BrandBlack might be new but they are not slowing down.
Their J. Crossover model was a really nice on-court performer with one glaring drawback… ventilation was nonexistent. They look to change all that in a bold way with these new knitted uppers. Yes, we’ve seen this upper done on the Kobe 9 Elite but these will do what they didn’t, feature a knitted upper without plastic backing it.
According to CounterKicks, these will release after or around the 2015 All-Star Game and I’m pretty excited to see the finished product. I do wish the midsole and outsole was redesigned but since the upper was heavily tweaked, I can look past it and hope that the 3rd model is a completely fresh new take.
Take a look at some Samples below and let us know what you think.
Via CK
They’re using the previous outsole
Is that bad
Bold, was thinking about the first raptors but with all this change coming seems worth it to wait
white and red ones are looking fly
No doubt. I was thinkin the same thing. Gotta have that pair
these are SICK. can’t imagine how dirty they would get though….
what is that hole on the forefoot for?
Not sure if that hole is supposed to be on the production models, it seems a bit big. I will say though, that Asics basketball shoes have small holes in the outsoles of their performance model shoes as a part of their ‘magic ventilation’ system. Not sure if all their shoes use it, but the ones I have of theirs all have small holes in the outsole for ventilation. I’d never seen that before, so not sure if they are the first to use it?
My Peak McGee II’s also had a hole in the middle of the outsole where their foothold mid foot shank is. They called it a ventilation channel that was supposed to aid ventilation. I only wore them to ball in twice. Not sure it did much. Very underrated ball shoe though.
This is most likely to mark them as prototypes/samples.
That makes sense, as I would think that the hole is too big for any functional reason.
This is awesome. Can’t wait…
Loving the raptor lo so I’m happy the same midsole/outsole will be used. Really curious how that knit forefoot portion will hold up.
These actually look pretty dope, looks like they finally added some ventilation to the sneaker, I might actually get these.
I’d be pissed if I got my hands on the last shoe far as the mid-sole goes, but I didn’t so I’m not. I’ll indeed give these a try. Maybe they’ll be cheaper since it’s not all leather too! Who knows.
Where can you get these?
High quality looking for sure.