The Phoenix Suns are going to wear socks with Steve Nash’s face on them
Steve Nash is inarguably one of the greatest players in Phoenix Suns history, a one-of-a-kind playmaker who fueled an offensive revolution in the desert. He won back-to-back NBA Most Valuable Player awards while leading the Suns to consecutive Western Conference finals berths, and his name appears all over the franchise record book — nobody’s ever dished more assists, attempted or made more 3-pointers, or shot a higher percentage from 3-point land or the foul line than the Canadian captain who helped change the way we view and enjoy the NBA.
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Nash’s years in Phoenix deserve to be commemorated, and the Suns will do just that during Friday’s game against the Portland Trail Blazers at Talking Stick Resort Arena, celebrating his oeuvre in orange by inducting him into the team’s Ring of Honor. He’ll join fellow Phoenix greats Alvan Adams, Charles Barkley, Tom Chambers, Jerry Colangelo, Walter Davis, Cotton Fitzsimmons, Connie Hawkins, Kevin Johnson, Dan Majerle, John MacLeod, Joe Proski, Dick Van Arsdale and Paul Westphal in the Ring.
But while the evening’s festivities will focus on Nash’s elevation into the ring encircling the rarefied air above the court, the 2015-16 Suns will pay their own tribute to the future Hall of Famer quite a bit lower to the ground:
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Yep, that’s right: the Suns are going to wear socks with Steve Nash on them.
I’m sorry, that wasn’t specific enough: they’re going to wear socks with Steve Nash’s face on them.
Hang on, let me try that again: they’re going to wear socks with Steve Nash licking his fingers on them.
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The fun design comes courtesy of Stance Socks, the league’s new sock outfitter, to whom Suns equipment manager Jay Gaspar reached out with a very special order this summer, according to Ben York of Suns.com:
Jay Gaspar: When it was announced that we were inducting Steve Nash into the Ring of Honor, I knew it would be a special night and I wanted to try something different. I knew Stance is known for designing socks with images of athletes. They haven’t done anything like this on a performance sock, only casual. I had no idea if it would even be allowed by the NBA.
The first step was to contact the league office for approval, and if they said yes, take the idea to the people at Stance. Stance and the NBA were very excited about the idea, and the rest is history. Stance took the ball and ran with it. Thank you very much to the people at Stance for creating these in such a tight timeframe.
Obviously, the image of Steve licking his fingers stands out. As we all know, he was famous for doing that and then brushing his long hair behind his ears. Stance sent me three images to choose from, and that was a no brainer. The color was chosen to go with the uniform we will wear Friday, which is orange.
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That is, indeed, a very neat thing, and a unique tribute to a truly unique player. And yet, given the game’s proximity to Halloween, I can’t help but wish that Stance cooked up a special and spooky small batch showcasing one of the faces that I remember most from Nash’s many postseason runs in Phoenix. A little bit of crimson would really pop against all that orange and black, y’know?
Minor quibbles with photo choice aside, there’s a certain poetry to the (admittedly somewhat odd) sartorial salute. In addition to his preternatural floor vision and marvelous shooting touch, Nash’s greatest strength was arguably his ability to think on his feet, even in amongst the tall trees and amid the roiling chaos. Now, as Jeff Hornacek’s Suns look to set about the business of returning to the playoffs for the first time since Nash was at the controls of the offense, they’ll be thinking of him, and how he’s literally on their feet.
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Dan Devine is an editor for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
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