Worn To Perfection When it comes to mojo, there are prevalent threads that tend to abound - certain areas where the mojo monsters tend to appear more often. Those areas have to do with food, clothing and color. David Cone has a lucky leather jacket. Pete Maravich would wear his socks forever and ever, until they tended to look like droopy, melted Salvador Dali images hanging onto his magic ankles. Everybody in sports, it seems, has some little bit of clothing mantra, mojo, ritual - from being superstitious about the way their ankles are taped to wearing Babe Ruth's hat during a game (which is what New York Yankees' David Wells, who pitched one of baseball's rare perfect games in 1998, once did). Vida Blue, the great left-hander for the Oakland Athletics, had a lucky hat which he wore in every game for four straight years. It was old, funky and faded. And several American League umpires refused to let Vida take the mound wearing his gamey headpiece. But Blue persisted. He continued to wear it until he was ultimately threatened with a stiff fine and suspension from a game. Vida finally relented, but not before he ceremoniously burned the hat on the field before a game. ©1999 Middlefork Press << BACK TO EXCERPTS