My quest for a Hebrew Kansas City Royals shirt started at the end of last week when a loyal reader emailed me and said, “You should find that Lo Cain shirt I saw on TV.”
My first thought was … it must be one of Greg Azorsky’s shirts. He created Meshugge Shirts in 2010. On the website, www. Meshuggeshirts.com, it says “Meshugge is the Yiddish word for crazy and while our ‘designs’ are not necessarily crazy, I probably am crazy for creating these.”
The shirt I was hunting for was not one of Azorsky’s, but he has produced a couple of popular Royals shirts. Last year, he created a line-up shirt for another one of his ventures, KC Cool (kc-cool.com). He produced a 2015 version after the Royals defeated Houston moving into the ALCS last week. Then he decided to do the same batting order in Hebrew as well. It’s available in royal blue of course, and comes in both long-sleeved, short-sleeved and a women’s V-neck version. It can be found on the meshuggeshirts.com website. (The English versions are on kc-cool.com.)
Azorsky doesn’t take complete credit for the idea of translating the Royals batting line-up into Hebrew.
“I think Civia White had written all the players’ names out in Hebrew for the first-grade class at the Hebrew Academy, so I thought why don’t I put it on a T-shirt to match my other one. So I made a few and sold a few,” he said.
This isn’t the first shirt Azorsky has done in Hebrew. His first Israel-themed shirts debuted on Israel Independence Day in 2010 and then later for the Jewish Arts Festival. Then there’s his “I Bleed Sauce” shirt in Hebrew, modeled after one of his most popular shirts for his KC Cool line. It debuted at the Vaad HaKashruth’s first kosher barbecue festival.
Those are some “cool” shirts but if I was going to satisfy our reader’s curiosity, my quest for the Lo Cain shirt needed to continue. I found it on Ebay. It’s called Kansas City Royals Lorenzo Lo Cain Hebrew Soft Cotton T-Shirt (search Lo Cain on ebay.com.) Then I found Josh Wajcman, the designer, and learned the shirt can also be purchased through Etsy. The link for the shirts, by RoyalTeesKc, is https://www.etsy.com/shop/KCteedesigns or by emailing .
Wajcman said the inspiration to do a Lorenzo Cain Hebrew shirt came pretty naturally. He said he has a small group of “former HBHA holy brothers” who talk daily about the Royals.
“Some good thoughts, some bad, but Baruch Hashem everyone is passionate,” Wajcman said.
He said his HBHA chevra would occasionally take a spin on a player’s name and turn it into Hebrew or Yiddish.
“For example, for many years we called former Royal David Dejesus just plain Dovid. In this situation, for Lorenzo (Lo) Cain, it just flowed so naturally. Lo for Lo. Cain for Cain. Lo in Hebrew means No. Cain in Hebrew, means yes,” Wajcman said.
He’s not really in the T-shirt business, but after seeing some “outrageously priced shirts out there,” he said “we wanted to give the average Joe a high quality soft cotton tee at a significant lower price, while also incorporating some Jewish pride.”
“The beauty of the Lo Cain shirt is that it’s plain and simple. Ironically, random people have stopped me more than once, at the K, telling me they want to purchase the shirt-off-my-back,” Wajcman noted.
Royals fever doesn’t end with apparel. There’s been lots and lots of fun pics on Facebook posted by members of the Jewish community cheering on the Royals. Many have also taken photos with Marlin’s Man, aka Laurence Leavy, a Miami attorney who likes to attend major sporting events wearing his orange Miami Marlins apparel. He just happens to be Jewish and has been very philanthropic, reportedly giving a large sum of money to the families of fallen firefighters Larry Leggio and John Mesh. (Reports range from $5,000 for each family to $10, 000 for each family.)
In the interest of space, we’re sharing two pics with Marlin’s Man and young, Jewish Royals fans!
As I write this on Monday night, it hasn’t been a good night for Royals faithful. But I believe we will have more Royals baseball to talk about in next week’s Chronicle!