Retro Active

Walk into the Men’s Land clothing store in the Fox Hills Mall and enter a sports time warp.

Racks and shelves brim with the jerseys of athletes from bygone eras. But there is nothing antiquated about the prices.

A replica of Jim Brown’s No. 32 jersey with the 1964 Cleveland Browns costs $320. Nolan Ryan’s orange-and-yellow swathed jersey with the 1980 Houston Astros is priced at $300. And the eye-catching red, white and blue double-knit model worn by Wes Unseld for the 1977-78 Baltimore Bullets sells for $410.

In something of a surprising fashion trend, retro sports apparel represents the hottest look in urban men’s wear and is leading a resurgence in licensed athletic gear, particularly among teenagers with a new interest in what’s old.

LeBron James is one such teenager. The 18-year-old basketball phenom was temporarily ruled ineligible to play for his Akron, Ohio, high school because he accepted two retro jerseys for free from a Cleveland clothing store on Jan. 25. James, projected as the No. 1 pick in the next NBA draft, has returned the jerseys -- an Unseld model and Gale Sayers’ 1965 Chicago Bear jersey, with a total retail value of $845.

Returns, though, are rare. Fact is, sales of retro jerseys are booming.

“We can’t keep them in stock, from the smallest to the largest [size],” said Nate Turner, sales manager for Men’s Land. “The demand is very high right now.”

Their visibility is equally high, from Kobe Bryant wearing a different retro jersey each day of last year’s NBA Finals to hip-hop artists draping themselves in throwbacks for their music videos.

For Sunday’s NBA All-Star game at Atlanta, players will wear retro jerseys from the 1987-88 season.

Sam Azzam, owner of three Men’s Land stores in the Los Angeles area, says his business has increased substantially since he started selling retro jerseys last year.

“It brings in the high-profile customers,” said Azzam, who is wearing his store’s most expensive jersey, a replica of Lance Alworth’s No. 19 with the 1963 San Diego Chargers. The powder-blue beauty goes for $460.

Azzam’s Fox Hills store is a frequent destination for Laker and Clipper players, as well as professional athletes staying in Los Angeles. On Friday, Utah Jazz guard Mark Jackson purchased six retro jerseys at the store -- those of Ryan, Brown, Jerry Rice, Sammy Baugh, Randall Cunningham and Drew Bledsoe for about $1,800.

Hip-hop artists represent another influential group of buyers.

Not everyone, however, is attracted to the jerseys because of the name on the back. Frequently, it’s the color or style of the clothing that attracts attention.

“A lot of people don’t even know who the players are, or the number that represents the player,” Turner said. “They ask, ‘Who is this?’ ”

At the heart of the retro fad is another anonymous figure. Peter Capolino, 58, is the owner of Philadelphia-based Mitchell & Ness Nostalgia Co., the only company licensed by the NBA, NFL and Major League Baseball to make throwback jerseys, which are also licensed by the former athletes whose names are on the back.

The company’s “Hardwood Classic” basketball collection is the most popular. Best sellers include Julius Erving’s 1977-78 Philadelphia 76er jersey, the 1960-61 Laker jerseys of Jerry West and Elgin Baylor, and Unseld’s Bullet jersey. The use of authentic fabrics and stitching keeps prices high, which helps maintain the product’s cachet.

Capolino’s business has grown in Dr. J-like leaps in recent years because of the retro craze. Mitchell & Ness grossed $25 million last year, a $22-million increase from what the company made in 2000. Based on sales in the first month of 2003, Capolino said he expects to earn about $48 million this year.

In the last 12 months, he has expanded his work force from eight to 75 employees. The expansion prompted Capolino to build a 20,000-square-foot warehouse and move the company’s headquarters to a larger facility in Philadelphia.

“You might say that I’m a little bit overwhelmed,” Capolino said.

In April of 2001, Capolino hired a man who had been a longtime customer at the Mitchell & Ness retail store in Philadelphia. Reuben Harley, 28, who goes by the nickname “Big Reub,” is the company’s director of marketing and advises his boss on what jerseys will be embraced by the hip-hop community based on feedback from the artists.

The 6-foot-2, 325-pound Harley drives a Cadillac Escalade, equipped with $16,000 rims, purchased for him by Capolino last fall.

“He’s my touchstone,” Capolino said. “He was wearing these jerseys and jackets before anybody else, and he knew that once the urban community recognized what we were doing ... he said he could make me famous, and he’s done it.

“I owe about 70 or 80% of all the success to Reuben.”

The boom in business has given Capolino a crash education in a culture he only recently came in contact with.

“It’s been an enlightening experience for me, getting to know all the hip-hop artists, and getting to know pro athletes that I never got close to,” he said. “I’ve learned they’re a lot nicer and they’re a lot shyer than you realize.”

Capolino says when hip-hop artists and professional athletes tell him who their sports heroes are, in many cases those are the jerseys he puts into production.”A lot of the young black athletes will ask me to make [jerseys] of their black heroes,” he said.

Requests for the Washington Redskin and Tampa Bay Buccaneer jerseys worn by black quarterback Doug Williams have prompted Capolino to increase production of those items.

“This is not fashion as much as people think, it’s history,” Capolino said. “I have 8,000 uniforms that I’ve researched and I’ve only made 1,000. As long as the young people are interested in the history and they’re willing to be patient, because I’m very slow in making these things, I’m going to keep going.”

The retro trend shows no signs of slowing down.

Allen Iverson of the 76ers caused a stir in Philadelphia last year after wearing a Bill Russell Boston Celtics’ jersey. He later wore a Dominique Wilkins Atlanta Hawks’ jersey to a postgame news conference.

“I respect great players,” Iverson said. “Bill Russell, Michael Jordan, Wilt Chamberlain, Larry Bird, Dominique -- these are guys who paved the way for us, gave us the vision.”

Among the most hotly anticipated retro jerseys is the 1970s-era San Diego Clipper model worn by Joe Bryant, father of the Laker guard. The jersey is coveted, insiders say, because it features the name “Bryant” on the back and No. 23, which is also Michael Jordan’s number. Two superstars for the price of one, so to speak.

Last season, Kobe wore his dad’s 76er jersey at the All-Star game and donned retro jerseys honoring West, Joe Montana, Joe Namath, Jackie Robinson and Wayne Gretzky during the NBA Finals.

Laker center Shaquille O’Neal has also gotten into the act, ordering retro jerseys of legendary NBA centers -- George Mikan, Chamberlain, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Patrick Ewing, among others -- from Mitchell & Ness.

Paying homage to older players isn’t the only reason athletes wear retro jerseys.

After the Buccaneers defeated the Philadelphia Eagles in the NFC championship game, Tampa Bay defensive tackle Warren Sapp wore the Eagle jerseys of former quarterback Ron Jaworski and receiver Harold Carmichael during Super Bowl week, a gesture that some interpreted as rubbing it in.

Capolino’s reasons for making the jerseys are derived from a love of sports history. He produced retro jerseys for Major League Baseball from 1988-99, researching more than 500 different historic jerseys and jackets.

In 1999, a friend, Congressman Bill Lipinski (D-Ill.), convinced Capolino to try his hand at making retro basketball jerseys.

“He introduced me to David Stern, and the next thing I knew I was doing the history of the NBA,” Capolino said.

In 2000, Capolino approached the NFL, which issued him a license to begin making retro jerseys.

“I was just poking along, having fun,” he said.

He added the NHL to his roster this year. Mitchell & Ness’ first NHL jerseys will make their appearance in about three weeks, Capolino said.

“I don’t have the slightest idea what I’m doing, but I’m just going to keep doing it,” he said.