We have the Red Sox and the White Sox and the Reds which were also once the Red Sox. If you look at minor league teams, you have sox of every different hue. I know the term Sox comes from Stockings which was sometimes became legs or leggings in the early 1920s and later Sox.
So why are so many baseball teams named some color of “Sox”?
Well, without doing the research, my guess is that the brightly-colored stockings (or brightly bleached in the case of Chicago’s squad) were the most distinctive aspect of the teams’ uniforms.
Before official nicknames, calling a team simply by their city of origin could get monotonous; then, as now, reporters liked to vary their nomenclature within articles. Imagine a base-ball beat writer extolling the fine effort the local boys put up against the red-stockinged squad from Boston. From there, it’s no big leap to “Base Ball Nine defeat Red Sox from Boston” in a headline.
Powers &8^]
My understanding is that the fabric dyes available to baseball teams were either too expensive or believed to be toxic when in contact with the skin. The socks were easy to color and they could be worn over white “sanitary” stockings to protect the skin. Also, the knickerbocker pants style exposed the stockings, so the colored stockings became an early way to distinguish the teams on the field.
My copy of “The First Book of Baseball” (published sometime in the 1950s or 1960s, I think) states that the home team wears white uniforms, and the visiting team wears gray uniforms. In the days of yore, the cap and the socks were the only colored items in the uniform.
There’s also the St. Louis Brown Stockings, later renamed the Cardinals. (Not to be confused with the St. Louis Browns, who moved to Baltimore and became the Orioles.)
One theory even has it that the Detroit Tigers were so named because of their orange-and-black striped socks.
In its early days of development, baseball teams were fielded by gentlemen’s clubs, so teams just used the club names, such as is still done in Europe – Athletic Club of Philadelphia, Atlantic Club of Brooklyn, Forest City Club of Cleveland, Kekionga Club of Fort Wayne, Mutual Club of New York, Olympic Club of Washington, Western Club of Keokuk.
However, by the time the professional major leagues had matured, they were no longer considered teams fielded by gentlemen’s clubs but rather independent franchises and the commercial and athletic success of the Cincinnati Red Stockings made it fashionable for teams to be identified by their sock colors (at this point, team nicknames were still informal and ad hoc, not officially designated by the management) – Boston Red Stockings, St. Louis Brown Stockings, Chicago White Stockings, Louisville Grays, Hartford Dark Blues, Worcester Ruby Legs.
In 1882, the National League explicitly assigned sock colors to the clubs – Red for Boston, gray for Buffalo, white for Chicago, dark blue for Cleveland, gold for Detroit, light blue for Providence, green for Troy, and brown for Worcester. The league adminstration also assigned cap and shirt designs based on player position. So, for example, all first basemen in the league would wear the same caps and jerseys and only their socks would indicate which clubs they belonged to.