The sportswear company debuted its first NBA jerseys in July, which marked the beginning of its eight-year deal with the basketball league. NBA players tested Nike’s first jerseys to provide feedback on the fit and fabrication, and the result features recycled polyester fabrics and new placements for armholes, the neck and side seams to “eliminate distractions.”
Nike’s latest NBA jerseys and gear are firsts for the basketball league. The Connected Jersey features an embedded NFC (near-field communication) chip that will launch team and player content in real time, including pregame arrival footage, highlight packages and player’s favorite music playlists. All of the content will be delivered to the jersey wearer’s NikeConnect app after tapping the smartphone to the jersey.
“In our new connected era, Nike will lead with products that build a relationship with our consumers,” said Trevor Edwards, President, Nike Brand. “With NikeConnect, we deliver to basketball fans everywhere the personal and premium experiences we know they love.”
The second innovation, the Therma Flex Showtime Warm-up Jacket, is crafted with Nike’s Therma Flex fabric and is the first on-court warm-up jacket to feature a performance hood. Finally, the Statement Edition Uniforms is the third of the four core team uniforms, joining the Association and Icon Edition Uniforms that debuted in July.
Nike did away with the traditional “home” and “away” jerseys in favor of the Editions format, which is favorable to the NBA’s current jersey color style. In recent years, the home and visiting teams would wear different jersey colors, and at times would skip the traditional white uniforms and dark uniforms format. Now, the home teams will decide which uniforms to wear at their games.
“Our Nike uniforms set a new standard for connecting our most passionate fans with their favorite NBA teams and players,” said Adam Silver, NBA Commissioner. “Nike has once again taken the game of basketball to a new level, this time with one of the most advanced jerseys in sports.”
The Nike NBA Connected Jersey will launch exclusively online on September 29, the Nike NBA uniforms and Nike Therma Flex Showtime Warm-up Jacket will debut on-court on Sept. 30, the start of the NBA preseason, and all Statement Edition jerseys will be available in stores on Nov. 20, and will begin being worn on-court on Nov. 25. The fourth team edition jerseys will be released later this year.
