Hello Yellow: One Man’s Take on the Jazz’s Golden Get-Up

July 19th, 2017 | by Jarom Moore

The Jazz will soon introduce four “editions” of their 2017-18 jerseys.

I’m here to advocate for the hated, the downtrodden and the much-maligned. Yes, I’m here for the yellow jerseys.

As Nike gets set to enter its first year as the outfitter of NBA teams, the sportswear giant recently announced that each team will have four new jersey options. There no longer needs to be a light jersey for the home team or anything along those lines. Home teams will pick one of their four “editions” and the road team will pick a jersey to contrast that. It’s a fresh start with a new look at feel for all 30 teams.

The Jazz already have pretty great uniforms. The green is their best uniform in my opinion, but the white and blue were both good for what they were.  I’m also one of the probably very few who didn’t hate sleeved jerseys (please keep reading). However, that was for a different age and a different time.

Last year, Utah had sleeved jerseys and some guy named Gordon. Now Hayward has gone one to wear… well, green. That’s right, he’s traded out his Jazz green alternate for green solid uniforms. Now the team has the option to create a new identity. This will be a different team. A team looking to impose its will on others.

Reports that Utah’s refresh will include a jersey with gold as the primary color have ignited serious debates on Jazz Twitter. As you might guess, the typical answers are some variation of this: “Ewww.. no that’s the Lakers color” or, “Too Warriors/Lakers.”

I like to think of myself as the captain on this… yellow submarine. I’ve been advocating for yellow since the announcement of redone jerseys in 2012 and sleeved jerseys in 2014. I thought they would look cool.

Now I’ve moved on from thinking the Jazz are a team that would look cool in yellow to a team that NEEDS to wear yellow.

Now that the home team doesn’t have to wear white, but can choose their color and the road team has to contrast, the Jazz can impose their will. That’s what this team wants to do, impose their will on other teams.

Every season, often twice, thousands of yellow Kobe Bryant jerseys flood the arena for Lakers game. For a night, yellow suddenly becomes a near-dominant color. If the Jazz wear yellow the Lakers have to wear blue or black.

Think of all of the “The City” yellow Warriors jerseys that have been sold in the last… 15 minutes or so. Jazz wear yellow, those jerseys get lost in a crowd of yellow 45s, 27s and 8s. (There will be at least one Jonas Jerebko jersey somewhere out there).

This isn’t necessarily about fashion; this is about identity. This is a team that is built for spite, pettiness and hatred towards another team. This is a team with a leader that drops a video singing about loyalty at a random time that happens to coincide with Hayward’s free agent departure. This team has an Australian father who joked about switching to 20 just to screw with his purported best friend.

The same guy subtweets a wet willy emoji to reference an incident from 5 years ago.

This is a team with a rookie in Donovan Mitchell who is so mad at columnists that slight him during summer league, he’ll mean mug the columnist after a good play while running down the court.

This just in: Donovan Mitchell reads the internet

 

You may think that wearing yellow just to screw with the Lakers and Warriors is petty. I imagine they will wear green while playing the Celtics to have them change colors. If they played the Cavs in the 2016 playoffs, they would have bought black Jr. Jazz jerseys from Savers so the Cavs wouldn’t be able to wear their “lucky” black sleeved jerseys.

This is a petty team with a chip on their shoulder. Frankly, we are a petty fanbase.

Own it.

Wear yellow; screw the Lakers.

(Editor’s note: And, as one fan showed us today, a uni in Jazz gold could actually look pretty cool.)

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