Wives may cringe and mothers may shudder, but the Mohawk craze that swept through the Tigers'  clubhouse a week ago is catching on elsewhere.

"We've kind of created a Mohawk epidemic,"  declared Phil Coke with undisguised pride.

"Nothing wrong with that," insisted Coke, whose spiked hairdo is easily the most outrageous and provocative on the team. 

"It's just hair."

Now, copy-cats are popping up all over town, especially among the young generation.

Magglio Ordonez's 14-year-old son, Magglio Jr., showed up in the locker room over the weekend, wearing what Coke described as "a shaggy Mohawk" _ and a big grin.

"The other day, when we were in the bullpen, one fan, a random person, leaned over out of the stands and asked if I would give him a Mohawk," recalled Coke, who spends a couple of minutes each morning sharpening the strip of hair along the top of his head with gel until he looks like a prehistoric creature.

"I told him, 'Go get one.'

"And he says to me, 'Do you think they'll let me back in the ballpark if I go out and get one?' "

What would have happened, Coke was asked, if he had shown up at the last year, when he was playing for the clean-cut Yankees, wearing a Mohawk?

"They would have threatened me with termination,"  said Coke.

"Can you picture the headlines? 'Released Because of Mohawk.' "