BROOK-LYN: Center Brook Lopez models a hat with the new Brooklyn Nets logo at yesterday’s unveiling. (AP)
BROOK-LYN: Center Brook Lopez models a hat with the new Brooklyn Nets logo at yesterday’s unveiling. (AP)
After years of careful planning, the Brooklyn Nets were unveiled yesterday for the world to see, a few yards from the Barclays Center construction site.
With a black and white color scheme and a pair of primary logos — both using a “B” and both including the word “Brooklyn” — it’s clear the franchise is making a break from its past as it attempts to lay the foundation for what it hopes will be a bright future.
“We’ve been waiting a long time for this,” Nets CEO Brett Yormark said. “We knew we had one chance, and one chance only, to make this work, and we are thrilled with the results.”
The inspiration behind the black and white color scheme, a radical departure from the red, white and blue the team has featured for decades, came from minority owner Jay-Z.
“He came to me with a story he thought we should tell,” Yormark said. “If you think about the old New York subway system, [it] was very black-and-white … white tiles, black colors in the subway, and that was his inspiration.
“He came to us with the concept of go black and white. It’s simple, yet timeless. We bought into it … in a very short period of time everyone gravitated to it, and said this should be the Brooklyn Nets’ new colors, and this should be how we define ourselves.”
Along with helping choose the color scheme, Jay-Z also had a hand in how the team’s two primary logos turned out. One, confirmed in last Thursday’s editions of The Post, is a shield featuring “Nets,” and a basketball with a “B” underneath it. The other is the same basketball with a “B” inside a black circle with “Brooklyn New York” in white lettering.
There was a big debate over whether to go with “B” or “BK” in the logos, with Jay-Z helping push the verdict towards the eventual choice of “B.”
“The ‘B’ vs. ‘BK’ was a big decision, and we kept going back and forth,” said ONEXIM Sports and Entertainment president Irina Pavlova, who was representing majority owner Mikhail Prokhorov. “Jay-Z really weighed in on that, and he felt that the ‘B’ was key … as I’ve been saying all along, he’s been an instrumental part in designing this, and he probably tipped the scales on the ‘B’ versus ‘BK.’ ”
The Nets had Brook Lopez on hand to represent the players, along with head coach Avery Johnson and general manager Billy King. Both Johnson and King said they expect to be playing playoff basketball next season in their inaugural season inside the city limits.
“We’re going to put together a team that Brooklyn can be proud of,” King said. “It’s been a long time coming.”