The NBA has never officially acknowledged that Los Angeles Lakers legend and Basketball Hall of Famer Jerry West was the inspiration for the league's logo that has been used since 1969. The designer of the logo Alan Siegel has said that West is indeed the NBA Logo, per LA Times.

"They want to institutionalize it rather than individualize it. It's become such a ubiquitous, classic symbol and focal point of their identity and their licensing program that they don't necessarily want to identify it with one player," Siegel said on why the NBA don't want to acknowledge "Mr Clutch."

In an interview with Huffington Post, the 77-year-old legend was asked who he thinks would be on the NBA logo if the league decides to change it. "I hate to say it's not a Laker, but Michael Jordan. He's been the greatest player I've ever seen," West answered.

"And I'm probably a harsh judge of talent in the sense that I admire players that are really good defensive players and really good offensive players. And I felt that at his time in the game, he was the best defensive player in the game, but more importantly he was the best offensive player. And he made his teams win," he added.

The 1969 Finals MVP is not wrong in the sense that MJ is the greatest basketball player of all time. He has won six NBA championships, six Finals MVPs and five MVP awards to go along with 32, 292 points and nine defensive team honors as well as the 1988 Defensive Player of the Year trophy, per Basketball-Reference.com.

"His Airness" is currently on a different logo, as The Jumpman is owned by Nike for its Jordan Brand and used for any Michael Jordan-related merchandise. Tinker Hatfield designed the logo for Nike but was made before Jordan even laced up a pair of Nikes, as reported by Nice Kicks.

The report noted that during the preparation for the 1984 Olympic Games, MJ did a photoshoot while wearing a pair of Converse doing The Jumpman pose for LIFE Magazine. It was later in 1985 that MJ did the pose in a pair of Nikes to promote the Air Jordan 1.

"I wasn't even dunking on that one. People think that I was. I just stood on the floor, jumped up and spread my legs and they took the picture. I wasn't even running. Everyone thought I did that by running and taking off. Actually, it was a ballet move where I jumped up and spread my legs. And I was holding the ball in my left hand," Jordan said on a 1997 HOOP Magazine interview about his logo as quoted by NBA.com.