The basketball is rolling towards a lone man standing on a playground court. When it reaches him, he catches it, flips it up with his foot like a soccer ball, dribbles it between his knees in one motion, and sprints. As the sound of jet engines fades in, the camera changes to slow motion.
The Sneaker King of the Past and Future – Houston Texans Football Team Air Jordan 13 Shoes
He’s in the air with his left arm outstretched in seconds, and he’s at cruising altitude. We’re looking up into the sky in the next frame as he slams the ball through the rim. “Who says man wasn’t designed to fly?” he wonders in a voice-over that appears to be speaking directly from the heavens, with only clouds on the screen.
This was how Nike delivered Michael Jordan’s narrative to the six cities where his signature shoe was first released in April 1985. The campaign wasn’t groundbreaking on its own—Jordan wasn’t the first athlete or even basketball player to have his own sneaker, and Nike had previously established a name for its advertisements—but when you consider the stakes and what would follow, it was revolutionary.
The corporation was yearning for a success story in 1984. Nike was losing market share to Reebok, which had blown past its rival as sales of trainers surpassed those of running shoes. The situation was so dire that Nike chairman and CEO Phil Knight began his annual letter to shareholders with a dystopian assessment of the company’s plight: “Orwell was right: 1984 was a challenging year.”
However, there was one bright spot: that summer, Nike signed Michael Jordan, a rookie, to the most lucrative footwear deal in history. It was a gamble. The five-year, $2.5 million deal featured a buyout clause if the inexperienced athlete didn’t meet certain performance goals within the first three years—he had to win Rookie of the Year, become an All-Star, or average 20 points per game—but it had the potential to pay off massively. All Nike needed was a product that was worth the cost.
Peter Moore, the principal designer, came up with something that did all of that and more. The very first Air Jordan is a gorgeous pair of shoes. It’s high-cut and made of fine leather, and unlike most basketball shoes of the era, its distinct components allow for unique colour blocking—a feature that was previously only available in running shoes.
The swoosh is prominent, and the now-famous original Air Jordan emblem, which Moore allegedly fashioned after a set of plastic pilot wings, is towards the top. The shoes were timeless and futuristic at the same time; the New York Times described them as “spacebootlike” in 1986.
Before the Jordans, NBA legends like Walt Frazier and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar had distinctive shoes, but none had been created with such care, according to Elizabeth Semmelhack, the creative director of the Bata Shoe Museum in Toronto and author of two books on sneaker culture.
David Falk, MJ’s agent at the time, and Nike vice president Rob Strasser had requested a sneaker with appeal beyond the basketball court. Moore’s invention was successful. “Obviously, it had to function well for Michael Jordan,” Semmelhack adds, “but I believe it was built with an eye towards fashion or aesthetics in a way that many other sneakers were not.”
Russ Bengtson, a former Complex editor who was 14 when the AJ1 was released, vividly recalls the hoopla. Michael was the most exciting player to join the league in years, an instant All-Star with a gravity-defying, dazzling flair who was assisting the league in going worldwide at a time when it wasn’t easy. Bengtson isn’t sure if he was first aware of the player or the footwear.
“Did I know who Michael Jordan was before I heard about Air Jordan, or did it happen the other way around?” “It’s a chicken-and-egg situation,” adds Bengtson, who continues to cover MJ for the After the Last Dance podcast. Only 100,000 units of the $65 shoe were expected to be sold in the first year, according to Nike.
Instead, 1.5 million were shipped in the first six weeks. “If Air Jordan had failed, you’d be looking at an altogether different shoe environment right now,” Bengtson says. But the gamble paid off: the AJ1s set a new benchmark for sneaker fashion and, a few years later, found a second life as a skate shoe.
Some details about our product – Houston Texans Football Team Air Jordan 13 Shoes
KEY FEATURES:
- It’s meant to help you get the most out of your activities by being light and responsive.
- Christmas, birthdays, celebrations, and housewarming gifts are all possibilities.
PRODUCT INFORMATION:
- 100% unique leather for maximum comfort: warm but light.
- The sole is made of a slip-resistant rubber that is ideal for running and other activities.
- PRINTING TECHNIQUES: Dye-sublimation printing
- WASHABLE: Gently clean the shoes by hand with warm water and non-foaming soap. After cleaning the shoes, gently wipe them with dry cloths.
- TIME TO COMPLETE: 9-12 BUSINESS DAYS
NOTE: Houston Texans Football Team Air Jordan 13 Shoes
- Because the size is manually measured, please allow for a 1-3 cm fluctuation in dimension.
- The actual colour of the item may differ somewhat from the visual depictions due to differences in monitors and lighting effects.
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