Jazz owner responds to rebrand haters

Not pictured: the much-criticized yellow highlighter jersey. Photo: Utah Jazz

SALT LAKE CITY — Less than a week after the Utah Jazz revealed their newly rebranded uniforms, Utah Jazz Owner Ryan Smith had an opportunity to face the music and comment on the franchise’s new look. As fans and critics have been incredibly harsh on the change, Smith agreed that while there may be an argument that they went a bit too simple, there is a reason behind it.

“We want to get a cleaner, simplified look with how much Nike is bringing to us and have a unified color scheme that we can work with throughout the state. That’s really exciting. Both in the arena and outside the arena… it’s an evolution, the brand is going to evolve. There’s probably a fair argument that we went a little too clean, OK, but it will evolve and it will go.”

To his point, the look is certainly the most simplified uniform the Jazz have ever produced before but it hasn’t exactly been received well by the fanbase. While Twitter and the rest of the internet continues to scrutinize the black, yellow, and white primary colors, Smith did share some good news — purple is here to stay.

“We want purple to be a massive part of our color scheme going forward. We have not had purple as part of our color scheme in 20 years. Carlos Boozer and Deron Williams never wore purple. We brought it back twice on annual throwbacks, but that’s who we are when you talk to opposing players that played us back in the day. They associate purple with the Jazz, and it’s a little tricky because there’s two other purple teams out there in Sacramento (Kings) and LA (Lakers), but we want that to be a big part of our brand going forward. So we’ll get it right,” Smith said.

Jazz drop new uniforms. Super intrigued by these. Very disappointed in all the rest. #purpleisback #utahjazz pic.twitter.com/ESd8XsPImN

— Cole Bagley (@bagley_cole) June 17, 2022

So while it’s clear that Smith and the franchise understand that they didn’t quite nail the new look, and his comments about its evolution may lead some to believe that the rebrand still has a long way to go, Jazz fans can rest easy with the knowledge that purple is here to stay. In addition to the encore of the classic mountain jersey, Utah will be introducing four total purple jerseys over the next 36 months, making purple a staple of the franchise for years to come.