Monday was a big day for contract extensions in the NBA. The deadline for rookie scale contract extensions was 6 p.m. ET, and we saw Jalen Green, Trey Murphy III, Jalen Suggs, Corey Kispert, and Moses Moody all lock in with new deals. But that wasn’t the only extension that got announced on Monday, as the NBA and Nike agreed to a 12-year extension to keep Nike on board as the league’s exclusive supplier of uniforms and apparel — as well as the WNBA and G League.
Nike took over the league’s uniform manufacturing in 2017 and instituted the new system that gives teams four (and sometimes five) uniform sets each season. The City Edition and Statement Edition uniforms have been hit and miss, and it’s felt as though the need to come up with one or two new uniforms each season for each team has stretched things thin at times. That said, there have been some major successes, as some of their unique concepts have become certain teams most beloved uniforms. While I doubt it’ll happen, my hope for the new Nike and NBA contract is a little more flexibility for teams to keep uniforms that are hugely popular in the rotation rather than having to come up with new designs each season.
The Suns’ Valley unis and the Heat’s Vice sets are two of the best examples of designs that should be permanently in the rotation. Hopefully now that the deal is going to run for 20 years, total, Nike and the NBA will pump the brakes a bit on trying to create something new for each team every year when something pops. That seems unlikely, as new uniforms mean fans buying more jerseys, and fans will likely have another 12 years of different looks that are varying degrees of successes and failures.