Joe Maddon cares not for your talk of his legacy within the game of baseball.
With one small exception, of course.
"The only thing I've really focused on regarding my legacy to this point," Maddon said, "is the fact I think I really altered dress codes."
Huh?
Yes, dress codes.
The World Series-winning manager was asked before Sunday's series finale against the St. Louis Cardinals if he's ever given thought to his legacy down in Tampa Bay, helping to put the Rays on the map. Maddon returns to Tampa with the Cubs this week for a two-game set against the Rays.
In typical Maddon fashion, he needed no time to think about his answer and already had his amusing response ready to go. He even said he thought about the dress code aspect Sunday as he was walking into Wrigley Field, reflecting back on the hiring process before he got his first managerial job with the Rays and how every team asked him what his dress code would be.
MLB
"I always thought the dress code was one of the most absurd things ever invented in Major League Baseball," Maddon said. "Because they would wear all these expensive suits in the hope of winning because 'I wore an expensive suit.' And I never understood that.
"I never understood why it was so important to go from a clubhouse to a bus to a tarmac to a plane to a tarmac to a bus to a hotel lobby to your room and why it was so important to dress up.
"If I leave any kind of legacy in this game, I would hope I would be pointed at in regards to changing the dress code."
Maddon said he hated the dress code even as a player, making reporters laugh by telling a story about how he ruined a pair of nice white jeans on a bus one time because there was grease under the seat.
"I mean, all this crazy stuff that you do because you're attempting to ameliorate the mind of an older gentleman that was taught in a certain timeframe that it was important to dress a certain way to be within a group," Maddon said. "Cannot disagree more.
"Other than parochial schools. I'm into uniforms in parochial schools. I think the lack of competition with kids in their dress is cool. Otherwise, I'm totally against it."
Maddon has made his disgust with dress codes clear in his three years in Chicago, often telling guys the only dress code is: If you think you look hot, wear it.
He also admitted all those themed road trips — superheroes, NFL jerseys, matching sweatsuits, "Anchorman," etc. — are for camaraderie, but also to poke fun at the antiquated tradition of baseball players dressing up in suits every time they travel.
The Cubs do not currently have a theme for their final road trip of the 2017 season, with stops in Milwaukee and St. Louis after Tampa Bay.