The silhouette depicted in the NBA logo, this basketball player dribbling on the red and blue background, has a name.
It is their legend Lakers, Jerry West. Everyone knows this. The fans know it, Jerry West knows it, the man who designed it, Alan Siegel. "It's Jerry West," he told the LA Times bluntly.
And so one would expect him to receive royalties for using his figure in the tons of merchandise and spectacle that the NBA means. Correctly;
The short answer is "no". The "no" is of course the whole answer, since the NBA is the only one that does not admit that Jerry West is in the logo.
"I've known it for a long time," West told the Grantland website about his image, which is essentially the NBA logo. "The NBA says this is an urban legend."
The LA Times asked Spokesman David Stern, of the NBA Commissioner between 1984-2014, for the identity of the man depicted in one of the heaviest brands on the planet. "There is no archive in our offices," he told the newspaper.
There may not have been any records in their offices, but until recently, until the LA Times revived the issue, there was a short biographical video of Jerry West on the NBA official website entitled "The Logo" Logo)! Which is of course the nickname with which the American basketball legend has been known for decades.
Since 1969, in particular, when the National Basketball Federation of the United States, the NBA, asked designer Alan Siegel to design its brand. And they had specifications, they wanted something similar to what he had made for the baseball federation, "something in red, white and blue."
Siegel began looking for NBA photos for inspiration. Until he stumbled upon one of Jerry West. He "clicked," "he had a nice aura," he told the LA Times. It was perfect. It was vertical and had a sense of movement. "
"He has become such a classic symbol and focus of their identity and program that they do not want to be associated with a player," the designer tried to explain the NBA's furious refusal to publicly admit that he is Jerry West.
Who, remarkably, generously agrees: "It is not to honor a player. It does not do that [a logo] ", he told Grantland," it is the promotion of the image of a championship, something that is always important to me ".
And that's where the story would normally end if he did not note immediately afterwards: It would be really wonderful. "
So now that the signatures of the world to put on the NBA logo him Kobe Bryant have exceeded 2 million (and are growing rapidly), it's time to remember the historical adventures of the man who has always claimed rights from the NBA…
It all started in 1967, when then-NBA commissioner J. Walter Kennedy, having just taken over the reins of the National Basketball Association, looked for a way to separate it from the American Basketball Association, the other big-league basketball federation.
And then he turned to Alan Siegel, founder and owner of the design firm Siegel + Gale, and he began to frantically search the photographic archives of "Sport" magazine.
Until he stumbled upon an image of the Hall of Famer Jerry West, taken by Wen Roberts (see her here). It was dynamic and enclosed the whole essence of the game.
Jerry West played for 14 seasons in the NBA, all with his jersey Los Angeles Lakers, and was even called All-Star every year of his legendary career. In 1996 he was included in the best NBA team of the fifty years and the Lakers, to honor him, withdrew the No. 44 of his jersey.
Alan Siegel said from the outset who acted as the inspiration for the logo he delivered. He turned the silhouette of Jerry West with his pen and put it in front of the colors they had asked for.
And also from the first moment he could not understand the reluctance of the NBA to recognize that he was a real basketball player in its logo.
An incurable basketball fan, Siegel himself once attempted an answer: "They want it to be an institution, instead of a human being."
Whenever asked, David Stern always refused to comment. At one point, however, he said he did not know if West was in the logo. And later his spokesman, Tim Frank, said that "we have no records."
But the battle is not a battle for prestige. Or at least not only. The classic NBA image brings in over $ 3 billion a year in licenses and television rights. A small percentage is a particularly large amount.
It was in 2011 that Jerry West plowed the United States to promote his "West by West" biography, which Jonathan Coleman's biographer constantly observed the same picture: "Wherever we went, there would usually be young children who would recognize him. and they would say "yes, the logo!" It is interesting that so many people who never saw him play recognized him as the logo ".
Something that is also known outside the US. In fact, as the biographer says, two big things happened in 1969: the Nixon took over the presidency and the NBA, which had just 14 teams, made a new logo. Jerry.
"Jerry is proud of the logo," says Coleman, "but he's still ashamed, in equal proportions." The NBA, as it turns out, never acknowledged the fact for legal and financial reasons. And for exactly the same reasons he will probably never do it.
Jerry West had complained to TMZ Sports a few years ago that he does not receive a single cent for his presence in the official NBA logo. And from his tone he did not appear at all happy about it.
TMZ had found him in 2017 leaving a party in Beverly Hills and asked him about the benefits of being one of the most famous figures in the world. The question obviously bothered him. He said that the situation was "complicated" and he did not mean it in a good way.
TMZ then asked the NBA and got the same answer again. The refusal of the federation to comment.
"I wish it had never been made public that I am the logo, I really wish it," he told ESPN relatively recently as an executive Golden State Warriors"I've said it many times, it 's flattering that I'm, and I know it' s me, but if I were in the NBA I would be ashamed. Truth. I do not want to do things that make me public. I am not such a person. End. If they want to change it, I wish they did. In many ways, I hope they do. "
The Undefeated website decided to shake up the issue and spoke to Siegel again about the background of the logo. But as she tells us, despite her repeated attempts for a West comment, he constantly declared himself "unavailable."
Speaking to Undefeated, Siegel said West was not his first choice, but his final. She had seen a photo with him Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to shoot that he liked very much and another with Wilt Chamberlain that stuck in his mind.
However, when asked by the magazine if he told the NBA that it was the image of Jerry West that he used, the designer replied: "When I presented it to them, I did not make any agreement about it. I did not say it was West. I told them it was based on a photo I had found. Some managed to find her later. However, I never told them anything about it. "
But he also said: "I met with Commissioner David Stern on a holiday and we discussed it. He did not want to admit that he was based on an image of the West, whatever the reason. "
For his own experience with West, he even said that they never discussed it in the 2-3 times they met by chance. "West always seemed uncomfortable being the symbol of the NBA. When I designed the logo of the baseball federation, everyone called me and asked "is it me, is it me?"… In baseball, everyone wanted to be them. While West, who is indeed the symbol of the NBA, feels uncomfortable with it. "God knows why."
When asked again why he believes the NBA refuses to accept what everyone knows, Siegel said: "They may not want to be a real person, because others may be protesting. They may have thought West would want a reward. These are the two things I believe. And they make sense. But that is the reality. "
Siegel also said that at one point Stern asked him to change the logo. "Why do such a thing? It is very successful. It does what it was designed to do. It is one of the most recognizable symbols in the world. Wherever I go and despite what I have done in my life, I am always prefaced as the guy who designed the NBA logo. It 's crazy".
For half a century, Jerry West has been the face of the NBA. Everyone knows this…