If you’re one of the many Utah Jazz fans who were disappointed with the rebrand two years ago and the introduction of highlighter yellow to the Jazz color palette, today is a day for rejoicing.
Out with the yellow and in with the new
The Jazz announced the next evolution of their rebranding process Wednesday morning and are leaning heavily into what the fans have loved the most about the last few decades of Jazz jerseys and merchandising — purple, mountains and the J Note.
The Jazz scrapped their infamous highlighter yellow jerseys halfway through last season and they won’t be returning (much to the chagrin of Lauri Markkanen, who is on record as yellow’s biggest fan).
During the 2024-25 season, the Jazz will begin a transition into what they believe will become the team’s official color palette of the future — midnight black, mountain purple and sky blue. The team will start out the season wearing the white and black uniforms (with highlighter yellow features) that were worn last season as well as a new purple city edition uniform, featuring gradient mountains with accents of sky blue.
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In January 2025, the team will introduce a new black statement edition uniform and say goodbye forever to the black and yellow uniforms. The new black uniforms feature gray and gradient mountains with accents of purple and sky blue.
Then, beginning in the 2025-26 season, the Jazz will carry over the newly introduced black uniforms and will have completely phased out yellow. They will roll out new white and purple uniforms, all featuring mountains on the chest in gradient coloring.
‘Mountain basketball’
The transition away from yellow and toward a brand identity that the Jazz feel makes sense and gives fans what they want is encapsulated in what the Jazz are calling “mountain basketball.” The idea is not only literal, but should also give fans a sense of pride when they see or wear Jazz gear.
One of the most unique things about the Jazz is their Junior Jazz program, which is the largest youth program in the NBA and brings together tens of thousands of kids around the state to play basketball. That actually became quite important as the Jazz were wanting to roll out these new jerseys.
Since the Jazz weren’t ready to start production on the NBA jerseys for both the 2024-25 and 2025-26 seasons and didn’t want to just make an announcement with mockups and graphics, and because they needed to make the Junior Jazz jerseys anyway and always want those to be closely linked to what the Jazz will be wearing, they enlisted the help of 50 current and former Junior Jazz players to model the new looks and be the face of the mountain basketball campaign.
During the photoshoot with the Junior Jazz players, the Jazz crew went to Ridge View Elementary School in Herriman, Fort Herriman Middle School and Churchill Junior High in Millcreek with Mount Olympus in view. The thought was that not only would the mountains and picturesque views from local basketball courts get across the vibe that was intended, but that the Junior Jazz represent a stage in a process (think mountains, climbing, reaching the next peak or the next stage, evolving, etc.).
When can fans buy the new gear?
The Jazz haven’t set out any specific dates for when fans will be able to get their hands on the new jerseys, but a Jazz spokesperson said that fans can expect the new city edition uniforms to go on sale in fall 2024 and the statement edition to be available early in 2025, aligning with the times when the players will be wearing them.
The jersey designs that are expected to come out in the 2025-26 season will not be available until they debut with the team officially.
A select variety of mountain basketball merch is available now from the team store, according to a Wednesday Instagram post.
Why now?
Jazz owner Ryan Smith and many members of the branding team have admitted that the Jazz rebrand would be an evolution and that they know things weren’t perfect when they first launched in 2022. In this new iteration, they set out to bring together things that made the Jazz unique.
Over the last couple of years, they’ve taken a lot of feedback from fans — some solicited and some freely given. That’s been taken into consideration and the Jazz wanted everyone to know that they are listening.
Usually jersey launches come a little later in the summer and they usually don’t come out showing multiple years at a time. But the Jazz wanted to show that there is a complete vision and a place that they want this branding process to end up. So, rather than slow-rolling out things over the next couple of years, they wanted to introduce the completed idea all at once.
There you have it. Goodbye, highlighter yellow. Hello, mountain basketball.
