Check out the picture below, which comes from sug000's photos on Flickr.
As you can see the C's newest acquisition, James Posey, is going for a jump ball and rocking long socks, as is his custom. And that's cool. I just don't know where society as a whole stands on the long socks. Now when it comes to shorts it is pretty clear. Men wear baggy shorts. I don't care how hard John Stockton and Michael Jordan's younger brother* tried, the short shorts are dead.
And for the record Chris Webber and the rest of the Fab 5 take credit for that. Speaking of the Fab 5, they also claim ownership over the black socks for athletics phenomenon. Unfortunately this does little to solve my question about high socks. But I do have a story. My freshman year of high school I made the JV basketball squad. This was back when I had not made a strong choice on socks. As a side note it was also the year Beverly Hills Ninja broke my heart by being so terrible. Alas that is a whole other story. But back to the socks and basketball. One home game we were playing our hated rival. I was wearing long socks, much like Poesy's (pictured above). However, they were not pulled up to my knees. You can imagine how foolish they looked being that long and all. Meanwhile, the gym was packed because it was Friday night, the varsity game was next and much like us they were playing the aforementioned hated rival. During a timeout someone yelled, "Hey idiot, nice socks!" Now since I was in high school I immediately assumed he was talking to me. But to hammer home the point he waited a few seconds and said, "Yeah you Jim." This was a turning point for me as I immediately switched to the more athletic looking ankle socks. Well not immediately. The game had to end. And I didn't go shopping for a few days. But you get the point.
Now I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Posey is cooler than me. Everyone in the NBA is, Brian Scalabrine included. Well everyone but Damon Jones. He tries way too hard. In conclusion the high socks work for Posey. And I imagine that he will continue to wear them. But I will not be changing my ways.
The above picture of Jordan and Stockton comes from Fashionable Male's photos over at Flickr.
* I like to call Michael Jordan from the mid 80s, particularly after he broke his foot, Michael Jordan's younger brother. This was before he pursued a more aggressive lifting program and started shaving his head. It is something I thought about anytime I saw a game from that era. So I was fired up when David Halberstam mentioned the same phenomenon in Playing for Keeps. As always you only get the most in depth analysis here at Green Bandwagon.