Why are Yankees caps seen all over the world?

And why is Yankees merchandise popular with African-Americans?

The global ubiquity of the New York Yankees baseball cap was written about by Sam Borden in ESPN in 2019:

I stumbled off a red-eye flight to Tbilisi, the capital of the Republic of Georgia, only to be picked up by a cab driver wearing one. In Reykjavik, the capital of Iceland, it was the guy behind the counter at the gym. In Kazakhstan, I saw one on a young lady selling SIM cards in a street market. In Albania, it was the security guard in front of the soccer stadium.

Baseball is an international sport played at a high level in North America, northern Latin America, and Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan (and even a little bit in Australia). But it’s not soccer or even basketball, and it’s pretty much unknown in most of the world.

So, why does the New York Yankees cap show up so often in random places around the world that don’t care about baseball? Here, for instance, is a souvenir shop on the Via Corso in Rome:

I count:

New York Yankees 10 facings
Chicago Bulls (i.e., Michael Jordan) 2
Los Angeles Lakers (Kobe & LeBron) 2
Chicago White Sox 1?!?!

The 41-121 White Sox are probably still coasting on their 1990s black and white uniforms, which seemed to appeal to street gang members.

First, many foreigners think of the Yankees’ interlocked “NY” logo as the official emblem of New York City, so if they want people to know (or think) they’ve been to New York, they wear the Yankees cap. (In contrast, the regalia of the 62 year old New York Mets has virtually zero appeal abroad.) Heck, many people seem to see the Yankees cap as a symbol of the USA in general.

Second, the New York Yankees seem to be the rare baseball team that has a fair number of African-American fans anymore. African-American celebrities have enormous popular culture influence around the world, so the fact that black New Yorkers like Spike Lee and Jay-Z were often photographed wearing Yankees caps is a very big deal for baseball merchandise sales.

I am familiar with about two or three rap songs from this century, but even I have heard Jay-Z’s Empire State of Mind. In it, Jay-Z boasts about his ability to move Yankees merchandize:

Catch me at the X with OG at a Yankee game
Shit, I made the Yankee hat more famous than a Yankee can

Why have the Yankees remained fashionable among blacks, while blacks have largely moved on to following only basketball and football in other cities?

I don’t know. I suspect that older black guys like Spike and Jay-Z hearken back to the revival of Yankee dominance in 1977-2009, during which the Yankees won seven World Series. Rappers and the like aren’t really into underdogs like the 1969 Mets. (Getting all misty-eyed over the awful Mets upsetting the mighty Orioles is more for suburban white boys.) It was said of the Yankees during their 1950s dominance that rooting for the Yankees was like rooting for U.S. Steel, which sounds like something hip-hop generation African-Americans would be inclined to do.

And they liked Yankee owner George Steinbrenner’s in-your-face style. Lots of people across the country couldn’t stand the bumptious Steinbrenner, but the most influential New York blacks of the next generation apparently liked the guy.

Somebody else who liked Steinbrenner’s style was his protege Donald Trump. So, when Democrats tear their hair out over black men’s lack of enthusiasm for Kamala over Trump, think about Yankees caps.