In breaking news today, the National Basketball Association (NBA) commissioner Adam Silver announced major reform to player’s uniform numbers. Starting today, April 1st, 2015, player’s uniform numbers can be any real number. This breaks with the NBA tradition of allowing only whole numbers (that’s the natural or counting numbers including 0) on player’s uniforms. The commissioner announced that “The NBA today breaks all uniform numbering traditions in an attempt to broaden our limited view of number. Although some may see this as a radical move, today we rejoice in including negative integers, rational numbers, in both fractional and decimal form, radicals and yes even π as accepted uniform numbers. This has been long overdue.”
The National Association of Numbers (NAN) was quick to comment, “This is indeed a major gain for number equality. We know that all numbers are not equal, but with this major step forward, each and every number will have the equal opportunity to emboss an NBA uniform.”
NAN spokeswoman Ellen E. Todax (a.k.a. “X”) agreed that this was a step in the right direction. However, she continued, “complete number equality is far from a reality. Imaginary numbers and their natural extension complex numbers were not included by the NBA. The same can be said for e and φ. Even decimals numbers are cut short to two decimal places for positive numbers and only one decimal place for negative numbers. These are mere approximates of the actual value. You call that fair? I don’t think the NBA went far enough.” When asked to expound on this view, Commissioner Silver replied “It’s not about fair, it’s about space. There’s only so much room on a jersey.”
The Cantor Institute was also quick to respond. Representative Ann B. Yond issued a formal statement “We at the Cantor Institute regret that the NBA has not included Transfinite numbers. We believe that this is a harsh and infinitely hurtful. We are prepared to take this issue to court if necessary and willing to fight for their rights without bound!”.
Number critic I.M.Thicke thought the additional numbers were excessive. He wrote, “There are too many numbers already, 24 second shot clock, 3 second lane, 5 seconds to in-bounds, 10 seconds to cross midcourt, 60 second timeouts, 30 second timeouts! And now all of these crazy uniform numbers! Where will it end? From a peach basket to this – It’s all too much!”
The last big step forward in uniform numbers was the inclusion of the number “00” as a valid uniform number. In the 1977-78 season, Robert Parish, then with the Golden State Warriors, was the first player to were the number “00” (like that’s a number). At the time this was thought to be outlandish, but this did not deter Parish. He wore the number for the next 21 seasons. Others followed, including Slick Watts the next year and Orlando Woolridge three years later.
Merchandizing, the backbone of the NBA, is off to a slow start. New, real numbered jersey orders have trickled in. Shirtmakers complain that specialty jerseys may require new embossing and embroidery equipment. The added expense may cause jersey prices to skyrocket.
The NBA first player to select a new number was little used Syrian center Ihäté Al Jabbar, who chose the number 3.42 in honor of the number of minutes he’s played this season.
So at your next NBA game, don’t be surprized to hear ” … that’s four fouls on number √2 Johnny Jones. Looks like he is going to be replaced by number -1.3 Sammy Slick …”. We’ll just have to wait and see!
