NBA Will Allow Players to Put Social Justice Statements on Jerseys

The announcement comes just a month before NBA plans to restart season.

As the NBA sets to resume its season on July 30 in Orlando, Florida, the player’s union and the league are collaborating to allow players to add social justice statements to their jerseys in place of their last names.

Shams Charania, the NBA insider for The Athletic, confirmed on Twitter the NBA and NBPA’s plans for the personalized jerseys.

Oklahoma City Thunder guard and the National Basketball Players Association president Chris Paul told ESPN on Saturday that players will soon get the opportunity to include messages regarding the Black Lives Matter movement, as well as statements associated with social causes or charities.

“We’re just trying to continue to shed light on the different social justice issues that guys around our league continue to talk about day in and day out,” Paul told ESPN’s The Undefeated. “People are saying that social justice will be off of everybody’s mind in Orlando. With these jerseys, it doesn’t go away.”

After suspending its season on March 11 due to coronavirus concerns, the NBA will return in a month to Disney’s ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex. The league recently sent out a 113-page handbook to teams that lists specific safety protocols and procedures in place at the Disney Bubble.

But health and safety aren’t the only top priorities for the league. The NBA sent out a memo to its participating teams that suggest “sustained action to issues of social injustice, including combatting systemic racism, expanding educational and economic opportunities across the Black community, enacting meaningful police and criminal justice reform and promoting greater civic engagement.”

Several players, including Kyrie Irving, have been critical about the season’s restart and advocate to not participate, citing that it may take attention away from the Black Lives Matter movement. In early June, Irving led a conference call with over 80 NBA and WNBA players voicing their concerns over restarting the 2019-20 season, according to The Athletic.

The league continues its efforts to bring attention to BLM and social and racial injustice. This week, ESPN reported that the NBA will be painting “Black Lives Matter” on the Orlando courts for this season, mirroring the painted message on streets across the United States after the murder of George Floyd and many other Black individuals at the hands of police.

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