Well, that was fast (and entirely predictable).
According to an article in Salt Lake Tribune, the NBA’s Utah Jazz have been conducting polls amongst fans about possible new team uniforms. These polls are expected to continue over the current homestand.
The process involves voting on a series of uniforms and colour schemes the team has created. Fans will be shown images on an iPad, giving each a 1-10 rating. There’s no way for fans to sign up to take the survey, nor will fans be allowed to take photos or screenshots of the new designs. The surveys are randomized and show different jersey variations to different fans.
Salt Lake Tribune, “Utah Jazz polling fans on future jersey designs” (Dec 2, 2022)
The Utah Jazz unveiled an entirely new set of uniforms just this past June which featured a black and gold colour scheme. At the time of the announcement, the team almost completely ignored the fact the club was changing its colours and introducing new uniforms, instead choosing to focus on the 1990s purple throwback uniform the team would be wearing for a single season.
When the team itself didn’t seem to be excited, at all, about its own new look, it was fairly obvious they would be changing again soon.
Utah’s new uniforms were stripped down, bare-bones, plain jerseys with almost no striping whatsoever, single-coloured, trim-free logos and lettering.
“The data showed that purple was the No. 1 purchase online, and then when people got into the store, it was black and yellow, which was interesting. Look, it’s an evolution,” the Tribune quotes Jazz owner Ryan Smith as saying following the unveiling of the uniforms. “Brands are going to evolve. There’s probably a fair argument we went a little too clean. OK. But it will evolve.”
Some evolutions happen over millions of years; this one will take care of itself in a few dozen weeks.
The Jazz originally wore purple and gold uniforms from their inception in New Orleans back in 1974 through their move to Utah in 1979 and then continuing to 1981. They swapped out purple for green in ’81 before bringing the purple back in 1984. Things stayed relatively the same until a big rebrand took place in 1996 when the club added the large snow-capped mountain peak to the front of their uniforms.
In 2004, the Jazz changed things up again, going to a double blue colour scheme with the team name arched across the front of each jersey. The original team logo returned in 2010 with a focus now on dark blue instead of the original purple. That brings us here to 2022 with the new, out-of-nowhere, likely soon-to-be-extinct black and gold pairing.
LINK: Utah Jazz logo and uniform history
If the Jazz do indeed drop their black and gold quickly, the uniform set would join the ranks of the Jacksonville Jaguars’ gradient helmets, Buffalo Sabres’ “Buffaslug,” and the New York Islanders’ “Fisherman” as unconventional designs to get turfed as soon as league rules would allow it.
