They are easy targets.
“Worse, the prospect of jazz going into a lengthy restructuring, those new jerseys? ESPN’s Brian Windhorst asked the question on the “Hoop Collective” podcast back in June.
Reporter Tim McMahon joked about the uniforms worn by his sons-in-law’s senior summer league team. He described them as cheap, bright yellow mesh jerseys with black numbers.
“I call them Junior Jazz,” McMahon said.
of Jazz reveal uniforms for 2022-23 season We are just over a month away from the regular season. With the team now in full rebuilding mode and more losses imminent, we need plenty of airtime and social media space to discuss these uniforms.
My observation is that most people agree with Windhorst and MacMahon. I don’t I really like the simplicity of Jazz’s new look.
But what’s baffling me is that it’s completely taken on the worst uniforms in the history of the jazz franchise.
Somehow, amidst all this angst over black and yellow rebranding, the purple mountain jersey has become a “classic.”
It’s nothing.
Yes, John Stockton “sent the Utah Jazz to the NBA Finals” in those uniforms. And from a history and brand standpoint, a recommitment to purple makes sense.
However, the mountain logo and uniform combination, introduced in 1996, is the product of a particularly bad era of NBA rebranding, a cookie-cutter era.
Bad NBA rebranding in the 1990s
A lot of things got worse in the 90s. This includes professional wrestling, MTV, and lots of NBA jerseys and logos. Too many teams have embarked on ill-fated rebrandings, putting aside their truly classic looks in favor of intimidating logos and flashy (or weird) color schemes.
Rockets center Hakeem Olajuwon in 1998.
By Gary M. McKellar, Deseret News
In 1993, milwaukee bucks I chose a realistic and muscular deer and added purple.of Atlanta Hawks In addition, the 1995 logo was partially spread to pursue realism. particularly bad uniforms.
of houston rockets Probably the worst rebranding in a decade, it’s now completely Toontown. (It hurts to see Hakeem Olajuwon in these.)
But there are four logos in particular that always seem to come from the same shop.
Nuggets, Sonics, Jazz, Pistons rebrand
1994, Denver Nuggets moved away from the rainbow skyline for a more subdued blue, red and gold logo. The following year Seattle Supersonics We also chose a drab color, inexplicably added red, and introduced a logo that felt similar to the Denver logo.
In 1996, utah jazz When detroit pistons We rolled out two very similar logos with a surprising number of colors.
Jazz abandoned musical notes and went for purple… then white… then light blue… then teal… then copper. The Pistons ditched the classic red and blue color scheme and simple logo for a teal, chrome and flame logo set above the basketball.
I don’t design logos for a living, so I can’t identify the artistic principles behind this criticism, but these four teams essentially rolled out the same logo in the mid-1990s.
The Detroit Pistons logo from 1996.
Like Jazz, the Pistons are their The ‘classic’ uniform of the mid-1990s Part of the 2022 rotation.
“I apologize to my friend Grant Hill, those uniforms stink,” Wilbon said in “Pardon the Interruption.” Take out something like
future jazz jersey
Note that most teams that rebranded in the 1990s went back to the look of previous versions, or at least simplified things considerably.
The look of them was intolerable.
If the 1970s and 1980s were the decade of bad sports arenas, the 1990s should be known as the decade of bad NBA uniforms. Luckily, franchises and cities have started building beautiful baseball and soccer stadiums, and with the exception of the Mavericks and Cavaliers, the NBA logos and uniforms are much better.
When it comes to jazz, the purple mountain uniform is a good memory. No problem for the occasional throwback game. But they are not “classic”.
Jazz remains committed to Purple. Who knows what will happen to the simple yellow and black look? We hope it stays in some form, but nevertheless the purple jersey that the Jazz will wear in 2023-24 is really , is really good – especially the old school note jersey.
It looks “classic”. no copper. No teal. It would have been perfect for Pete Maravich.
