Golden State Warriors Surprise Everyone, Wear Forgotten Throwbacks

It seems that sometimes it’s still possible to keep a secret from the logo and uniform world.

Last night, the Golden State Warriors did just that, taking to the court for their final regular season game in Oakland while wearing their throwback home white uniform from the 2000s. The announcement of the retro set was successfully saved until just prior to tipoff when Warriors players came onto the court and took off their warmup gear, revealing the garments to the delighted home crowd.

You know we couldn’t celebrate 47 seasons at Oracle without bringing these back ? pic.twitter.com/WsxL1Efojt
— Golden State Warriors (@warriors) April 8, 2019

The “We Believe” set, named for team’s improbable run to clinch a playoff spot in 2007, at the time their first in 13 years, was originally adopted by the Warriors ten years earlier during the Summer of ’97 and featured ancient mythology imagery, a god wielding a lightning bolt as the primary logo. It was one of the first few new logos I added on here when SportsLogos.Net originally launched. The uniform underwent a bit of a re-design for the 2002-03 season.

Some changes to the original design, but all to bring the uniform into 2019. Last night’s version of the jersey included the Nike swoosh and the advertisement patch, the NBA logo placed on the back above the player name. Of course, during its original run (like all NBA jerseys of the time) it had only the NBA logo in the upper corner.

Stephen Curry wears the Warriors 1997-2010 throwback uniforms on April 7, 2019

A decade earlier, Stephen Curry wore it as a rookie during the 2009-10 season

One of the reasons we see so few surprises these days is the process to produce a new set of uniforms which usually requires years of notice from the team to both the league and manufacturers.

Rusty Simmons of the San Francisco Chronicle explains what happened in his article about the throwback uniforms:

The Warriors said the ode … was a player-driven idea that had to be OK’d with the NBA and league outfitter Nike. The players started chatting about the idea about two months ago, and the NBA, which often demands years advance notice for teams to wear new uniforms, helped the Warriors find a fast track through the usual red tape.
“There was obviously a lot of chatter about this being the last year at Oracle and how iconic these jerseys were. We just tried to make it happen, at all costs,” Stephen Curry said. “I’m glad we got it done and executed a nice, little surprise”
Rusty Simmons, San Francisco Chronicle (April 7, 2019)

Golden State used the set for 14 seasons before the “let’s try something wildly new and different” era of the 1990s gave way to the “let’s just do what we did before we tried something wildly new and different” era of the 2010s.

Following the 2018-19 playoffs, the Warriors will move out of Oakland’s Oracle Arena (previously known as the Oakland–Alameda County Coliseum Arena and The Oakland Arena, among others) into the new Chase Center in San Francisco. They have called the building home as far back as 1966, it’s been their full-time home arena since 1971.