Who's Setting the NBA Fashion Bar in 2014-15?

In the 2014-15 NBA fashion season, nothing should come as a surprise. The league's postgame duds have been getting wackier and wackier for a while now.

Fashion in the league has been changing for nearly a decade. When then-commissioner David Stern passed a new set of rules about what players can wear in 2005—otherwise known as the dress code—he unwittingly begat a league-wide sartorial revolution.

Dwyane Wade, one of the more curious dressers in the game himself, said as much this past September. Here’s Wade (via USA Today):

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It was like, “OK, now we got to really dress up and we can't just throw on a sweat suit.” Then it became a competition amongst guys and now you really got into it more and you started to really understand the clothes you put on your body, the materials you're starting to wear, so then you become even more of a fan of it.

Obviously sometimes we push the envelope, and I think it's because we're athletes. We’re not looked at as guys who should wear certain things. Being flamboyant is being OK.

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The key word here is flamboyant. Wade, along with superstars such as James Harden, Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook, has helped to ignite an era of increasingly fabulous off-court garb. Just look at this outfit Wade sported in last year’s playoffs, per Dennis G.:

Not everything Wade wears is exactly beloved, and the same goes for his peers. But the point of dressing so boldly isn’t to gain total approval—there’s an avant-garde bent to what sets the bar in the league these days, an experimental register that’s destined to ruffle feathers. Anything that’s not super weird is just plain good execution, and in 2014 it takes threads of a quirkier ilk to turn the heads of the basketball world. 

Whether it’s coincidence or fate that some of the league’s most eye-catching players on the hardwood are also earning our attention off of it is anyone’s guess. But there’s no denying the unusual fashion ambition of certain superstars. Wade is the NBA’s current elder statesman of dressing aggressively, but Westbrook—a well-documented savant with his clothes—is even more widely known for dressing out.

And if this recently circulated photo of his teammate Durant is any indication, last year’s MVP is hot on the trail to the fashion throne, too, per Jacob Greenberg:

Seen here as an effeminate and gaudy gazelle, Durant clearly has an eye to mess with public perception. It takes an unusual sense of humor (and confidence) for a top-scoring warrior to recast himself in this strange light, and Durant seems to be comfortable with that kind of irreverence—his Nike “Badde35t” campaign notwithstanding. 

“Some people are not afraid to do certain things or wear certain stuff. You have to have a certain swagger about you,” Westbrook said in a 2013 interview with Steve Marsh of GQ. Known in some fashion circles as “the Kate Moss of the NBA,” Westbrook is still the king of this game.

No one is more comfortable strutting into the stadium wearing unheard-of ensembles. The point guard is eminently comfortable risking embarrassment in the name of shifting expectations. And if you’re looking for Westbrook news in the offseason, there’s a good chance you’ll find out more about what he’s wearing than how he’s working out. ESPN.com's J.A. Adande shared a photo of Westbrook with fashion icon Anna Wintour:

Westbrook and Durant’s old teammate Harden cannot be left out of this conversation. His duds impressed throughout 2013-14, and as he continues his quest to prove himself outside of the Oklahoma City Thunder compound, it shouldn’t surprise anyone to see him grow more wild with his choices. Look at what he and Durant wore to last year’s All-Star weekend, courtesy of Upscale Hype:

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.@JHarden13 Watches NBA Slam Dunk Contest Wearing @Versace Shirt and Balenciaga Sneakers (http://t.co/itCCEOXJFY) pic.twitter.com/lkN38ZcTxw

— UpscaleHype (@UpscaleHype) February 16, 2014"

Between Westbrook, Harden, Durant and Wade, the NBA has its four horsemen of style-setting. But a new generation is coming up, too, and it seems to have learned the tricks to standing out in Stern’s dress code from its forebears. Just take a gander at the showy suit jacket Andrew Wiggins, the 2014 NBA draft’s No. 1 overall pick, wore as he entered the league, as David Ebner of The Globe and Mail shared a photo:

Once Wiggins finds his stride as a star player with the Minnesota Timberwolves, perhaps he can push the fashion bar even further. He can join sophomore Nerlens Noel of the Philadelphia 76ers in a new wave of loud looks.

Noels' impressive throwback flat-top hairdo has the league on notice. Lest we forget that some of the brashest styles grow right from the body Noel—like Harden and his iconic beard before him—is here to remind us, as Wayne Boothe shared:

It's hard to say what's next in NBA fashion. The league's boldest dressers move more quickly toward the disarmingly bizarre than Derrick Rose does toward the basket, these days. Although new things are surely on the horizon in 2014-15, at the moment it’s difficult to imagine the NBA’s clothing game getting any weirder or more progressive than it already is.