A person familiar with the league’s thinking told The Washington Post that there have not been serious discussions about changing a logo with which the NBA is comfortable. League officials felt happy, as did Bryant’s family, about the way it chose to honor his memory with the MVP award for its All-Star Game, the person said.
More on Kobe Bryant NBA Logo?
In his Instagram post, Irving shared an image of Bryant dribbling with a ball laid over the logo in a way that resembled the silhouette’s pose. The image was identical to one used on a Change.org petition last year that asked the league to “immortalize [Bryant] forever as the new NBA Logo.”
Harrison Faigen: Vanessa Bryant likes the idea. pic.twitter.com/SpWrljauup
Clutch Points: Kyrie Irving believes the NBA should change its logo to this one of Kobe Bryant. Thoughts? pic.twitter.com/kzcCmZlcZD
Well, this is a big deal ... Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban says he's on board with the movement to change the NBA logo to Kobe Bryant -- telling TMZ Sports, "I would support it." Not only have MILLIONS of people signed a petition to have the league swap out the current logo which features an image of Jerry West, but a bunch of NBA stars have backed it as well ... from Paul Pierce to Jamal Crawford and more.
Harrison Faigen: Kyle Kuzma on all the talk this week about Kobe Bryant becoming the logo: "It'd be great if the NBA did that. Obviously he meant a lot to the game, but Jerry West meant a lot to the game too. So that's a decision the league has to make, but I would not be opposed to it at all."
Start with this: The NBA won’t even officially acknowledge that its current logo, which has been used since 1969, is based on former Lakers star Jerry West. This despite the fact that the logo’s designer, Alan Siegel, has often said he used a picture of West as the inspiration for the design. Doesn’t matter. The NBA has never said its logo features a specific player. The reasons are myriad, mostly legal and financial. West has never tried to cash in on his likeness, and for the past few years even publicly wished the league would change the logo and use someone else.
Biyombo, an NBAPA vice president, said he’s sure the key people in the Players Association’s hierarchy will jump on a conference call soon to mull options and gather ideas. One he wouldn’t mind moving forward: the NBA changing its red, white and blue logo from an outline of Jerry West to Bryant. “We are hoping,” Biyombo said. “The NBA is going to do something. As a player, I think you want to see that. You just want to see that because of what the guy has meant to the game, to be honest. For me, I think as a player, I would really like to embrace that because you’ve seen the change, and you’ve seen it over the course of the years. Kobe, he wants to teach. As we see now, he opened the academy, and everybody was going to his academy, and the guy was present there early in the morning early to teach. There’s not many people who are doing that. “(Making him the logo), it’s an appreciation of what the guy has done for the game of basketball, and that’s what I think we all should be thinking about.”
“Yeah, I think they should make him the logo. I think they should retire 8 and 24 on every team,” Bridges said. “Yeah, I definitely think he should be the logo for sure. You could see the shock around the league when it happened. How many people it affected, players. It affected everybody in the NBA. So I feel like no player has had an impact — besides MJ — on anybody like Kobe. So I feel like he should definitely be the logo.”
The people are speaking, and they want Kobe Bryant to replace Jerry West as the NBA’s new logo. Over two million people have signed an online petition for the change in the wake of the legendary Bryant’s death on Sunday in a helicopter accident at the age of 41. The petition, on Change.org, reads: “With the untimely and unexpected passing of the great Kobe Bryant please sign this petition in an attempt to immortalize him forever as the new NBA Logo.”
“Nick’s petition is not only the fastest-growing on Change.org, it’s also the first petition of 2020 to top 1 million signatures anywhere in the globe,” Michael Jones, managing director of Change.org, said in a statement. “As the world comes to terms with the death of someone as famous and well-known as Kobe Bryant, Nick has given basketball fans an outlet to create a permanent memory of someone who made history in the NBA.”
