Paul Ward of Utica, N.Y., dances with other students at mascot training camp between innings during a Richmond Braves game. van View More Images from this story Visit the Photo Place

TRAININGDAY

By ADAM HIMMELSBACH

Date published: 6/22/2003

RICHMOND--Look at that poor dog lying so lifelessly.

Without a bark. Without a breath.

His tongue's scraping the carpet and there's no water or puppy chow in sight. Those droopy brown eyes could make a flea change its mind.

So why is Cosmo's owner so happy, sitting on a tabletop a few feet away in a room that reeks of drying sweat?

Why is Joby Giacalone telling six young men how good it feels to don dog fur?

"I think most people would hate it because of the smell, the heat and the eyes on you," Giacalone says. "But when I'm in costume, all of a sudden I can dance."

Welcome to Mascot Camp, where silence is expected, idiocy is encouraged and beer-spilling is lauded.

Twenty-two years ago Giacalone, the camp director and founder of Charlottesville-based Mascot Consulting, was cut from the baseball team at Lenoir-Rhyne College in Hickory, N.C.

He hated being a fan, and he really hated seeing his ex-girlfriend gallivant around town with the man who portrayed the school mascot, Joe the Bear.

So before a basketball game one autumn afternoon, Giacalone and his buddies snatched the furry getup. With three pillows strapped around his waist to give the bear a belly, Giacalone had quite a day.

He danced with toothsome cheerleaders and hugged tiny toddlers. He slid headfirst across the hardwood floor. He loved it.

Once the game ended, the wife of the school president approached Giacalone, who figured the show was over.

"I did the cardinal sin of mascoting. I took my head off," Giacalone says, shaking his permanent noggin. "I took it off right in the middle of everybody and explained who I was. She said they'd never had a mascot as funny as I was."

Giacalone was hired as Joe the Bear for his final two--er, four--years of college, and the fervor grew with each performance.

During his ho-hum stints working for the Census Bureau after graduation, Giacalone always knew he couldn't fail with a tail.

In 1989 he saw a flier in a pizza shop inviting hopefuls to become the mascot of the Charlotte Knights AA baseball team. A couple of months later, Giacalone was making $25 a game as Homer the Dragon.

In 1994, he reached the big leagues as Dinger the Dinosaur of the expansion Colorado Rockies, and stayed for two seasons.

Date published: 6/22/2003