Nike paid the NBA $1 billion to use its uniforms and 2 of the NBA's biggest stars are hiding the swoosh
- Nike is the new supplier of uniforms for the NBA, and that includes the socks.
- Nike will reportedly pay the NBA $1 billion over eight seasons for the right to plaster its logo all over NBA players.
- Stephen Curry and James Harden are not Nike athletes and apparently don't want the swoosh near their shoes.
The NBA went through a major visual overhaul this season as Nike and the league struck an 8-year, $1 billion deal, according to Darren Rovell of ESPN, for the athletic shoe and apparel giant to become the official supplier of NBA uniforms.
We are less than one month into that new deal and Nike and the NBA are already running into problems. The most notable problem has been the prevalence of ripped jerseys, something Nike is said to be working on.
But there is another, potentially larger, problem that has gone largely unnoticed - some of the NBA's biggest stars are going out of there way to hide some of the Nike swooshes on the uniforms.
In addition to the NBA adding advertising patches to the jerseys of many teams, the NBA also allowed Nike to add its logo to the uniforms, something Adidas was not permitted to do under the previous uniform contract. Less noticeable has been the addition of the Nike swoosh to NBA socks, as the company also replaced sock-maker Stance as the official sock of the NBA.
The problem with the swoosh on the socks is that it is awfully close to the shoes, a big source of endorsement revenue in the NBA. Two NBA stars apparently don't want the swoosh anywhere near their non-Nike sneakers, Stephen Curry and James Harden.
Curry is the face of Under Armour in the NBA. Ever since Nike took over the uniform contract, Curry has been rolling his socks down, which hides the swoosh. Compare this to Kevin Durant's socks, as seen at the top of this post.
According to a source with the NBA, there is nothing in the NBA Operations Manual that would prohibit a player from rolling down their socks.
Meanwhile, Harden, who is the NBA face of Adidas, was rolling his socks down in a similar manner to Curry. However, as first noted by Paul Lukas of Uni-Watch, he appears to now be going to the extra length of just cutting the top of the socks off and removing the Nike logos altogether.
And this wasn't a one-time occurrence. Harden appears to have cut the top off of his socks in at least three other games this season.
It is less clear if physically removing the Nike logo violates NBA rules. It was suggested to Business Insider that Harden was just rolling his socks in a manner that made the socks appear to have been cut.
Harden was rolling his socks earlier in the season, as seen in this photo. However, it seems pretty clear in the photos above that he is now cutting the logos off of the socks.
Of course, this wouldn't mean much if Curry and Harden were also rolling or cutting their socks last season when Stance was supplying socks for NBA teams and players, a company that is not considered a major rival of either Under Armour or Adidas.
Both Curry (left) and Harden (right) had their socks extended during the 2016-17 season and did not appear to make any attempt to hide Stance's circular logo.
So far, this bit of gamesmanship appears to be limited to Curry and Harden, among the NBA's biggest stars. A quick survey of other top players who endorse non-Nike shoes did not reveal any other players who have taken steps to hide the swoosh logo on the socks.
This bit of logo swashbuckling is not a new problem for companies partnering with major sports leagues.
Major League Baseball has had a similar issue for years. With their uniforms supplied by Majestic, many Nike athletes have opted to wear Nike undershirts with a prominent swoosh at the base of the neck. Without any Majestic logos, it gave the false impression that MLB uniforms were being made by Nike.
A more famous, albeit less nefarious, example in recent years was when Microsoft paid the NFL $400 million for the Surface tablet to be the official tablet of the league. Unfortunately for Microsoft, network announcers spent the first few months of that deal calling the tablets "iPads."
In that case, both Microsoft and the NFL, "coached" the announcers on using the proper name, and it eventually worked. Short of altering the ops manual and threatening the players with stiff fines, there might not be enough coaching for Harden and Curry to change their ways and Nike might be out of luck, especially if more players start following suit.