The Fashion Disasters of TV Sports

ESPN anchor Rece Davis began his career looking like a Sigma Nu pledge. "I had two shirts," he says, "the white oxford buttoned-down and the blue oxford buttoned-down." However, experience—and the prodding of his wife—has helped Davis forge his own neo-preppy look. He began turning down the network's swag suits and cut a deal with New York clothier Peter Millar. Now Davis "can't stand to see guys wear buttoned-down shirts with suits. Save that for the yacht club," he says. Thanks to his fashion-forward colleague, Scott Van Pelt, Davis is on to a new style motif—pocket squares. "Van Pelt said his grandfather told him once that 9 out of 10 men don't wear pocket squares," Davis recalls. "And you don't want to dress like 9 out of 10 men."

Dressing sports anchors may be the least fulfilling job in the fashion industry—just below being Naomi Campbell's personal assistant. This explains why many networks, such as CBS (CBS), hire third parties such as Ward Rhobe Management, the U.S. Steel of the third-party sports-anchor-styling business. Founded in 1992, Los Angeles-based Ward Rhobe has faced competition from numerous anchor-styling outfits in what is estimated to be at least a multi-hundred-dollar industry. Two decades later, its market dominance is unrivaled. "CBS Sports was our very first client when they got the Olympic Games in Albertville," says founder Rich Valenza. "They were concerned by what their talent might look like without help in a country such as France."