New Phoenix Suns jersey design may have leaked

On an Chinese social media account today, an image of what appears to be a new Phoenix Suns road jersey has leaked, and it is a stark difference from the current jerseys the team has been wearing since 2013-14.

As first reported by Weibo in China and then Chris Creamer’s Sportslogos.net in Canada, if this leaked image is true, gone are the sunburst stripes that currently adorn the front of all three main Suns jerseys. In it’s place is a font that is similar in structure to that which is currently the PHX font used in the Phoenix firebird secondary logo that has been in place since the second to last jerseys the Suns wore beginning in 2000-01.

One commentor on twitter actually made the comparison of that font to the Houston Rockets jersey of the late 90’s and early 00’s.

The Phoenix Suns franchise is entering it’s 50th season in the league and it would not be surprising that they would look to refurbish their appearance a little bit. Much like the franchise did as it entered it’s 25th season, a brand new series of jerseys would be recognition of not only the franchise’s golden anniversary, but also and ushering of the Phoenix Suns into a new era.

While NBA franchises generally cannot make drastic changes to their jerseys within seven seasons after introducing a new look (that number is based on memory and in my research I could not find the exact number. If seven seasons is inaccurate and someone has that information to send me, I will make the correction), with Nike taking over the league’s jersey supplying, it gave the opportunity for teams to potentially update their uniforms within that period.

If the Suns are about to announce an update to their look, then they will have only worn their previous jerseys for four seasons, the shortest length of time in franchise history for any style.

A brief history of Phoenix Suns jerseys can be seen here.

Phoenix’s plain and western style-font Phoenix  jerseys were worn for the franchise’s first 24 seasons, from 1968 through the 1991-92 season.

The fireburst jersey most synonymous with the Charles Barkley era, was worn from the 1992-93 season through the 2000-01 season, a total of nine years.

Their third jersey, which included solid color panels down the sides for the first time, and the jersey most connected to the Steve Nash era, was worn from 2001-02 for 12 seasons through the 2012-13 season.

Their current jersey, which used elements from past styles in the fireball striping across the front and the phoenix logo on the sides of the shorts which were a reference to the sunburst logos previously worn through 1991-92, have been worn since the 2013-14 season.

Should these images be legitimate, then it appears that the jersey Phoenix will wear for the foreseeable future will again use elements of the past with the Phoenix across the chest, similar to the original look, only with the more modern and edgy font.

It will be interesting to see what the home jersey and third jerseys might look like, and if PHX will be retained on any particular jersey, as it has been used in one way or another since 2001-02.