100 Objects #14: Basketball Sleeve

Producer and reporter Ramtin Arablouei has a simple question: Why are so many NBA players wearing a compression sleeve on their arm?

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Roman Mars?

  This fall, LL Bean is celebrating the moments people look forward to all year. The first school drop off, the first sweater weather day, and the first chilly evening around the fire pit. For over 100 years, LL Bean has been part of these traditions. Crunching leaves in Maine-made Bean boots, cheering from the sidelines in Scotch plaid flannel, and walking the dog in a rugged field coat. So grab the layers and people you love and get outside. Visit llbean.com to shop the fall collection. LL Bean, be an outsider.

• 0:36Roman Mars?

  If you're a small business, the right hire can be make or break. Indeed-sponsored jobs gets you quality candidates when you need them most. Join the 3.3 million employers worldwide that use Indeed to connect with quality talent that fits their needs. Listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit to help get your job the premium status it deserves at indeed.com/podcast. That's indeed.com/podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Hiring now, then this is a job for Indeed-sponsored jobs. 99% Invisible is presented by Acura. Curating and designing the perfect experience takes meticulous craft, an obsession with detail, and a love for innovation.

• 1:20Roman Mars?

  Just like museum designers, Acura carefully considers every detail to curate the most engaging, exhilarating, and rewarding experience for drivers. That craft isn't always something you can see, but it's something you'll feel. That flutter in your heart, the engine roars. Every Acura is designed with deliberate intention around how people actually use the vehicles. And that is precision-crafted performance.

• 1:48Speaker 01

  During the last NBA season, I was sitting in my living room watching a random game on a random night with my son and wife. We do this all the time. She's sitting there grading papers, my son is doing his homework. And at some point during the game, my wife looks up at the TV and asks, "Why are so many of the players wearing that sleeve on their arm?" I told her that those are compression sleeves. They're like a medical thing. But then she's like, "So all of them have medical issues, like elbow issues?" And that simple question kind of stopped me in my tracks.

• 2:25Speaker 01

  I started counting, and eight out of the 10 players in the court had them on. At this point, I'm like neurotically counting. Whoever subs in, whoever's sitting on the bench, how many of these players are wearing the sleeve? And everyone's got one on. Like, what's going on with this? There is no way they all have elbow issues.

• 2:45Roman Mars?

  This is Ramtin Arablouei. He's a producer and reporter. You might know him from the NPR show Throughline.

• 2:51Speaker 01

  Is it a blood flow thing? Is it something about their shooting range? Turns out, the sleeve isn't there to do anything, really. It's just a look. The sleeve is fashion. And this fashion is also pretty new. If you go back and watch an NBA game from the 1990s, the era I grew up watching them, you won't see anyone with these sleeves on. Not one player. It seems like it came out of nowhere, and now it's everywhere. So I looked into it, and what I found was that the story of the sleeve is really the story of Allen Iverson, an underdog player who went from a prison cell to international fame in just a few years. Iverson had a huge impact on the sport.

• 3:33Speaker 01

  In sort of the same way Michael Jordan changed how the game is played, Iverson changed the culture around basketball.

• 3:42Speaker 01

  And through the story of him and his sleeve, you can see the whole history of basketball's relationship with race, with respectability politics, and who gets to look like what on the court.

• 3:58Roman Mars?

  From 99% Invisible and BBC Studios, this is A History of the United States in 100 Objects. I'm Roman Mars.

• 4:10Roman Mars?

  Today, the basketball sleeve, from reporter Ramtin Arablouei.

• 4:37Speaker 01

  This past season was a huge one for the NBA. And I'm not just saying that because I'm a Knicks fan. When I was sitting there watching all these players rocking their compression sleeves, so was everyone else. NBA viewership was at the highest it's been in decades. Nationally televised games had celebrities sitting courtside. The whole thing looked glamorous and big and more expensive than ever. But it wasn't always like this.

• 5:05Speaker 01

  The 1970s were the era of tiny shorts, the high socks and afros. The fashion was iconic.

• 5:16Speaker 01

  But not that many people were watching. Viewership numbers were really low. A lot of games weren't even shown live. They were taped and then aired later, sometimes after 11:30 PM. Fistfights broke out on the court regularly, something you rarely see today. The game was just extremely physical. And there was this feeling, this impression many people had about the league, that the real problem with the NBA was that it was...

• 5:42Speaker 02

  Too black. And not just meaning black in demographics, but that they didn't play the right way.

• 5:50Speaker 01

  This is Teresa Runstedler. She's a former NBA cheerleader turned historian, and she wrote a book about this era of the NBA called Black Ball.

• 5:59Speaker 02

  They were playing streetball, that they were using drugs, that they were uncontrollable off the court, that they were lazy, that they weren't team players.

• 6:08Speaker 01

  The NBA had been segregated until 1951, and the 1970s marked the first time the league was majority black. The media often blamed the black players for the problems with the game, sometimes accusing them of rampant drug use.

• 6:25Speaker 02

  I did a quick search in one of the newspaper databases, typed in cocaine and NBA, and was shocked at the number of articles that immediately came up in the search.

• 6:38Speaker 01

  Now, there was a lot of drug use, especially cocaine, in a bunch of professional sports in the 1970s, no doubt. But many of these stories published about NBA players were based on rumors and innuendo. There was even an LA Times article that cited several anonymous sources in the NBA.

• 6:57Speaker 02

  Saying that 40 to 75% of basketball players in the NBA were using cocaine.

• 7:04Speaker 01

  But years later, many of those sources came out and said...

• 7:08Speaker 02

  Listen, we were misquoted in that article. We didn't even say that.

• 7:14Speaker 01

  But that narrative was already everywhere. The NBA was seen as dangerous and unwholesome. And then in 1977, something else happened, this time on the court, that would make things much worse.

• 7:31Speaker 01

  It was a regular season game between the LA Lakers and Houston Rockets. It was in the third quarter. A scuffle broke out between two players underneath the basket, and it continued on as other players tried to break it up. A Lakers player named Kermit Washington, who was involved in the initial altercation, was standing at half court when...

• 7:52Speaker 02

  He saw somebody coming out of the corner of his eye. It was Rudy Tomjanovic.

• 7:57Speaker 01

  Kermit saw Rudy Tomjanovic, a Rockets player, and thought he was coming after him.

• 8:03Speaker 02

  And he just punched.

• 8:10Speaker 02

  And injured Rudy Tomjanovic very badly.

• 8:14Speaker 01

  One punch. Washington hit Tomjanovic directly in the face. He fell to the ground, writhing in pain. He was hospitalized and underwent several surgeries. He was left with permanent injuries and chronic pain. Kermit Washington's life would also change because the story became national news.

• 8:36Speaker 02

  Out of this came a huge outcry, calling for his punishment. He became persona non grata. His whole life kind of went into a spiral after that point.

• 8:49Speaker 01

  Tomjanovic is white, and Washington is black. So this tragic incident just further cemented the idea being portrayed in the media that...

• 8:58Speaker 02

  Basketball was becoming this space where you had essentially big black men who were criminals, who were beating up white men on the court. And then that became the kind of narrative that mainstream Americans had for the NBA at that time.

• 9:21Speaker 01

  A narrative that fit perfectly into the larger issues happening in the US in the late 1970s.

• 9:31Speaker 03

  There was terror in a lot of neighborhoods last night. Police have described the looters as animals.

• 9:36Speaker 02

  As the United States really entered into the worst of what they call the urban crisis.

• 9:42Speaker 03

  Like a swarm of locusts is the way one Harlem cop described the looters.

• 9:47Speaker 02

  Disinvestment from black neighborhoods.

• 9:49Speaker 04

  The South Bronx, 500 acres littered with devastated buildings and rubble.

• 9:54Speaker 02

  Increasing crime and white flight to the suburbs.

• 9:59Speaker 04

  The Jews, the Irish, and the Italians began to move out. The South Bronx became a ghetto of the very poor, who were mainly black and Puerto Rican.

• 10:08Speaker 02

  The NBA became a kind of microcosm of that larger social problem.

• 10:14Speaker 01

  The NBA was in the dumps, but the league's fortunes would quickly shift in 1980. Two generational players, one white and one black, entered the league and took it by storm. They give it a magic. He's got Cooper on his right.

• 10:32Speaker 01

  Magic Johnson and Larry Bird.

• 10:38Speaker 01

  An outstanding afternoon. He looks like he could be headed for one of his bags. They both stood six foot nine. They were both incredibly skilled and fun to watch. And they were arch rivals. For the NBA, it was like a miracle from the basketball gods.

• 10:54Speaker 02

  So you have these two men of different races who are on different coasts, who are battling out.

• 11:02Speaker 01

  Let's start with Magic Johnson. He played for the Los Angeles Lakers.

• 11:07Speaker 02

  Who is this very effervescent personality?

• 11:11Speaker 01

  He has a huge smile and he's very charming.

• 11:14Speaker 02

  He's showtime. He represents Hollywood.

• 11:17Speaker 01

  But he's also got the vibe of a friendly neighbor.

• 11:20Speaker 02

  He's just very ebullient, you know, fun to watch.

• 11:24Speaker 01

  Then there's Larry Bird. He's from rural Indiana, but plays for the Boston Celtics.

• 11:31Speaker 02

  Who kind of epitomizes the Midwest, the kind of white Hoosier history of basketball.

• 11:38Speaker 01

  He was lovingly called the hick from French lick. He rarely smiled. He talked a lot of trash on the court and he came across as working class and serious, almost the complete opposite of Magic Johnson.

• 11:53Speaker 01

  And so it became Magic versus Bird, black versus white, West Coast versus East Coast. The rivalry was the perfect sports storyline in the racially and class stratified United States and the NBA's new commissioner.

• 12:08Speaker 02

  David Stern.

• 12:09Speaker 01

  He saw this narrative as a path to reach his radical vision for the NBA.

• 12:14Speaker 02

  He begins to think about the NBA as a kind of multinational corporation.

• 12:21Speaker 01

  A corporation that needed a makeover, a new image to move away from the struggles of the 1970s.

• 12:28Speaker 02

  He looked at the NBA as being more akin to Disney than the NFL.

• 12:33Speaker 01

  So the NBA made their focus games that featured Magic versus Bird.

• 12:39Speaker 05

  I think that one of the things that our sport does is it gives you our players unadorned.

• 12:45Speaker 01

  This is David Stern from an interview explaining his approach for marketing the NBA.

• 12:50Speaker 05

  They're not wearing a lot. They've got no helmets, no long sleeve uniforms. And you can see the expressions on their faces. And that expression, I think, capsulizes their personality.

• 13:02Speaker 01

  He didn't want to just focus on the game itself. He wanted the players and their personalities to take center stage. This seems obvious now, but it was kind of revolutionary at the time.

• 13:14Speaker 05

  And our fans understand that we've got 300 great players, but we've got 300 different personalities.

• 13:19Speaker 01

  David Stern's focus on individual personalities worked. By the early 1990s, the NBA had made huge strides in terms of audience and profits. Games were being televised live with huge viewership. Team owners and players were making millions of dollars.

• 13:45Speaker 01

  Then David Stern and the NBA got lucky again with the ascension of arguably the greatest player to ever live.

• 14:01Speaker 01

  Michael Jordan won six championships in the 1990s. He became an absolute legend and he did that partly by carefully crafting a public image that was inspiring and motivational. He was seen simultaneously as mysterious and accessible, edgy, yet inviting. But maybe most importantly of all.

• 14:22Speaker 02

  Completely devoid of any political content. Michael Jordan is kind of like this blank slate upon which anyone can project whatever their values are.

• 14:36Speaker 01

  Jordan was a perfect canvas for advertisers. He could mold his image into whatever was needed for his own brand. It was reported that once Jordan told his teammates that he wouldn't endorse a Democratic Party politician in a Senate race because.

• 14:53Speaker 02

  Republicans buy sneakers too.

• 14:55Speaker 01

  He was also meticulous about how he looked. Jordan showed up to games and did post-game interviews in perfectly tailored designer suits. He always looked like a professional, like a businessman. Michael Jordan is CEO Jordan. This is from a TV ad called Michael Jordan CEO.

• 15:18Speaker 01

  He literally changes from his Bulls uniform into a suit in the ad and becomes a CEO. Of course, it was tongue in cheek, but it also reflects reality. Today, the Jordan brand is estimated to be worth hundreds of millions of dollars. He was the perfect fit for what David Stern was trying to do with the NBA, a clean-cut, carefully crafted superstar for a family-friendly corporate league.

• 15:41Speaker 02

  Whereas, you know, in the previous generation, you know, if we're thinking of style icons from the seventies, we're thinking of somebody like, you know, Walt Clyde Frazier.

• 15:52Speaker 01

  Walt Frazier was a star guard for the New York Knicks in the 1970s. He's a Hall of Famer and considered one of the greatest players of all time. He's also a style icon.

• 16:03Speaker 02

  Somebody who was very much of that black New York culture with the fedoras, with the fur, with the excess, you know? He was sort of like this figure of black urban cool at that time. But by the time you get to Michael Jordan, it's kind of been neutered of all of that context.

• 16:27Speaker 01

  Michael Jordan was portrayed and marketed as the kind of black man that didn't offend, who was acceptable to everyone, who was helping to sell the NBA to the world and cultivate a reputation that left the problems of the 1970s behind. And other players started to emulate Jordan. Suits and ties became the unofficial dress code for players who wanted to be taken seriously.

• 16:53Speaker 01

  But this perfect calibration of performance and respectability was about to get disrupted by a new, undersized player who entered the league in 1996. A player who was so good, many people thought he could become the heir apparent to Michael Jordan, a player they called the answer. With the first pick in the 1996 NBA draft, the Philadelphia 76ers select Allen Iverson from Georgetown University.

• 17:30Speaker 01

  But unlike Michael Jordan, Allen Iverson wasn't going to wear a suit. Coming up, Allen Iverson remakes the NBA and leaves behind a sleeve.

• 17:54Roman Mars?

  Claude is the AI for minds that don't stop at good enough. It's the collaborator that actually understands your entire workflow and thinks with you. Whether you're debugging code at midnight or strategizing your next business move, Claude extends your thinking to tackle the problems that matter. And Claude doesn't just give you answers. It helps you think through the problem and amplifies what you're already curious about. Create your personal command center by connecting Claude to your calendar, emails and tools like GitHub, Jira and Google Workspace. Save time by delegating tasks. Claude can run automated security reviews for your pull requests and fix vulnerabilities. So I wanted to buy this one-room cabin that I had my eye on and it had been on the market for years and years. And it also had, you know, some things that needed to be fixed and it was in a weird

• 18:39Roman Mars?

  market and I kind of didn't know where to start in terms of my negotiation. So I asked Claude, here's the list price, here's the location, here are the issues with the place, what should be my opening offer? And it broke down all the sort of logic of things and presented a range of what I should offer without insulting the seller and ended up that offer got accepted and I bought the place. For problems worth solving, get started with Claude at claude.ai. That's claude.ai. Ready to give your home a style refresh? Article makes it easy to create a stylish, long-lasting home at an unbeatable price. They offer a curated selection of mid-century modern coastal and Scandi-inspired pieces that will make a perfect addition to your home. All Article collections are carefully curated, focusing solely on high-quality, meaningful

• 19:24Roman Mars?

  pieces that will stand the test of time. And with Article's 30-day satisfaction guarantee, you can shop with confidence. I'm trying to think of any of the Article furniture I haven't talked about at this point. I have couches. I have dining room sets. I have sideboards. I have, what do you call it, a media center thing that you put a TV on? Side tables, end tables, chairs. All of them are still in heavy use in my house and all of them have held up great. Article is offering our listeners $50 off your first purchase of $100 or more. To claim, visit article.com/99 and the discount will be automatically applied at checkout. That's article.com/99 for $50 off your first purchase of $100 or more. When you're at work, you never know when you'll be interrupted.

• 20:09Roman Mars?

  But with the Dell Pro powered by Intel Core Ultra with V Pro, no matter what distracts you, your laptop won't. It's battery optimized for the way you work with built-in intelligence that quiets distractions when you need to focus. Your laptop will help keep you locked in even when it's bring your dog to work day. Built for those who stay in the flow. The Dell Pro, built for you. Dell.com/Dell-Pro.

• 20:39Roman Mars?

  If you're a small business, the right hire can be make or break. Indeed Sponsored Jobs gets you quality candidates when you need them most. Join the 3.3 million employers worldwide that use Indeed to connect with quality talent that fits their needs. Listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit to help get your job the premium status it deserves at indeed.com/podcast. That's indeed.com/podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Hiring now and this is a job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs.

• 21:20Speaker 01

  Allen Iverson.

• 21:22Speaker 06

  Allen Iverson was 39, just one.

• 21:25Speaker 01

  And the crowd rising to their feet. Allen Iverson arrived in the NBA with a huge splash. He dominated right away, becoming an instant star in the face of his team, the Philadelphia 76ers. He won the Rookie of the Year award.

• 21:41Speaker 02

  He was Aura personified.

• 21:44Speaker 06

  Aura tracks him, Iverson, tough shot and he hit it.

• 21:47Speaker 01

  He just kept getting better each season. And I loved watching him play as a kid. He was an amazing scorer who could do anything on the court.

• 21:55Speaker 06

  Lynch picks it up. Here comes Iverson flying inside. How can someone so small fly so high?

• 22:02Speaker 01

  And he did it all at six feet tall, which was tiny in a league where most players were at least six inches taller.

• 22:09Speaker 02

  He was somebody who was incredibly quick on the court. He could do his crossover dribble and make people fall while they were guarding him.

• 22:20Speaker 06

  Now he's got stocked and he breaks his ankles and he got it.

• 22:26Speaker 01

  But Allen Iverson's road to NBA stardom wasn't straightforward at all.

• 22:36Speaker 01

  He was born in Hampton Roads, Virginia in 1975, a poor, fairly segregated part of the state. Despite his small frame, he was one of the best football and basketball players in this state and high school. He seemed to be on a clear path to being a professional athlete until.

• 22:55Speaker 02

  He was involved in this ruckus that was happening. I think it was at a bowling alley back in the early 90s.

• 23:02Speaker 01

  He was at a bowling alley where there was a huge fight in 1993. He was accused of hitting someone in the head with a chair and injuring them badly. He denied wrongdoing, but a Virginia court found him guilty of a felony charge and sentenced him to five years in prison. He was only 18 years old.

• 23:22Speaker 02

  He was this huge basketball star, but his future was very uncertain at that point.

• 23:29Speaker 03

  You know, when all that was taken away from me, I just tried to be as strong as I could.

• 23:35Speaker 01

  This is Allen Iverson in 2001 recounting that dark period in his life.

• 23:40Speaker 03

  And it was tough for me when I got locked up because people would never let it go away. Like it was in the paper for a month or two straight. You know, it was only TV every day.

• 23:55Speaker 01

  After four months in prison, Virginia's governor granted Iverson clemency, saying he had doubts about the facts of his case. He got a second chance. He was given a scholarship to play basketball at Georgetown University. He became a star there and eventually was the first pick in the NBA draft. Yet the shadow of his jail sentence followed him into the league, but he didn't shrink away from it.

• 24:21Speaker 02

  The core of who he was didn't change and he wanted to represent the people that he knew that, you know, were closest to him. So he was just very unapologetic in that way.

• 24:45Speaker 01

  By 2000, Allen Iverson was a full-fledged NBA superstar. He got the nickname "The Answer," as in "The Answer to Anything in Basketball." It was Allen Iverson. The 76ers had been struggling. Allen Iverson was the answer. The future of the NBA without Michael Jordan was uncertain. Allen Iverson was the answer.

• 25:08Speaker 01

  He had a shoe deal. He was in commercials. His jerseys were constantly selling out. And it wasn't just because of his play on the court. His appeal to fans was also about the way he carried himself. His brash, confident attitude, his authenticity and the way he looked. While Michael Jordan wore suits.

• 25:28Speaker 02

  He came to the games wearing a durag. You know, he had the baggy jeans. He was wearing his Timbs, wearing his cornrows.

• 25:38Speaker 01

  This was at a time where almost no players in the NBA were doing that.

• 25:42Speaker 02

  Most folks were like Michael Jordan. They shaved their heads or they kept, you know, they might have high tops or whatever, but it's, it wasn't like a thing to wear your hair in such a quote unquote "black" style.

• 25:57Speaker 01

  And then there were the tattoos.

• 26:01Speaker 01

  Iverson's arms were covered in them.

• 26:04Speaker 02

  I mean, if you look back to the footage of Michael Jordan and others from the late 80s into the early 90s, maybe a few tattoos here and there, but not really on the level that Allen Iverson and his generation took it to.

• 26:22Speaker 01

  And this had an impact on the broader culture. Iverson helped to normalize tattoos for everyone.

• 26:28Speaker 02

  Because it used to be only associated with people who went to prison or people who were in the military.

• 26:37Speaker 01

  Iverson wasn't trying to hide his past or to conform. He was saying, "I'm proud of who I am, of where I come from." And this connected him with fans of all ages.

• 26:48Speaker 02

  He always looked like he was intentionally saying to all of his young fans, "Hey, I'm representing you."

• 26:58Speaker 06

  He just had a way about him where he, you know, had confidence in himself.

• 27:02Speaker 01

  This is Lenny Courier. He was the Philadelphia 76ers trainer when Allen Iverson played there. He saw him almost every day. And he got to understand how intentional Iverson was about his look.

• 27:15Speaker 06

  He was meticulous. The shirt was halfway untucked. The pants might be droopy on his hips. Didn't look like he was meticulous, but let me tell you, he was.

• 27:25Speaker 01

  Lenny says a friend of his, who was a high school teacher at that time, told him just how much of an impact Iverson was having on his students.

• 27:33Speaker 06

  It was amazing how the kids, how they were just so enamored with Allen and wanted to look like him. So they, you know, they wore the same kind of hairstyle. They wore their boots. They wore, you know, everything that Allen was wearing, the kids at school wanted to wear. And people followed him and he, and he knew that.

• 27:54Speaker 03

  When everybody started looking like I look, that's when I realized that I was a trendsetter.

• 28:01Speaker 01

  This is Allen Iverson reflecting on his impact in an interview with Slam Magazine in 2013.

• 28:07Speaker 03

  When I started seeing guys wear the durag and hats and the jerseys and getting the cornrows and then everybody flooding themselves with tattoos, stuff like that, you know, I sat back and that's cool. You know what I mean? Like everybody is trying to look like themselves, but look like you.

• 28:27Speaker 01

  On the court, Allen Iverson played like he had nothing to lose.

• 28:31Speaker 06

  He was completely fearless. I don't know that I've ever seen an athlete who was more fearless than Allen.

• 28:38Speaker 01

  But that fearlessness came with a price, a price often paid by his body.

• 28:46Speaker 06

  The way he played, he invited the contact. He invited the, you know, the danger that came with, you know, trying to go up against seven footers. Needless to say, he spent a lot of time picking himself up off the floor and I had to go out and pick him up a few times myself.

• 29:02Speaker 01

  Lenny says Iverson always played through injuries, but during the 2000-2001 season, he started suffering with pain in his right elbow, his shooting arm. He had something called bursitis.

• 29:14Speaker 06

  Well, bursitis, you know, your joints have what are called bursa sacs. They're fluid-filled sacs that provide lubrication for the joint. Some of the joints, those bursa sacs are a little bit more prominent and easier to, you know, damage, if you will, especially the elbow.

• 29:33Speaker 01

  So every time Iverson fearlessly drove to the basket and got knocked down by some seven footer, he.

• 29:39Speaker 06

  Constantly had, you know, his elbow compromised, hitting the floor hard.

• 29:44Speaker 01

  Repeatedly causing trauma to the tissue. And if you've ever had this injury, you know, it sucks.

• 29:50Speaker 06

  It looks weird. It's just such an unusual swelling and it's so inflamed. It's like it hurts to touch it.

• 29:58Speaker 01

  The normal way to fix elbow bursitis is to just rest it. Don't use it. It takes weeks, but eventually the swelling will resolve. But Allen Iverson didn't have weeks. He was in the middle of a high-stake season, a pivot point. After years of individual accolades, he was getting criticism for never bringing his team to the finals. He had tension with his old school coach. There were rumors the 76ers were considering trading him. Iverson couldn't sit. He needed something that would allow him to play with his injury.

• 30:28Speaker 06

  I think he was just looking for relief and I was looking for a solution.

• 30:32Speaker 01

  Lenny needed an answer for the answer. And the entire season, and Iverson's reputation was resting on it. No pressure.

• 30:43Speaker 01

  So first, Lenny thinks, we could try elbow pads.

• 30:47Speaker 06

  He never really wanted to wear padding.

• 30:50Speaker 01

  Think like your old gym teacher who coached volleyball. Big bulky pads, very uncool.

• 30:55Speaker 06

  He didn't really want to do that.

• 30:57Speaker 01

  And honestly, Lenny didn't have that many options. Padding was the standard move.

• 31:02Speaker 06

  Yeah, I guess it was a little bit of a challenge.

• 31:05Speaker 01

  So then he tries something he'd never really considered putting on an elbow, compression stocking net. Yes, those things pregnant women or old folks put on to prevent blood clots. He thought theoretically it should help to compress and protect the elbow while not messing with range of motion. It would allow Allen Iverson to still be Allen Iverson.

• 31:25Speaker 06

  I just introduced the idea of putting that compression stocking on it one night and it kind of sold him on it.

• 31:32Speaker 01

  So Lenny cut a custom size of the stocking net that would fit onto Iverson's arm. It was all white, made of cotton, breathable, but it definitely looked homemade.

• 31:41Speaker 06

  He liked the feel of it.

• 31:43Speaker 01

  So on January 21st, 2001, Allen Iverson played his first game wearing the janky white compression stocking net on his arm.

• 31:52Speaker 06

  Here's Iverson against Mark Jackson. The double team comes and he floats it in. Allen Iverson's first bucket.

• 31:59Speaker 01

  Iverson came out on fire.

• 32:05Speaker 01

  And Lenny is watching this from the sidelines, locked in on Iverson's elbow.

• 32:10Speaker 06

  I was just thinking, I hope this works.

• 32:16Speaker 01

  Iverson hit his first few shots and then just kept making them.

• 32:28Speaker 06

  He liked the way it felt. It was snug and it didn't, you know. Interrupt his shot. Knifing to the basket once again with forty seven points. A big save and then a better.

• 32:43Speaker 06

  It was just, you know, the right product for him at that time.

• 32:47Speaker 01

  The seventy sixers ended up losing that game in overtime. But Iverson had one of the best games of his career, scoring fifty one points, all while wearing a stocking net on his arm.

• 32:58Speaker 06

  You know, then he just, you know, began to wear it all the time, every night. And, you know, he would usually pull it off after a game and throw it into the crowd, you know, for some adoring fan.

• 33:12Speaker 01

  Iverson averaged thirty one points a game, leading the league in scoring after putting on the sleeve. He won NBA MVP that season and for the first time took the seventy sixers all the way to the NBA Finals. Even after his elbow bursitis got better, he kept the sleeve on and it became part of his iconic look.

• 33:32Speaker 06

  You know, it just clicked. I think he was just the right person to adorn that sleeve. I don't think we ever, you know, imagined it would become a fashion statement, if you will, and a fashion item.

• 33:44Speaker 01

  But at the same time, a small upstart sports apparel company called Under Armour was trying to create a market for functional sports gear, basically clothing items to make every person feel like a serious athlete. And they did imagine the sleeve as a fashion item.

• 34:01Speaker 06

  The folks from Under Armour contacted us and said that they, you know, had a new product line. They wanted to know if Allen would try it.

• 34:09Speaker 01

  Elbow compression sleeves.

• 34:11Speaker 06

  They sent me a, you know, a number of different, you know, pieces. And I wanted to ask Allen, would you like to try these? And they built them really nicely. They were thick, so the sense of compression was still there.

• 34:25Speaker 01

  They also just looked sleek and cool, not like something Lenny had put together in the training room.

• 34:30Speaker 06

  That's what won him over.

• 34:32Speaker 01

  From then on, Iverson wore the Under Armour sleeve in various colors that matched his jersey.

• 34:37Speaker 06

  Then it became, you know, a commercial product, sold in all the sporting goods stores and sold online, et cetera.

• 34:44Speaker 01

  Over the next few years, other NBA players started wearing the sleeve, even if they didn't have elbow bursitis. Basically, everyone was trying to emulate Iverson's entire look. He transcended sports and reached the mainstream. He'd already brought hip hop culture from the streets to the NBA. Now players were even wearing his medical gear. Iverson was at the pinnacle of his power, both on the court and off. But that moment came at the same time that criticism of him was starting to pile up.

• 35:27Speaker 01

  This is a song Iverson released as a rapper in two thousand. He got a bunch of flack for it.

• 35:33Speaker 07

  You have someone who is a seventy sixer, who is a focal point in the black community in particular, coming out saying these horrible, disgusting lyrics, and it can't be tolerated.

• 35:49Speaker 02

  Racial slurs, attacks on women, and a threat to kill gay people.

• 35:55Speaker 02

  The NBA powers that be, they would embrace a certain kind of hip hop aesthetic, but they didn't want any of the criminal associations being, you know, in your face at a game.

• 36:11Speaker 01

  Allen Iverson was the embodiment of that version of hip hop aesthetic.

• 36:17Speaker 02

  And this is a guy who already had a criminal history.

• 36:20Speaker 01

  And soon Iverson's every move and word was suddenly a news story. Here's an example. At an infamous press conference right before the two thousand two season, he was asked about missing seventy sixers practices.

• 36:34Speaker 07

  Because we sitting here, I supposed to be the franchise player and we in here talking about practice. I mean, listen, we talking about practice.

• 36:42Speaker 01

  This clip has basically become a meme, and I remember what a big deal it was at the time. It makes Iverson seem spoiled and entitled. Why won't he just show up to practice? But if you have the context, it makes more sense. It's the season after he won the MVP and he's the best player in the league. And now, leading up to the next season, he's frustrated because he's being asked questions about practice, not about his performance.

• 37:10Speaker 07

  I know I supposed to be there. I know I supposed to lead by example. I know that. I'm not shoving it aside, you know, like it don't mean anything. But we talking about practice, man. What are we talking about?

• 37:21Speaker 01

  Even the reporters in the room seem aware of how ridiculous the question is.

• 37:26Speaker 07

  We talking about practice, man.

• 37:30Speaker 07

  We talking about practice.

• 37:32Speaker 01

  Iverson had gotten a reputation as a bad boy, a thug. The shadow of his high school conviction followed him because he refused to conform.

• 37:41Speaker 02

  And that pissed off a lot of people.

• 37:44Speaker 01

  David Stern and the NBA were getting frustrated with all the negative attention Allen Iverson, their MVP, was bringing to the league. He wasn't the professional corporate businessman type of player that they were used to marketing. And they worried the league was developing a bad image. And right on cue in two thousand four, something happened at a game that seemed to confirm their fears.

• 38:13Speaker 01

  In two thousand four, in a game between the Detroit Pistons and Indiana Pacers, a fight broke out between players and soon it spilled off the court and into the crowd.

• 38:32Speaker 01

  Players and fans were squaring up and throwing punches. It was bad.

• 38:42Speaker 01

  The brawl was called the malice at the palace. It became national news. Allen Iverson wasn't involved. He wasn't even there. And yet it seemed to confirm the narrative that the hip hop culture he introduced into the league, the clothes, tattoos, the attitude, was ruining the NBA.

• 39:01Speaker 02

  You know, it almost follows the same playbook as the nineteen seventies. Black criminality, you know, here they are wearing cornrows, they're wearing their durags. They look like they're straight out of a gang.

• 39:16Speaker 01

  NBA Commissioner David Stern saw this as much of an image problem as anything else. And before the two thousand five season, he instituted an official NBA business casual dress code.

• 39:27Speaker 02

  The list of things that were no longer allowed. It's basically everything that Allen Iverson ever wore to a game.

• 39:36Speaker 01

  Players could no longer wear sneakers.

• 39:38Speaker 02

  Durags.

• 39:39Speaker 01

  Sunglasses inside.

• 39:40Speaker 02

  Large chains.

• 39:41Speaker 01

  Baggy jeans.

• 39:43Speaker 02

  The Tims.

• 39:43Speaker 01

  Even T-shirts.

• 39:45Speaker 02

  It's all of the things that we.

• 39:47Speaker 01

  The average fan.

• 39:48Speaker 02

  Thought was like the coolest thing ever for a basketball player to embody. And David Stern was sort of saying, nope, we're done with that.

• 40:01Speaker 07

  It was tough on me because I understood that it was a shot at me.

• 40:08Speaker 01

  This is Allen Iverson from an interview with Slam Magazine's founder from a year ago.

• 40:13Speaker 07

  People just wanted to look like themselves. You know what I mean? They wanted to wear what they wanted to wear, opposed to what they thought they should wear because of the eras before us. You know, it was always suit and tie. And then once guys saw that I was doing it, it wasn't that they were copying me. It was like, oh, oh, you can do this? You know what I mean? And guys just started dressing the way they wanted to dress. You know what I mean? But it was more on the hip hop side, like to where it was baggy clothes and chains and earrings and watches. And I guess David Stern was like, no.

• 40:46Speaker 01

  The dress code was seen as a direct response to the impact Allen Iverson had on the league. But Allen Iverson didn't always follow it. Neither did some of his teammates. They racked up thousands of dollars of fines for violations. And none of this helped Allen Iverson's reputation. He continued to be seen as a troublemaker. And that perception, as well as mounting injuries, hurt his place in the league. Just five years after his MVP season, he was traded to the Denver Nuggets. He bounced around to two other teams and by two thousand ten, he was out of the NBA.

• 41:27Speaker 01

  The NBA had banned the clothes he wore, but the one thing they couldn't ban was the sleeve. It was a medical item, not fashion, but it soon became fashion. It became a representation of the way Iverson changed the game and the culture in the NBA. And it's the part of his brand that is still around. Watch an NBA game on any given night and you'll see that half the players on the court are wearing elbow compression sleeves, that most of them don't even need for medical reasons. And the market for elbow compression sleeves is now estimated to be over five hundred million dollars. Companies extracted the one thing about Allen Iverson that wasn't overtly dangerous to the status quo

• 42:11Speaker 01

  and made a lot of money off it. But ultimately, what the sleeve symbolizes, to me at least, is Iverson's rebellion and how his ferocious sense of independence resonates even with players today who were just babies when he retired.

• 42:31Speaker 02

  There's so many players who style themselves, both in terms of how they play, on the court and also off the court, in the kind of legacy of Allen Iverson.

• 42:44Speaker 07

  Fast forward to now, I feel good about it because you see everybody else.

• 42:50Speaker 01

  Expressing themselves the way they want to. They feel good when they come into work.

• 42:56Roman Mars?

  Iverson is right to be proud of the impact he had on his workplace. Before NBA games today, there's this tradition where players are shown on TV walking into the stadium through a tunnel. Their fashion choices have turned this into a runway. Players sometimes show up wearing bright red overalls or an outrageously oversized pink sweater that looks like it belongs on a runway in Milan or Paris. This tradition emerged as its own way of resisting the NBA dress code. Just like Allen Iverson, players fought back by being authentic, by being themselves.

• 43:37Speaker 05

  The dress code was you could wear jeans, just wear a pair of shoes and a shirt with a collar. But our players went over the top.

• 43:48Roman Mars?

  This is David Stern from a 2019 interview reflecting on the impacts of the dress code.

• 43:53Speaker 05

  Did you find it offensive that some people thought it was racist? Well, no, because race is always an issue. And the NBA has always been on the edge of discussions of race.

• 44:07Roman Mars?

  David Stern passed away in 2020. Many of the players that wear a compression sleeve today probably don't even know its history or its connection to Allen Iverson. But every time they pull that sleeve up over their arm, they are carrying on a legacy. A legacy that reminds us of the ongoing tensions between race, respectability politics, and capitalism. It shows that Black American culture cannot be controlled or regulated, that no matter how many rules the NBA put into place, self-expression found a way.

• 44:54Roman Mars?

  Ramtin Arablouei is a producer, reporter, sound designer, and composer. He is a co-founder of the Peabody Award-winning show Throughline. Today, he's still making audio stories and finishing an immersive exhibit on the history of human vision that premieres in Las Vegas in September.

• 45:28Roman Mars?

  A History of the United States in 100 Objects is a production of 99% Invisible and BBC Studios. It's hosted and curated by me, Roman Mars. This episode was produced by Ramtin Arablouei, who also composed music for this story. Our series producers are Priscilla Alabie, Brenna Daldorf, and Ellie Lightfoot. This series was edited by Annie Brown and Courtney Harrell. Mixing by Iver Manley. Fact checking by Amy Bracken. Our theme song is by Swan Real. From 99% Invisible, our executive producer is Kathy Tu. From BBC Studios, our executive producers are Annie Brown and Courtney Harrell. Our production coordinator is Shan Pelé.

• 46:11Roman Mars?

  And the production manager is Mabel Finnegan Wright. Artwork by Stefan Lawrence. 99% Invisible is part of the SiriusXM Podcasts family headquartered in beautiful, uptown Oakland, California. And BBC Studios is headquartered in beautiful, white city, West London. If you want to get in touch or have an object for us to consider, email us at [email protected].

• 46:56Roman Mars?

  This episode is presented by Air France. Air France Business Cabin offers comfort from start to finish. Enjoy priority check-in and boarding, followed by access to peaceful lounges. Onboard, savour menus created by renowned French chefs paired with wines and champagne selected by sommelier. Stay connected with free high-speed Wi-Fi. Then unwind in a fully adjustable lie-flat bed with a mattress topper developed with Sofitel My Bed, a signature touch of French hospitality. The art of travel elevated. Because Air France Business Cabin goes further in every detail to make your journey exceptional.

• 47:36Speaker 07

  It starts with a handshake. A word becomes an agreement. An agreement becomes a contract. A contract becomes bound by law. Today, Harvey, the AI platform designed specifically for legal work, is powering that next step. More than 200,000 lawyers and 80% of the Am Law 100 are building with Harvey, accelerating review, sharpening negotiations, and more. Harvey. Learn more at harvey.ai. Harvey does not provide legal advice. Users should always independently review and verify any output from Harvey.

• 48:06Speaker 04

  This podcast is supported by Nurtac ODT, Remedy Pant. We know you didn't ask for an interruption, but migraine doesn't wait for the right moment to interrupt either. It just barges in, takes your time, and throws everything off. So when migraine takes your time, take Nurtac. It's for the acute treatment of migraine with or without aura in adults. Nurtac can provide pain relief in two hours, which can last up to two days. Ask your healthcare provider if Nurtac is right for you, because your time is for you, not migraine. Don't take if allergic to Nurtac ODT. Allergic reactions can occur even days after use. Get help right away for trouble breathing, rash, swelling of face, mouth, tongue, or throat. High blood pressure and Raynaud's syndrome can occur. Get help for high blood pressure, numbness, coolness, pain,

• 48:50Speaker 04

  or color changes in fingers and toes. Common side effect is nausea. For full prescribing information, call 1-833-4-NUR-TAC or visit nurtec.com. All right, back to your podcast, playlist, or whatever's keeping you going today.