Walt Schofield is the man behind the mask.
The sculptor of Seattle's Squatch and Sacramento's Slamson. A Mavs Man's mastermind.
Schofield, East High School's assistant principal, has helped create heads for about half of the NBA's mascots. His portfolio includes the Golden State "Warrior," the Phoenix Suns "Gorilla" and Chicago's "Da Bull."
Schofield also sculpted the mascot head for the National Football League's New England Patriots, which was unveiled at their first Super Bowl appearance in 1986.
Locally, he has sculpted Cosmo the cougar for Brigham Young University and Swoop for the University of Utah. He even did the panther for West High — a rival team of his school.
"It's nice to come over here and be a kid," Schofield said before pulling on a gold muscle-man suit at Alinco Costumes in Murray. "It's kept me sane."
The former art teacher and bronze sculptor is a contracting artist for Alinco, creator of the famous San Diego Chicken and the Utah Jazz Bear. The company is known for its "soft-head" design and realistic details on mascots, including hair highlighted in team colors and specialty contact lenses.
There are a few ways to make these elaborate pieces. But basically, here's how it works.
A team gives Alinco an idea of what it's looking for. Artists sketch what ends up looking like cartoon characters and send the drawings to the team for approval.
Once everything's just so, the sketch goes to artists like Schofield. He retreats to a workshop in Milford, Beaver County. He uses oil-based clay to sculpt the likeness of the mascot's head, which can take a week to complete.
Alinco makes a latex mold of the sculpture, then cuts it so it can lie flat as a pattern for fabric and foam. Or, if the head is a human likeness of, say, Prince Charming, the latex mold is painted and that's it.
If the head is for a mascot planning to ski stadium stairs or flip through fire-burning rings for a slam dunk, there's another step. The man donning mascot duds must have his face molded. That way, the bear, bull or bigfoot head will fit precisely to the wearer's face and won't come loose during stunts.
Hockey helmets are molded into the mascot heads for added safety. Shoulder and knee pads are sewn into some suits, like the Bear's, for the same reason.
All told, such elaborate costumes might cost $5,000. Simpler designs can be purchased for $700 to $1,000.
Schofield has created dozens of characters in his 25 years of mascot manufacturing. They dangle on Alinco's walls, among shelves of spare buzzard feet and gorilla arms and orders ready to ship to Houston high schools and Italian production companies.
Schofield also has had to play mascot doctor in a pinch. NBA teams have chartered flights to his Milford home 240 miles southwest of Salt Lake City for emergency repairs just hours before a game. Once, he returned the Chicago Bulls mascot wearing a brand new Utah Jazz hat, just for kicks.
"It's good therapy," he said of the hobby. "Plus, I'll be watching a game, see a mascot on TV and think, 'Gosh, I did that, you know?' "
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