Ranking the best NBA Christmas day jerseys: Cursive font remains elite

Oh NBA, oh NBA... how lovely are your jerseys. More accurately, how lovely were your Christmas Day jerseys, because they don't exist anymore and we're sad about it. Even LeBron is nostalgic for the beauty of the mid-2010s NBA Christmas Day uniforms!

With our Nike overlords now making jerseys for the NBA, it's unclear whether we'll ever see special edition Christmas uniforms again. Adidas, come back, we miss you... okay, we don't miss everything you did (sleeved jerseys were always crazy) but Christmas day games aren't the same viewing experience without special edition jerseys.

Considering Nike gives teams about 19 new uniforms a year, you'd think it would be easy to make some Christmas day uniforms, but I digress. To all the Nike execs reading this... please bring back Christmas day uniforms. We'll even pretend to like the City edition uniforms you put out every year. That's a fair trade!

While we won't be seeing any new, fun unis on December 25th this year, we can at least remember some better times by ranking all the best Christmas day looks of the past.

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1. Script Font, 2015

I can't look at these for too long because I'll start crying because they're so pretty. The colors, the script font, the matchups... it's all so beautiful.

Don't get me wrong, I love the modern NBA and I'm not pining for the "old days." Okay, I'm pining a little bit. Can you blame me for pining? The jerseys are so cool!

Only one team (out of 10) eclipsed 100 points on Christmas day in 2015. It was less than a decade ago but the game has undergone a massive transformation.

2. Script font part 2, 2016

The uniforms in 2015 were so good, the league ran it back in 2016 with essentially the same formula. And it still worked! One of the big reasons it worked is that the 2016 Christmas day slate produced one of the best games in recent NBA regular season memory, as the Cavs and Warriors gave us a classic.

It's easy to be romantic about this game; the biggest matchup in the NBA for years, the biggest stars, a thrilling game. That's as good as it gets.

3. Color overload, 2014

At the time, these jerseys felt kind of "meh," but in retrospect... they're pretty dang cool. I love colorful games, and the NBA basically going color rush on these unis actually worked really well. OKC's blue and Miami's red look so cool on the floor together when the colors are emphasized like this.

Why was it so easy for Adidas to make cool jerseys, but Nike is having so much trouble?

4. Snowflakes! 2008 to 2011

Even something as simple as a snowflake on the jersey can add a little jolliness to the NBA on Christmas. And is there anything we should strive for in life more than adding joy? I don't think so.

Teams wore their traditional jerseys, but with a snowflake patch in the corner. This wouldn't work anymore, because that's where teams now have advertisements on their jerseys. Personally, I think constantly being bombarded with ads is cool and fun (I don't).

Also, I like how for pretty much the entire 2000s, the NBA decided that LeBron, Kobe and KD should all just play each other in some combination on Christmas Day. Don't overcomplicate things!

5. BIG LOGO AND SLEEVES, 2013

Self-explanatory. I appreciate the audacity here, but it didn't quite pay off.

The biggest redeeming quality of these jerseys is that they star in the iconic Jingle Hoops commercial. Also, Steve Nash on the Lakers being in that ad is so bizarre and looks like a "What doesn't belong in this picture?" prompt.

6. First name basis, 2014

This was such a silly idea. I love thinking about the NBA top brass around a big table, and someone saying "I have an idea... first names on the jerseys," and everyone nodding in agreement.

Like, yes, that is "Draymond," and that is "Klay." I now know that, because of their jerseys.