Sleeved NBA jerseys sell poorly. Players dislike them.
So, the NBA switching from adidas to Nike is apparently an excuse to ditch the sleeves.
Sara Germano of The Wall Street Journal, via Paul Lukas of Uni Watch:
Nike, meanwhile, is expected to present its initial NBA jersey designs to retailers beginning this week. The company said it doesn’t plan to produce sleeved jerseys, a style debuted by Adidas in 2013 that received mixed reviews from players and fans.
Whether or not sleeves were introduced for ad space, uniform advertisements are still coming. The ads can fit on standard jerseys, no problem.
At this point, there’s just little to no upside for sleeved jerseys.
Nostalgia will treat sleeves better than present-day evaluations, but until we look back wistfully on this mostly failed experiment, good riddance.