There’s actually a hidden meaning behind the Cavaliers’ ugly City Edition jerseys

This is fun.

When the NBA made the switch from Adidas to Nike as the league’s official uniform supplier, we saw every team depart from the traditional home-and-away set in favor of (at least) four frequently updated uniforms per team.

Nike’s City Edition uniforms are among the uniforms that change each season for every NBA team, and over the past few weeks, we’ve seen the 2020-21 designs leak on social and get unveiled. Between the Suns’ awesome Valley jerseys and the Knicks’ terrible “City Never Sleeps” set, they’ve been pretty hit-or-miss.

But none of these designs are going to keep fans busier than the apparent City jerseys for the Cleveland Cavaliers.

At first glance, the jersey is ugly — let’s be honest. But there is at least a hidden message behind the design.

The “Cleveland” text is comprised entirely of iconic Rock & Roll Hall of Fame band wordmarks. It’s basically a Riddler-style ransom letter on a jersey as a nod to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame being in Cleveland. But man, fans have really tried to figure it out.

As you can see, there’s some disagreement between the social media guesses. It does appear to be something like:

C – Cleveland Cavaliers

L – Sex Pistols

E – The Who

V – David Bowie

E – Metallica

L – The Beatles, maybe? The bottom of the “L” looks slightly different, but it has to be The Beatles, right?

A – Nirvana

N – NWA

D – Pink Floyd

In all, the idea is actually awesome — really clever! It’s still an ugly jersey, but I’d love to know what that marketing and design meeting was like.

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