which adds cool points. (That World Series is the second-funniest NYC-meets-New-Millennium phenomenon behind Bronx native Ice Spice being born on January 1, 2000.)
Matthew Roberson: I don’t know, dude. While you’re right, this hat is extremely New Yawk—any zaza emporium worth its weight in pre-rolls has at least one guy behind the counter always wearing this exact hat—it feels very forced. This hat reads like someone who just moved to the city trying to show everyone that they not only live in New York, but they really get it now. Which, hey, that is kind of Eric Adams’s whole deal, depending on how much you believe he’s actually spending time in the five boroughs. But you know what’s objectively cooler than a Mets x Yankees collab hat? A Mets hat! Or a Yankees hat! Leave it to the politician to both sides this one.
Would you wear this hat?
EC: Like, sure, but maybe only on days when I’m feeling brave. Think of all the conversations it would spark! I’d have to be ready for them. I’d have to be in the right headspace. Bummer it’s already sold out. I might check Grailed.
MR: I absolutely under no circumstances would wear this hat. I am a self-respecting sports fan. What I will do is list a bunch of guys off the dome who played for both teams, and would theoretically be allowed to wear this hat: David Cone. Doc Gooden. Curtis Granderson. Joely Rodriguez. Brandon Drury.
Is it tacky for the mayor to support both teams?
EC: If anything, he’s kinda the only person who should? Plus, Eric Adams does seem like the type to keep his all bases covered (pun obviously intended), in a How to Win Friends and Influence People sort of way.
