Blazers New Sleeved Jersey Debuts Tonight

The Portland Trail Blazers are the latest NBA team to be forced against their will (as some are now saying) to add a sleeved jersey to their regular rotation. It will make its on-court debut tonight against the Cleveland Cavaliers.

#RipCity S/S uniform debuts tomorrow night! #PORvsCLE Best cultural uniform in the league IMO. pic.twitter.com/cGRr74tikD
— Blazers Equipment (@RipCityEQ) November 4, 2014

#SupportTheSleeves pic.twitter.com/VtG09Ye55C — Blazers Equipment (@RipCityEQ) November 4, 2014

The jersey is their alternate “ripcity” jersey from previous seasons with sleeves.

As for the sleeved jerseys being “forced against their will” I mentioned in paragraph one, the following is right from Trailblazers.com beat reporter Casey Holdahl in a post which went up on the official Portland Trail Blazers website earlier today:

Just a reminder that it was the NBA’s decision to make all “heritage” or “pride” jerseys, such as Portland’s “Rip City” uniforms and Detroit’s “Motor City” kits, sleeved jerseys. I have it on good authority that some teams asked that they not be forced to change the look of their most popular uniform option, but to no avail.

Interesting, right? But not surprising in the least… it appears all the player disappointment and (what I perceived to be) a lack of jerseys being seen on fans in public did nothing to deter this experiment in the eyes of the league.