Skip to content
 
Uni Watch

Cleveland Cavs Unveil 2024-25 City Edition Uniform

By

[Editor’s Note: Today we have Weekend Editor Jim Vilk bringing us his review of the new Cleveland Cavaliers City Edition uniform, his hometown team. Enjoy! — PH]

• • • • •

As Clevelanders, and all of us in Northeast Ohio who grew up watching Big Chuck and Lil’ John are used to singing, here we go again…

The Cavaliers keep trying to convince us that “The Land” is a thing. They hammered their point home for the third year in a row, and for the fourth time in eight years, with another “The Land” City Edition uniform. This one features two shades of light blue and white for another low-contrast work of…”art?”

I’ll get into the artsy stuff in a minute. As I said, this is the fourth of eight City Edition unis with “The Land” on the jerseys.

Since he asked, 2021 is number one, 2018 is second, and everything else is tied for last. Anyway, this year’s merch dump is a “wearable canvas” and an homage to the west wing of the Cleveland Museum of Art.

According to the Cavaliers,

“The uniform prominently features the team’s traditional City Edition phrase ‘The LAND’ with this year’s look drawing inspiration from the architecture of the west wing of the Cleveland Museum of Art and its logo. The uniform also features a two-tone blue design with contrasting shades of the color found on the front and back.

This year’s uniform is unique in that it doubles as an interactive art piece. The most distinctive feature of the design is the ‘torn-away pieces‘ found on the side panels of the jersey and shorts that reveal a coloring book pattern underneath.

The pattern features iconic Cleveland motifs and symbols along with Cavaliers artwork.

The pattern encourages fans of all ages to customize their own jerseys by coloring in the symbols. This unique aspect transforms each jersey into a potential masterpiece, allowing fans to express their creativity and personal connection to the team. The ’DESIGNED BY’ jocktag prompts fans to insert their own name, empowering them to become artists themselves and highlighting the artistic customization aspect of these jerseys.”

Okay then. Here is the 1994 uniform they’re referencing with the darker shade of light blue:

While the lettering on the new jersey, which won’t be distinguished from more than ten feet away, is easily identifiable with the west wing, the lighter light blue is only seen on the museum’s logo. You don’t see any blue on the outside of the museum, or on the inside.

Well, you’ll see it this year as the Cavs and the museum collaborated on a display which features players wearing the City Edition, and a scale replica of the special floor the Cavs will use when they wear the unis.

Here’s a detailed look at the court.

On the plus side, I like the number font and the players’ names being placed under the numbers. The Cavs logo on the front of the waistband is a nice touch, even though you won’t really see it that well.

The unis will debut Sunday evening, and they’re scheduled to be worn five more times this season.

Now, onto the next City Edition release!

 

 

 
  
 
Related Posts

Looking Back At Army/Navy Specialty Uniforms Over The Years

NBA Rewind Series (Part II)

MLB All-Star Game And Workout Caps Are Here

Here’s the Latest on What Paul’s Been Doing on Substack

Sunday Morning Uni Watch 2024: Week Thirteen
Comments (23)

    As a uniform, in isolation, I actually think there is a lot to like here. Contrived city nickname’s notwithstanding, I really like the wordmark and the design as a whole has an edge while still feeling like a uniform rather than a pure fashion statement.

    All of these new NBA uniforms are terrible. Becoming more like soccer every day. Ads on uniforms and sidelines. New uniforms every year. Flopping. Begging for fouls. Yelling at refs. Overpaid players for putting a ball in a net. Both are unwatchable.

    No need to shit on things you don’t understand. I watched the Leafs game on Wednesday, and everything you’ve just complained about was present there too.

    Still running with The Land? Jeez, is there a single person that refers to Cleveland as The Land? Or Washington DC as The District? Or Phoenix as The Valley? So dumb. So forced. So NBA.

    For whatever it’s worth – the Guardians use #ForTheLand in their Twitter handle. As a matter of fact, you can use it now and see that they launched uni tweaks of their own.

    I’ve seen it used in other places. But it’s not like it’s an everyday thing for folks living on the Sunny Shores of Lake Erie.

    As a native Clevelander, I don’t mind “The Land”. I don’t love it. I don’t use it. But I don’t mind it.

    #LetEmKnow

    I live here too and I’ve literally never heard it used in actual conversation. The closest I’ve seen is someone on Facebook asking a general question about “where to find the best whatever in the Land” or the like, but that’s also pretty rare.

    Q: How does this jersey in any way celebrate Cleveland?
    A: Cleveland was built on vast amounts of Land. Acres of it, in fact.

    You are obviously not from here; the shores of Lake Erie are never sunny.

    See: the weather the last few days…

    Yeah, all of these “The This” and “The That” unis is just getting old. Almost as old as the “blackout/icy white” football unis.

    Do people in Portland use Rip City for that matter? All these nicknames feel so dumb and forced.

    I especially hate “Lake Show” for the Lakers. That nickname popped up in the early 90s when the championship parades had left town and all the Lakers had were annoying guys like Cedric Ceballos and Nick Van Exel running around and putting up 40 shots a night. It felt like a painful reminder to Laker fans that Showtime was dead.

    Hey, did you see that The University of North Carolina just got new uniforms?
    Those aren’t uniforms for The University of North Carolina?
    Wait..

    30 Rock really leaned into giving Cleveland an equally dumb nickname back in the 2000’s, “The Cleve.”

    As a member of the Cleveland Museum of Art (one of the best art museums in the country, btw, and absolutely free) for more than a decade, I am insulted by the laziness of these uniforms. The connection between the script and the west wing of the museum is so flimsy that 99% of people who visited the museum would have no clue what was being referenced, no matter how hard they try to force the association by taking interior shots inside the galleries.

    So basically they’ve combined an awful nickname with an unreadable typeface. Well done, gents.

    “The Land” started with the rap group Bone Thugs N Harmony, who often referred to their hometown as “The Land” and “The Land of the Heartless”

    Machine Gun Kelly (who also grew up in Cleveland) had a pop;lar song in which he gave a nod to his childhood idols w/ the lyrics “Im from The Land”

    When the song was popular, the Cavs used it in all of there promotions and it kinda took on a life from there.

    If you’re basing your city’s nickname on a lyric from Machine Gun Kelly, you are doing it wrong.

    By itself it is not a bad uniform for a small college or high school team. But color by number uniforms for adult athletes? No.

Comments are closed.